Men Prefer Flashy or Brawny Vehicles; Women Prefer Import Brands and Smaller Vehicles According to TrueCar.com Study

SANTA MONICA, Calif., April 23, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- TrueCar.com, the authoritative voice in new car pricing and industry trend information, has released its third annual demographic study based on car-buying behavior in 2011, examining gender differences in auto buying. TrueCar.com's study was based on over nine million retail purchases in 2011.

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"While gender preferences amongst the buyers of various automotive brands still exist, the gap is narrowing," said Jesse Toprak, Vice President of Market Intelligence at TrueCar.com. "The SUV and truck heavy mix of the domestic automakers continue to generate a disproportionate number of male customers, while the exotic brands remain to be the best medicine for a midlife crisis."

Some of the key findings of the TrueCar.com study include:

• The brand with the highest percentage of retail sales to females in 2011 continues to be MINI (46.2 percent), followed by Nissan (45.7 percent), and Kia (45.6 percent) compared to 2010 when MINI (47.9 percent) came in first, followed by Kia and Honda respectively (46.8 percent and 46.0 percent).  There were fourteen brands with a female ratio over 40 percent in 2011 and newcomer FIAT landed at 41.9 percent.
• Males continue to be the majority of exotic new car buyers but in 2011, there was only one exotic brand with 10 percent or less retail sales to women, Ferrari (7.5 percent), compared to 2010 when there were six brands.
• Sixteen of the top 20 brands in 2011 with the highest percentage of female buyers were import brands, while domestic brand FIAT landed at 12. Chrysler, Buick and Jeep bottomed out the list at 18-20. Only three luxury brands made the top 20, with Lexus (44.2 percent) being the only luxury brand over 40 percent.
• Thirteen of the top 20 brands in 2011 with the highest percentage of male buyers were either exotic or luxury brands. When including luxury brands, nine of the top 20 were domestic. GMC and Dodge brands both had over 70% new car male buyers in 2011.
• The new Volkswagen Beetle, introduced in 2011, had a higher percentage of male buyers in 2011, with 45.4 percent of buyers being male. In 2010, the Volkswagen New Beetle had only 39.4 percent of male buyers.

"Female car buyers really gravitated toward smaller, more fuel-efficient cars and crossovers," said Kristen Andersson, Senior Analyst at TrueCar.com. "It was the complete opposite for male buyers, who preferred either a fast and sporty vehicle with distinctive curb appeal or a big vehicle, like a large truck or SUV."

TrueCar.com also examined the most current market prices and listed discounts for all of the brands and specific models that were tracked with over 1,000 vehicle sales annually.  Below are the top ten brands with the highest male and female purchase ratios and their current discount percentages:

Below are the top ten models that had the highest percentage of male and female buyers (minimum 1,000 retail sales) and their current market discounts from MSRP:

For more information, visit the TrueCar Blog where the top 20 tables are available. For more information about TrueCar, please visit www.truecar.com.  You can follow TrueCar on Twitter (@TrueCar) and become a fan of TrueCar on Facebook and Google+.

About TrueCar, Inc.
TrueCar, Inc. is an online automotive information and communications platform focused on creating a better car buying experience for dealers and consumers.  Consumers want a hassle-free car buying experience and dealers want high-quality sales velocity.  TrueCar helps achieve these goals by providing unbiased market information on new car transactions and by supplying an online communications platform through which dealers and consumers can communicate with each other.  TrueCar's market-based information provides both consumers and dealers with an accurate and comprehensive understanding of what others actually paid recently for similar vehicles, both locally and nationally.  TrueCar's communications platform then allows informed, ready-to-buy consumers to communicate directly with participating dealers.  Some of the nation's largest and most well respected membership and service organizations rely on websites powered by TrueCar to help educate their members and customers who are in the automotive market.  TrueCar is headquartered in Santa Monica, CA, and has offices in San Francisco, CA, and Austin, TX.  After experiencing dramatic growth since 2006, TrueCar is developing a suite of products and services centered on radical clarity through the comprehensive analysis of market data and information.  TrueCar's participating dealer partners have sold over 500,000 new vehicles to TrueCar users nationwide.

Disclaimer
This press release and the information contained herein is for noncommercial use on "as-is, as available" basis and may be used for informational purposes only.  TrueCar makes no representations or warranties, express or implied, with respect to the information contained in this press release and the results of the use of such information, including but not limited to implied warranty of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement.  The information contained in this press release may include technical inaccuracies or typographical errors.  Neither TrueCar nor any of its parents, subsidiaries, affiliates or respective partners, officers, or directors, employees or agents shall be held liable for any damages, whether direct, incidental, indirect, special or consequential, including without limitation lost revenues or lost profits, arising from or in connection with your use or reliance on the information presented in this press release. 

SOURCE TrueCar.com