The Ford F-Series will end 2015 as America’s best-selling truck line and the best-selling vehicle line overall.
end 2015 as America’s best-selling truck line and the best-selling vehicle line overall. Yes, there are two months remaining on the calendar, but there will be no unseating of the Ford, which built up a 137,400-unit leadover the second-ranked vehicle over the course of 2015’s first ten months.
The F-Series isn’t the only vehicle to secure its position at the front of its respective pack. These are the kinds of stories typically not published until the beginning of January, but we already know that the level of dominance enjoyed by certain nameplates is so high that they won’t – they can’t – be caught.
BEST-SELLING CAR
With five-sixths of 2015 complete, the Camry has outsold the next-best-selling car by 54,418 units. In other words, if Toyota stopped selling the Camry now, the Corolla, America’s second-best-selling car, would end 2015 as the top-ranked passenger car.
Toyota is not going to stop selling the Camry. This year will be the 14th consecutive year of Camry passenger car leadership in America.
BEST-SELLING SUV/CROSSOVER
Not since August of last year has the CR-V surrendered its best-selling crown on a monthly basis. The last time a competing utility vehicle outsold the CR-V over the course of a full calendar year was 2011, when the Ford Escape broke a four-year CR-V streak.
In 2015, the CR-V’s 7-percent year-over-year improvement through ten months produced 288,531 sales, 30,800 more than the Escape has managed through the end of October. The Escape will not outsell the CR-V by 15,400 units in each of the next two months. Therefore, 2015 will be the fourth consecutive year in which the CR-V is America’s top-selling utility vehicle.
BEST-SELLING THREE-ROW VEHICLE
Although the Explorer hasn’t been America’s best-selling SUV since 2006, it is easily America’s top-selling three-row vehicle, regardless of classification. The Toyota Highlander is 80,820 sales behind the Explorer heading into November. Even when combined, the Dodge Grand Caravan and Chrysler Town & Country minivans fall more than 60,000 sales shy of the Explorer’s tally with two months remaining on the calendar.
Year-over-year, Explorer sales jumped 20 percent to 210,894 units between January and October, meaning this is already the best Explorer sales year since 2005.
BEST-SELLING SMALL/MIDSIZE PICKUP TRUCK
Powered in large part by new GM alternatives, the small/midsize pickup truck segment has grown its market share in the overall pickup truck category from 11 percent in the first ten months of 2014 to 14 percent in the same period this year. But while much of the credit for the segment’s expansion is owed to the rather popular Colorado and Canyon, Toyota sold 148,905 Tacomas already this year, 53,773 more than the Colorado and Canyon combined.
Tacoma volume is up 17 percent so far this year aided by renewed interest in the category, a clear-out of MY2015 trucks, and now the introduction of 2016 models. This year will be the 11th consecutive year in which the Tacoma has outsold all other non-full-size pickup trucks.
BEST-SELLING COMMERCIAL VAN
The year will end as the first full year for Ford’s Euro-esque Transit van in America, but the ramp-up was rapid and the results were all-conquering. Transit volume climbed to 95,446 units in the first ten months of 2015, 27,024 sales ahead of the Chevrolet Express/GMC Savana tandem.
Between the Transit, E-Series, and smaller Transit Connect, Ford owns 53 percent of the commercial/cargo van marketin America in 2015.
BEST-SELLING PREMIUM BRAND CAR
Thankfully, BMW began issuing a breakdown of 3-Series and 4-Series sales halfway through the year. Yet even without its 4-Series offshoot contributing to its total, the 3-Series is still the most popular so-called luxury car in America. 3-Series volume is up eight percent in 2015 in a market that’s increasingly veering away from traditional passenger cars.
With 80,832 sales through October, the BMW 3-Series leads the surging Mercedes-Benz C-Class by an insurmountable 9,014-unit margin.
BEST-SELLING PREMIUM BRAND SUV/CROSSOVER
Despite a slow start, 2015 is turning out to be a terrific year for the Cadillac SRX, America’s second-best-selling luxury utility vehicle. On the flip side, 2015 isn’t such a great year for the Lexus RX, America’s top-selling luxury utility, because Lexus is transitioning from the third-gen to the fourth-gen and because some buyers are being lured away by Lexus’s new entry-level NX.
Nevertheless, RX sales – down 8 percent to 77,940 units so far this year – are 21,208 units stronger than the SRX’s year-to-date tally. The RX is responsible for 28 percent of Lexus sales in the U.S.
BEST-SELLING SPORTS CAR
“Sports car†is and always will be defined differently by different individuals. But of this there can be no doubt: the Ford Mustang is now more of a sports car than it’s ever been. Besides, we’re adopting loose borders for the definition for the sake of this section.
The Mustang was outsold by the Chevrolet Camaro in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014. But the Mustang was all-new for the 2015 model year. The new sixth-gen Camaro is only reaching customers now and sits 39,488 sales back of the Mustang’s 106,321-unit year-to-date tally.
These are the dominant ones, the vehicles which control the largest chunks of their respective categories; the cars and trucks and SUVs which have so thoroughly outsold their rivals in ten months that victory over twelve months is assured.
They’re not all equally dominant, however. The Ford F-Series hasn’t just outsold all other vehicles in each of the last four years, but outsold its two chief twin rivals from General Motors, combined. This year will be different. The Chevrolet Silverado/GMC Sierra duo leads the F-Series by an insurmountable 42,774-unit gap so far this year. Only GM’s admittedly successful branding exercise allows Dearborn to once again claim top spot.
Timothy Cain is the founder of GoodCarBadCar.net , which obsesses over the free and frequent publication of U.S. and Canadian auto sales figures. Follow on Twitter @goodcarbadcar  and on Facebook .