SUV/CUV Loyalty Reaches Record Levels

SUV/CUV loyalty among consumers grew in 2017, according to an IHS Markit report. This rise in loyalty among utility vehicles, however, is coming at the expense of other vehicle segments.

IHS Markit analyzed 17.1 million new vehicle registrations from 2017 and found that 66.9% of consumers that returned to market who previously owned a utility vehicle purchased another utility vehicle. This percentage, IHS Markit noted, marked a record high for the segment and was a 2.5% increase from the same time last year, and a 12.6% increase compared to 2012.

Similarly, pickup loyalty in 2017 was also up. Of those same vehicle registrations analyzed, 50.6% of people with a pickup in their garage purchased another pickup, an increase of 8.1% from 2012.

Sedan loyalty, on the other hand, has fallen, as 47.7% of sedan owners purchased another sedan in 2017, down 8.5% since 2012, representing the steepest decline among all vehicle segments.

“As households have moved to sport utilities and pickups at the expense of other categories, all car body styles have lost market share, and sedans are down more than 10 percentage points over the past five years,” the report noted. “The combined share of the four lower-volume car body styles (hatchback, coupe, station wagon and convertible) has dropped more than three points to just 8.2%, which suggests that, combined, these four categories now account for less than one of every 10 new vehicles registered.”