Cadillac ATS Eating Into CTS Sales

As we mentioned in our review of the October sales numbers, CTS sales are significantly down in the face of the new ATS and XTS. This certainly makes sense as Cadillac shoppers essentially had just the CTS to choose from for close to a year now and offering new sedans would certainly take some customers away from the CTS (either because those shoppers were looking for something slightly smaller or bigger or just newer than the current CTS). Automotive News, quoting some research data from Edmunds.com is suggesting that the ATS is largely to blame for the lower CTS sales. Of interest is that Cadillac is being smart about how they will play this lower demand. They plan to cut production of the CTS variants rather than continuing to build cars that don't have buyers and then having to discount them or put them in rental fleets. This is a good move as it preserves resale value and avoids cheapening the CTS or Cadillac brands. This should be temporary blip as a larger, more expensive CTS is due in 2013 as a 2014 model and will do to the BMW 5-Series and Mercedes E-Class exactly what Cadillac has done to the 3 and C with the new ATS. Time will tell if this new strategy works in the long term. Source: Automotive News