The Chevy Impala, like many other cars nowadays, is being phased out from automaker’s production lines. Cars like the Chevy Impala aren’t selling as well as they used to since the interest shifted to SUVs, vans, electric cars, and trucks as the designated family vehicles.

However, when you look at the sales figures, the Impala still seems to do OK for a car that’s been discontinued. Especially when you compare it to other cars that are getting phased out as well. 

MotorCities breaks down the history of this long-running vehicle.

A brief look at the Chevy Impala

The Impala officially rolled off the Chevy assembly line in 1958 into the arms of many customers anticipating its debut. The original beauty had sweet, styling lines, dual headlights, and even the triple tail lights which were features unseen on a Chevy until the Impala came onto the scene. 

The first few years saw tons of sales for Chevy and those increased a while later when the Impala Sport Coupe design came out. To keep this car fresh for new buyers, Chevy would redesign some of the elements every few years or so. By 1965, the taillights transformed into round-shaped ones instead of the triple light design the original came with.

This Chevy car continued seeing sales for several more years after that. It wasn’t until 1986 that the car disappeared from the dealer’s lots. The Impala had shifted to their Caprice line. But it was only short-lived as it came back full-force in 1994 donning the SS logo along with it.

Chevy continued to reproduce this sedan until February 2020, when they officially discontinued it.  

Q1 2020 sales for the Chevy Impala

Despite knowing that the Impala is done getting produced, some customers still want to buy a brand-new version, at least for the very last time. But sales for the first quarter of 2020 didn’t see a lot of purchases.

The first quarter of 2019 saw 13,259 sales, according to an article on GM Authority’s website. Going into the new year, the Impala sales dropped about 63 percent and only had 4,965 purchases. Even in Canada, there was a drop of 89 percent of sales for the first quarter of 2020.

Full-size sedans saw the most sales in the Dodge Charger, followed by the Nissan Maxima. The Impala fell to the fourth place spot, just ahead of the Toyota Avalon. 

Is the shift from cars to SUVs and trucks to blame for the abysmal Q1 sales?

While it’s likely that the change in interest to the crossover, electric cars, SUVs, and trucks caused some decrease in car sales, it’s not the only factor. The fact that cars are slowly fading away from the production lines are a part of the problem as well, but not the only reason either.

You have to remember that 2020 is the year of an unfortunate pandemic of epic proportions. The beginning of this year brought with it a time of social distancing and quarantining. Most dealerships have had to do business online, and they had to take special precautions when setting up test drives and signing paperwork.

This hurt sales as more people endured financial hardship because of businesses closing and no way to earn income, except through unemployment. 

As our country is getting back on its feet, albeit slowly, sales will more than likely increase later on in the year. Whether or not the Chevy Impala sales pickup remains to be seen. But, so far, people still seem to be interested in the long-running sedan that’s been around since the late ’50s.