According to Automotive News, George Pipas, Ford’s sales analyst, told a group of reporters this week that the automaker isn’t particularly concerned about the Chevrolet Camaro outselling the Mustang this year for the first time since 1985.
“If that was important, we wouldn’t have taken a shift off at Flat Rock,” the Auto Alliance assembly plant where Mustangs are built. At the end of the November reporting period, Ford had sold 68,264 Mustangs. Chevrolet sold 75,685 Camaros.
Mustang sales have never fully recovered from the pre-Lehman Brothers era, when 10,000 to 12,000 monthly sales numbers were commonplace. Ford sold 4,093 Mustangs in November, a 12.8% increase over the same month in 2009.
The overall automotive market fell from an annual sales rate of about 16 million to around 10.7 million after the financial institution’s bankruptcy. Now recovering, Pipas said the current run rate suggests a 12 million unit market, possibly approaching 13 million in 2011.

