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Big-Car Sales Booming In State
by a Financial Timet Writer
All around North Carolina automobile
showrooms are filled with smiling faces as the
long, dry spell in car sales seems to be over.
The reports from major markets around the
state are almost uniformly optimistic. Sales
are brisk and consistent. The trend in what
kinds of cars are being sold is a bit supris
ing—the full-sized, gas guzzlers are going as
fast as deaim's can get them.
One of the reasons for this development,
dealers agree, is that 1976 is the last year the
full-sized American dream boat car will be
available in large numbers.
Government pressure and an almost
certain rise in retail fuel prices have forced the
major auto companies to retool their
production to smaller, more economical
versions of their long-bodied, heavily powered
models.
Chrysler will be the only holdout against
that trend.
Says Pat Patterson of Charlie Wiygul Ford
in Raleigh: “People are aware that this may be
the last year they can get the full-sized
automobile. So they’re buying them up, just
like they did the small ones back during the
first days of the energy crisis.”
Patterson added that small cars are still
selling well but that his agency—the largest
Ford dealer in Eastern North Carolina—had
only 12 Lips in stock. That, he said, “is
almost nothing when compared to our overall
inventory.”
Greensboro dealers are ecstatic over the
volume of business they've done in the past
few quarters. The Piedmont Triad has been
very bullish lately in it§ automobile buying.
“Car sales are up tremendously,” said Bob
Lafster, sales manager for Tal Williams
Chevrolet. “We’re doing twice as much
business as last year, and could be doing three
of four times that it we had the inventory.
Intermediates are best and large cars next.”
Ken Williams, sales manager of Black
Cadillac-Olds in Greesboro, said last month’s
sales set a record. Cutlass Supreme was the
No. 1 seller in the nation for domestics and
Cadillaes and Olds 98s and 88s were also doing
well, he said.
At City Motors in Greensboro, AMC sales
manager Dewey Navey reports sales are up
25% over last year’s comparable period.
Pacers and Gremlins are fast items.
It's impossible to get enough Jeeps,” Navey
said. “Four-wheel, off-the-road cars are in
great demand as recreational vehicles.”
Said Mark Cooke, sales manager for Green
Ford in Greensboro, “Our biggest demand is
for the Granada. It’s got ample room and gets
Greensboro Dealer
Sets Sales Record
GREENSBORO—WhiIe large and inter
mediate cars have been the big guns among
new car dealers lately, a dealer named Garson
Rice zipped his little Toyotas to a national
sales record.
Rice sold 550 cars during May, 401 of them
new Toyotas, to set a new record for Toyota
dealers outside of Japan. He put on a $75,000
advertising campaign, mainly on television.
So impressive was Rice’s performance that
I. Makino, president of Toyota Motor Sales,
USA, and some of his top executives came to
Greensboro for a victory celebration last
Thursday night. Toyota distributors were
there, too.
Rice’s campaign was part of one involving all
Toyota dealers in the Southeast, who sold
ISfOOO of the little imports.
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The Carolina Financial Times
good gas mileage. There’s heavy demand for
LTDs, but everything in the whole line is
moving today, down to Pintos and Mavericks.
Trucks and vans are booming. Right now I
could use 1,000 more than I have.”
Harry Creekmuir of Gate City Motors in
Greensboro said his full line of Chrysler-
Plymouths are “almost double what they were
a year ago. Cordoba is going well and so is
Volare. There’s been a 25% jump in New
Yorkers, our biggest car.”
In Fayetteville, where a large military
installation insures a steady market for new
car dealers, Royal Dodge reports that
compacts and Chargers are doing well, but
that full-sized automobiles are only “holding
their own.”
Jim Farnsworth of Royal's sales department
said that the Aspen model, introduced this
year is selling exceptionally well. He added,
however, that his sales force is not happy with
the way the big cars are going and they have
been reduced in inventory.
‘The Charger and the Cordoba are going
well," he said, “but they always have. At any
rate, this year is so much better than last that
it isn’t funny.”
In Charlotte, Dave Ellison of Borough
Lincoln said the trend in large-car buying is
“absolutely true. The small-car market is
dying, and the large-car market is alive and
very well."
