Whither Autos?

As usual at this time of year, the key to much of 1960's economic health lies hidden in a vital question: How big a year will it be for autos? Automen traditionally make a brave try at guessing the answer on the basis of the latest sales, which rose 10.7% in January over last year. But this year the significance of the figures has been clouded by the carryover effects of the steel strike and the first full model year for the compacts. Last week Detroit cut back auto production, but that only thickened the clouds; automen blamed much of the cutback on parts shortages, weather and changeovers in production.

"We're just floating in a sea of figures that we don't know how to interpret," said a top Ford executive. "If you take January and seasonally adjust it, it looks like a 6,500,000 year, including imports. But if you figure that part of January's total is a carryover from November and December, it looks like a 6,100,000-car year, not too different from 1959." Chevrolet Boss Ed Cole, setting out with a phalanx of salesmen on a two-week tour to stir up dealers, quickly made his choice. Said he: "1960 promises to be one of the best selling years in history, and a record breaker for Chevrolet. We expect Chevrolet dealers to sell about 1,500,000 conventional passenger cars, 300,000 Corvairs and 365,000 trucks. Such an achievement would represent an alltime sales record for Chevrolet."

In the cloudy market picture, one thing is clear: the compacts are still setting the sales pace. Ford and Chrysler are trimming production schedules on their standard cars to step up production of compacts, and American Motors added a third shift, is producing round the clock. The shortage of compacts is slowly beginning to ease, but many dealers are still crying for more compacts, especially on the West and East coasts. Rambler led the January compact-sales parade with 35,000 cars, followed by Ford's Falcon (32,000), Chevrolet's Corvair (19,000), Studebak-er's Lark (9,100) and Chrysler's Valiant (8,200). In overall sales, Chevrolet pulled ahead of the field with 122,000 cars, v Ford's 113,000. Many foreign cars were already feeling the competition, and imports, though still big, were down more than 20% since last June.

Though Detroit is confused, it still expects the spring upturn that appeared last year after an absence of three years. Said the Morgan Guaranty Trust Co.: "The disappointment in January may mean a somewhat slower pace of assemblies for the first quarter than had previously been planned. But it does not mean that the automobile market has suddenly turned soft. It is still better than it was in December, and better than it was a year ago."

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