A big part of my job involves meetings. Meetings about what we can do to make our Web site better for all of you, meetings about what sort of content we should be creating, meetings about how we’ll cover the Turnpike bridges coming down and even meetings about our new health project.
But a strange thing happened Thursday; almost all my meetings were canceled. So I spent my day working with the Federal Cash for Clunkers database and looking at what vehicles were purchased in Lawrence and in other select communities in northeast Kansas.
First, let me say, the database does not seem to be exceedingly accurate. For example, according to the data, a 2000 Nissan Xterra with 1,257,367 miles on it was traded in for a 2009 Honda Civic at Jack Ellena Honda.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t doubt a 2000 Xterra was traded for a brand-new Civic. But more than one million miles in 10 years? Please. Typo!
And in another extreme, a 1984 Chevrolet C10 truck with just 15,586 miles, was traded for a 2009 Nissan Frontier at Briggs Nissan. Of course, it’s possible that a person bought this car 26 years ago and basically left it in the garage. Doubtful though that he or she would then trade it in as part of Cash for Clunkers.
Here are some other goodies, and even some graphs that I’ve already put together.
This first graph looks at the total number of miles on the cars taken off the street at each dealer in Lawrence. Keep in mind, that big, million mile Xterra turned in at Jack Ellena.
And this graph examines the MSRP of the all the new vehicles purchased as part of a Cash for Clunkers transaction in the state of Kansas. You can see millions of dollars in sales were generated at least in relation to this program.
Some other facts:
Of seven dealers in Lawrence that reported a total 306 sales in Cash for Clunkers transactions, here’s how many sales they each made:
And, what was the most popular car to be purchased as part of Cash for Clunkers in Lawrence? That would be a tie between Hyundai Accents (27/33 mpg) from Laird Noller and Honda Civics (24/31 mpg) from Jack Ellena. The data shows 18 of each sold, including one Civic Hybrid, which would get higher gas mileage.
Surprisingly, the data shows only two hybrids were sold as part of the program in Lawrence: the aforementioned Civic and a Ford Fusion.
I’ve got a lot more numbers that I’m still making sense of, but I want to know what you want to know. What’s the most interesting statistic for you, in terms of Cash for Clunkers. Is it how much in sales (at least at MSRP) that each dealer brought in? Or is it why the data is so inaccurate? Or is it a story about that million-mile Xterra? Let me know what you think. Or if you were one of the folks who traded in an old clunker for a slick new ride, I want to talk to you too.
Or, if you’ve got a good eye and some experience with databases, I’m making all of my Lawrence data available as a .csv file. If you see something interesting in there that I might have missed, post a comment here or drop me a note.
Look for more on this story in the next few days.
