USA 1972: Chevrolet Vega threatens VW Beetle
1971 Chevrolet Vega
While going through old issues of Wheels Magazine at the Sydney State Library I fell upon some info on the US car market in 1972: then the VW Beetle’s domination of the small car segment was being threatened by the new Chevrolet Vega… Despite fire-risk carburettor and exhaust problems necessitating the recall of 130,000 cars and sabotage on the assembly lines (!) the Vega topped 520,000 sales in the States only in 1972 with the formerly invisible class-leading VW Beetle reaching 560,000.
Please note this may not reflect the top of the ranking as it is only information about the small car segment. If you have more detailed information on the best-selling models in the US before 1974 please make sure to get in touch by commenting on this article!
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I have the complete collections of both Wheels and Modern Motor right here with me in Cairns. Issue one to this month of both.
Quite popular imported marques in the U.S.A in the 70´s were Volvo, Saab, Honda, Toyota, Datsun, Mazda, and Bmw. Fiat stand out and selling about 50.000 cars every year between 1970 and 1979 mainly 850 Spyder & Coupé, 124, 128, 124 Coupé, 124 Spyder, 131 ( Brava ), Ritmo ( Strada ) and Pininfarina Spyder. Lancia had also its glory days in the U.S. market with the Beta range and Montecarlo called there Scorpion because of the Chevrolet Montecarlo. Between 1975 and 1982( when Lancia pulled out of the american market ) the lancia Beta berlina sold about 3.100 examples, the Coupé sold about 11.000 examples. The Beta HPE about 1.600 the Spyder 2.100 and the Scorpion 2.500.