![\"Joe](\"https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/presto\/2019\/12\/10\/PDTN\/957eee5a-5a6e-4d4f-9479-4eedb4a41c0e-2019-1210-mo-Sedan132.JPG?width=540&height=&fit=bounds&auto=webp\")
<\/p>\n<\/div>Joe Busch, sales consultant at LaFontaine Hyundai in Dearborn, wipes the ice off of a 2020 Elantra SEL Tuesday. Hyundai saw sales of its compact car increase 102% this November over last year.\u00a0(Photo: Max Ortiz, The Detroit News)<\/span><\/p>\n Phoenix \u2014<\/em>\u00a0A year after Ford and Chevrolet\u00a0abandoned the compact-car segment to prioritize SUVs, buyers are abandoning those makes and shopping for cars made by\u00a0Hyundai, Toyota\u00a0and Honda.<\/p>\n Some 42% of Ford Focus and Chevy Cruze compact car owners have stayed in the compact car segment with a significant percentage buying competitors’ vehicles, according to an industry study by Edmunds that finds a deterioration of market share for the Detroit makes,\u00a0and a decline in brand loyalty.<\/p>\n Hyundai, for example, saw sales of its Elantra compact car increase 102% this November over last year. The brand has also introduced an all-new 2020 mid-size Sonata that \u2014 like the all-new Toyota Camry and Honda Accord introduced in 2018 \u2014\u00a0the automaker hopes will capture buyers who still want sedans.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are 6.5 million car owners who do not have a successor sedan for them from their manufacturer. Forty-four percent of those say they want a sedan, so if you look at the raw numbers, there are still a lot of buyers out here,\u201d Hyundai Vice President of Product Planning Mike O\u2019Brien said at a media test of the new Sonata in Phoenix.<\/p>\n He noted that since Chrysler dropped its 200 sedan after the 2017 model year, there\u2019s been an exodus of 20 nameplates from the sedan market.<\/p>\n The Edmunds study focused in particular on compact cars,\u00a0which is the biggest car market \u2013 at 9.1%\u00a0of share \u2013 in the United States\u00a0today. The Ford Focus and Chevy Cruze have both left the segment in the last year as the Detroit makers concentrate on market demand for SUVs.<\/p>\n To be sure, a healthy share of former Focus and Cruze owners are acting as Ford and Chevy hoped:\u00a0by\u00a0moving into one of their SUVs. To date this year, 18% of Focus owners traded for a Ford SUV, while 21% of Cruze owners traded\u00a0for a Chevy SUV.<\/p>\n But those buyers tend to have extra cash to spend as small SUVs can cost between $4,000-$8,000 more than a small car, reports Edmunds. As a result, those staying in the compact car segment are increasingly turning to the remaining foreign brands.<\/p>\n Dearborn is home to Ford’s headquarters. It\u00a0also is home to Metro Detroit’s largest Hyundai dealer, LaFontaine Hyundai \u2014\u00a0a distinction driven, in part, by customers’ desire for a compact alternative to the discontinued\u00a0Focus.<\/p>\n “We’ve seen a lot of interest in the Elantra since Ford left the compact market,” said Lafontaine sales manager Steve Hunsinger. The Elantra is prominently featured on the dealership’s\u00a0website.<\/p>\n Determined to compete in the Detroit Three’s backyard, Hyundai matches Ford’s friends-and-family discount by offering Michigan buyers its own employees’ discount. Hunsinger says that, in addition to meeting demand for an affordable compact, the Elantra also benefits from Hyundai’s best-in-industry, 10-year\/100,000-mile drivetrain warranty.<\/p>\n \u201cFord and GM made a strategic decision to prioritize profit at the expense of market share,\u201d said Edmunds auto analyst Jessica Caldwell. \u201cWhile this may set them up better in the long run so they have the cash they need to fund electrification and autonomy, there\u2019s no question that decision is giving their competitors an edge now.\u201d<\/p>\n Focus owners trading in their car to buy another Ford vehicle decreased from 40% in 2016, to 33%\u00a0 in 2019. The drop in brand loyalty has been steeper among Cruze owners \u2014 from 57% of owners trading in for a Chevy in 2016, to 45%\u00a0this year.<\/p>\n Asian carmakers have benefited:\u00a0the Honda Civic picked up 4% of former Focus buyers, the Toyota Corolla 3.5% and Hyundai Elantra 2.3%. Cruze trade-ins for Civics and Corollas nearly doubled from 2016 to 2019.<\/p>\n More:\u00a0<\/strong>The racy Honda Civic Si just wants to have fun<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n