Hyundai reports 1st monthly sales drop in 2 years
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Editor's note: An earlier version of this story overstated the rank of the Eastern region. It's Hyundai's second-largest U.S. region by sales volume.
LOS ANGELES -- Hurricane Sandy and tight supplies of small cars in October caused Hyundai to post its first monthly sales decrease in more than two years.
Hyundai sales fell 4 percent to 50,271 vehicles, down 4 percent from October 2011. It was Hyundai's first year-over-year monthly decline since August 2010.
Year-to-date sales were 590,085 units, up 8 percent from the first 10 months of last year.
In a post on Twitter, Hyundai Motor America CEO John Krafcik attributed the declines to Hurricane Sandy and tight supplies of the Accent subcompact and Veloster sporty coupe.
In a statement, Dave Zuchowski, Hyundai's executive vice president of sales, said the storm had a "devastating impact on our dealers and millions of residents along the Eastern Seaboard."
The Eastern region is Hyundai's second-biggest by sales volume, and the storm disrupted operations at many of its 173 dealerships, Hyundai says.
Among high-volume dealerships that closed temporarily were Brad Benson Hyundai in South Brunswick, N.J., Hyundai's third-largest dealership; and Atlantic Hyundai in West Islip, N.Y., Hyundai's highest-volume U.S. retailer as of Sept. 30.
Both stores were operating today, and a Hyundai spokesman said 80 percent of the company's Eastern Region dealers are expected to be open tomorrow.
According to a Hyundai tally early Thursday afternoon, fewer than 300 vehicles in inventory were reported destroyed by the storm.
In a statement, Krafcik said: "We'll also continue to work with our dealers in areas impacted by Sandy to ensure vehicles lost to the storm are replaced as quickly as possible."
You can reach Ryan Beene at rbeene@crain.com. -- Follow Ryan on 
