CR-V Trumping Civic? Not Without Fight

DETROIT – Honda’s CR-V looks poised to become its top-selling U.S. model.

Compact CUVs such as the CR-V are the hottest vehicle type in the market, and just 9,592 units separated the CR-V from the Civic in 2016 sales.

But a top Honda executive says don’t count out the compact car yet.

“(There’s) a very good possibility (the CR-V will be on top), but the Civic will have more bullets in the gun as well, so we’ll see,” John Mendel, executive vice president-American Honda tells WardsAuto in a recent interview.

While the CR-V was the No.1-selling CUV in the U.S. last year with 357,355 deliveries, the Civic held onto the title of Honda’s No.1-selling model with 366,927 sold.

Working in the Civic’s favor this year is the lineup’s continuing rollout, Mendel says.

Although the sedan debuted in late 2015, and the Civic coupe went on sale early last year, the Civic hatchback is just arriving at dealerships; this year the performance-oriented Civic Si and Type R launch.

Mendel says Honda has enough capacity to take Civic sales beyond the nearly 367,000 sold last year, should the forthcoming variants prove popular. “The 5-door is coming from the U.K., so we’re utilizing capacity there. We can flex around on 4-door/2-door (mix) and we can (lean on Japan for production) if we need to.”

But Honda also has increased CR-V output, and it is expecting big things for the fifth generation launching now.

The automaker now has three North American plants, in Ohio, Ontario and Indiana, assembling the model. However the latter plant, in the city of Greensburg, also assembles the Civic sedan, suggesting if both the CR-V and Civic are in demand Honda indeed may need to lean on Japanese plants for more units.

Of the 366,927 Civics sold in 2016, only 10,225 were imported, WardsAuto data shows.

American Honda is projecting another record sales year in the U.S. Last year, it surpassed its year-old record by selling 1.64 million vehicles.

“We have new product launches like CR-V and Civic (and) we have some (other) new products,” Mendel says. “We have (the) Odyssey (minivan) coming, so we think we can sell more than we did last year.”

Honda is expecting a flat U.S. light-vehicle industry as Mendel says, “Competition will increase, because everybody else has put installed capacity in and we’re all going to fight for share.”

Honda’s U.S. market share grew from 9.1% in 2015 to 9.4% last year. Mendel says Honda doesn’t pay much attention to market share and usually calls share gains “math” that sometimes works in the Japanese company’s favor.

[email protected]