Genesis sales jump with more dealers

[YEH]

Automotive News
Laurence Iliff

LOS ANGELES — Genesis is finally seeing light at the end of the tunnel after its efforts to establish a dealer body separate from corporate parent Hyundai — and sales are soaring, a top executive said.
In the U.S., 318 Genesis dealers are open and selling cars after months of working through the paperwork and other regulatory hurdles to get their dealer licenses, Genesis Motor America COO Erwin Raphael said.

"We think that number might top out at 340, but the remaining 22 or so tend to be in very, very small markets, so we don't see them as impacting the overall volume," Raphael told Automotive News.

Leading the sales recovery is the G70 compact sedan launched late last year. While Genesis sold just 408 of the award-winning sports sedans in the fourth quarter, U.S. deliveries rose to 2,231 in the first quarter of 2019.
Raphael expects them to be at least 60 percent higher than that in the current quarter.

Overall sales for Genesis were 4,202 in the first quarter, down 3.7 percent from a year earlier, when there were just two nameplates, according to the Automotive News Data Center. But through May, the brand's sales were up 26 percent, to 8,120.

Genesis sales jump with more dealers

Genesis is finally seeing light at the end of the tunnel after its efforts to establish a dealer body that's separate from the Hyundai brand's.

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To expand its lineup, Genesis will have its three-row crossover, which is about the size of the BMW X5, on sale next summer, followed by a compact crossover based on the G70 platform, Raphael said.

"We're focused on those two right now," he said. "We think there is a market for something smaller. We think there is a market for something larger, but we're not necessarily going to go into every market that's out there."

The something smaller would be the GV60; for the something larger, think Genesis will wait and see how things go before they do a CUV equivalent of the G90.

The flagship segment is the toughest for Genesis, a new entrant, to gain traction in, but at the same time, may be an opportunity for Genesis as none of the Japanese lux brands have a proper flagship CUV (and for that matter, Audi doesn't have a GLS/X7 competitor).

Based on what was stated in an Australian pub, seems like we'll be seeing at least 2 BEV models - 1 being a CUV (possibly a BEV variant of the GV70 or an entirely separate/distinct model).

And the people over at Genesis are pushing for production of the Mint concept.

So, we may very see a 10 model Genesis line-up by the mid-way point of the next decade.