"For the second straight year, Honda products have led automotive retail sales in four key segments — small car, midsize, SUV and minivan -- with Accord finishing 2014 as the best retail-selling car in America.  Again, "retail" means sales earned one car and one customer at a time, rather than bulk purchases for use as rental cars or in government fleets.

Why does Honda alone continue to speak about retail sales?  First of all, it's good for our customers. Protecting the value of our products means a lot to our customers when it comes time to sell the vehicle in which they invested their hard-earned dollars. In a similar way, we have held the line on shortsighted marketing tactics like excessive sub-prime lending practices that can put customers in a cycle of negative equity that can be difficult to break.

Our strategy of selling to individual buyers is also good for Honda … because decisions made by individual shoppers are one reason we have such high owner loyalty rates … with customers returning to the Honda brand again and again to purchase a Honda vehicle. So, this week's news of our retail sales leadership was the best kind of celebration – something that is good for our customer and also good for Honda."

John Mendel Executive Vice President, Automobile Division American Honda Motor Co., Inc.