Workers are shown on the production line at the Toyota Motor Manufacturing Texas Inc. plant in San Antonio, where the company builds the full-size Tundra pickup and Sequoia SUV. Sales for the gas-powered Tundra fell 10.5% in March, while its hybrid counterpart broke a five-month consecutive streak of sales increases.
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Texas
Toyota Motor Corp.’s sales fell 8.5% in March, with sales of the San Antonio-made Tundra reporting a steeper drop.
Sales had been increasing during the first part of the quarter compared with the 2025 period, although February’s 3.2% growth was significantly slower than January’s 8.1% boost. But in March, Toyota reported that it sold 19,719 fewer vehicles compared with a year ago. Total sales for the month came in at 211,617 vehicles. The March decline weighed on first-quarter sales, which edged down 0.1% on a year-over-year basis.
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“March 2025 was an unusually strong month for the industry, driven in part by tariff-related news that accelerated consumer purchases and created a temporary spike in demand,” Toyota communications manager Derrick Brown said. “That created a particularly high comparison point for March 2026. Even so, first-quarter sales were essentially flat year over year — which we view as a strong result, given ongoing production constraints and lower vehicle availability as we continue to ramp up the new RAV4.”
Cox Automotive also pointed to the tariff-fueled surge in March 2025 sales in its projections for total U.S. new-vehicle sales.
FEBRUARY SALES: Toyota’s sales slow; San Antonio-made models helping drive growth
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It expects March new-vehicle sales to be down 14.2% on a year-over-year basis. Cox also pointed out that market conditions had changed, with uncertainty about the economy and affordability hampering sales.
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“Sales are no longer swinging wildly month to month, but growth is also harder to come by,” said Charlie Chesbrough, senior economist at Cox Automotive. “Affordability remains the central challenge for the industry.”
Gas prices have continued to rise as the war in Iran continues. Texans are shelling out 36% more to fill up their tanks, with gas prices as of Wednesday at $3.77 per gallon compared with $2.77 per gallon the year prior, according to AAA. Despite the uncertainty with the war in the Middle East, Cox Automotive said its full-year outlook of sales falling 2.6% to a total of 15.8 million hasn’t changed.
“After a year marked by policy-driven sales volatility, the new-vehicle market has settled into a slower rhythm in early 2026,” said Jeremy Robb, chief economist at Cox Automotive. “The pull-ahead demand created by last spring’s tariff announcements and, later, the loss of EV tax credits is now all firmly in the rearview mirror. While the stimulus of a good tax-return season is a positive, the new-vehicle market today is being shaped by higher vehicle prices, ongoing inflationary pressures, and still-elevated interest rates.”
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Sales for Toyota’s South Side-manufactured trucks declined in March, with its gas-powered Tundra tumbling 10.5%. It sold 10,679 pickups, 1,248 fewer trucks than in March 2025. Its first-quarter sales dropped 5.2%, selling 1,566 fewer trucks than in the year-ago period.
Its hybrid counterpart saw a similar downward trend, with sales falling 8.4%. The Japanese automaker sold 2,270 trucks compared with 2,478 in March 2025. The drop in sales for the hybrid Tundra breaks a five-month streak of consecutive increases for the San Antonio-made truck. Despite the March decline, sales for the first quarter were up 11.7% with 632 more hybrid pickups sold.
The electrified Sequoia kept up its streak of sales growth for a sixth consecutive month, selling 17% more of the hybrid SUV. This amounted to 2,218 SUVs sold compared with 1,896 in March 2025. But the pace is slowing. In February, sales jumped 23.9%; in January, they surged 37.3%. Its first-quarter sales reflected its strong sales streak, with a 25% increase and 1,275 more SUVs sold.
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Sales for electrified vehicles across the board increased compared with the month prior, when the segment saw only a slight increase of 0.9%. In March, sales of its electrified vehicles rose 2.5%, for a total of 115,422 vehicles sold compared with 112,609 in March 2025. But the weaker performance at the start of the year — January sales dropped 6.1% — weighed on its first quarter, with sales declining by 1,521 vehicles, or 0.5%.