Ford loses sales spot to Toyota

DETROIT, Jan. 5 (UPI) -- The Ford Motor Co. is now only the United States' third-ranked automaker thanks to declining sales and a good year for Japan's Toyota Motor Corp.

With Ford's sales in the United States dropping 12 percent in 2007, the Michigan automaker lost its second place spot to Toyota in terms of vehicles sold in the United States, The New York Times said Thursday.

While Ford's sales plummeted last year, Toyota saw its 2007 sales increase by 2.7 percent in the United States.

That increase placed Toyota on the brink of unseating General Motors as the top U.S. automaker as GM endured a 6 percent drop in U.S. sales in 2007.

Meanwhile, a chief sales analyst for Ford attempted to downplay the company's drop to third by saying the auto group had expected and prepared for such a decline.

"While the decline is relatively large, much of it was anticipated at the beginning of the year," Ford analyst George Pipas told the Times.