Said Ellison, “I think that people have more
faith in the economy, and they ire willing to
but and invest in a large, comfortable car.
They are adjusted to the higher prices in
gasoline now. I think people have just become
used to being in a comfortable car and they
want one.”
Ellison said his company is selling its
Marquis model and Cougars and “we can’t
International Trade Seen
As Key To World Economy
[Editor’s note: The following is a global
economic forecast prepared by Bank of
America]
SAN FRANCISCO—WhiIe all signs point to
continued global economic improvement in
1976 and 1977, the key to abiding recovery is
solid and steady growth in international trade,
according to Bank of America.
In its Economic Outlook 1976: Global
Report, the bank said expansion of world
trade relies on less developed countries
bringing their debts under control, and all
countries minimizing their trade barriers,
particularly import restrictions.
Import controls and the threat of retaliatory
trade action are in conflict with necessary
international trade expansion and economic
recovery, the bank’s economists said.
“Once nations become aware of this
inconsistency, we can expect them to
cooperate in resolving balance of payments
difficulties in a mutually satisfactory manner,”
the report said.
According to the report, there is good
reason to believe that international trade and
commerce are headed for a period of sustained
expansion, “although hard bargaining lies
ahead.”
The bank's economists expect real economic
growth in the non-Communist world to reach
about 5% in 1976, while the inflation rate
declines, averaging less than 10%.
Though the United States will lead world
growth rates in 1976—expanding by more
keep the Lincolns or Mark IVs on the lot.
“When our customers come in, they’re just
hungry for big cars. The small models just
aren’t selling at all.”
Johnny Farabee of Town and Country
Ford’s financial operations division in
Charlotte said the big cars are “selling much
better than before,” and added that “the
smaller models are still going well, too.
“I think money’s getting a little more
plentiful, and people don’t want to drive these
little two-bit cars.”
Although business is good overall, said
Farabee (450 cars sold last month), “it still
isn’t as good as it was five years ago.”
Patterson, of Charlie Wiygul Ford, waxed
philosophical about the trend in car buying.
“It seems that there's been a complete
turnabout from the rush to buy small cars to
the demand for big ones," he said.
“But I do think this. People have been lulled
into thinking that the energy crisis is over. I
feel, and this is my personal opinion, that we
are in the eye of the storm. We’ve come
through one side, and we’re going to have to
go through the other somewhere down the
road.
“Gasoline is beginning to climb and I won’t
be surprised if it doesn’t reach 75 cents per
gallon within the next year. This is something
the Europeans have been living with for years
and that’s why they drive small, economical
cars.”
Ford, he said, will go to the scaled-down
version of its full-size models in 1977. He said
this is the last year that the Thunderbird will
be a large automobile.
“The day of the big car, whether we want it
or not, is over,” h$ said. “And with the way
energy sources are going, maybee it’s just as
well.”
than 6%—it will drop to about 5% next year,
“a sustainable rate for long-term growth,” the
economists said.
Global recovery will gain momentum toward
the end of 1976 and continue at more than 5%
in 1977, while inflation drops below 9% by
1977, the bank said.
The economists said the economic growth in
the United States is solidly based, and that the
short-run economic outlook for the country is
good.
The real gross national product in the
United States is expected to grow at an annual
rate of more than 6% in 1976, dropping
slightly in 1977, according to the report. Price
increases, moderate so far this year, will begin
to rise by the end of the year because of
increases in raw material, food and energy
costs.
Although unemployment will proceed at the
very high annual rate of 7.4% this year, it will
fall to 6.8% in 1977, and could well drop to 6%
by the end of next year.
The report also makes these observations on
the American economy:
—Although the fear of a downturn has
caused many corporate managers to postpone
investment decisions, the probabilities of a
boom-bust scenario are diminished as long as
confidence in the economy returns slowly and
speculation is avoided.
—While the 1976 balance of trade is
expected to shift from last year’s $9 billion
surplus to a $3.9 billion deficit because of U.S.
(Continued on page 9]
June 14, 1976