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With the continued counter-trend growth of the luxury car market, the overall pattern of brand differentiation is also further highlighted, which can better reflect the reality in the second-tier luxury field. Gone are the days when Cadillac continued to lose its second-tier crown and held the top spot for many years in 2020. At the same time, Lexus officially topped the list of second-tier luxury.

Cadillac has always had a stable market position, but since 2019, Cadillac has been repeatedly pressed by Lexus brands behind it, and only after Cadillac started a crazy "price for volume" did Cadillac continue to take the lead by a small margin. Cadillac's annual sales in 2019 were 212507, down 7.6% from a year earlier, while Lexus's annual sales were 200521, up 25% from a year earlier.

In 2020, Cadillac officially lost the first place of second-tier luxury sales, and the sustained and steady growth of Lexus really put pressure on Cadillac. In July 2020, Cadillac sold 20003 vehicles, while Lexus sold 22325. From January to July, Lexus achieved 7 per cent year-on-year growth and remained at the top of the second-tier luxury rankings with 117651 vehicles continuing to overtake Cadillac's 104360.

Unlike many mainstream luxury brands, Lexus has always maintained its import status. As a high-end brand of Toyota, Lexus has always maintained the identity of imported cars sold in the Chinese market, insisting on not producing in the domestic way. This has also led to the generally high price of Lexus models and the strength not to participate in the price reduction competition in the domestic market, and its status as an imported car has also attracted some consumers.

The market sales of Lexus "low inventory" has always been controversial, and many netizens believe that this has further led Lexus dealers to increase their prices. However, some netizens believe that selling by order is also a reflection of the value of the Lexus brand.

Some industry insiders pointed out that Lexus can maintain positive growth, on the one hand, through order sales, can effectively control prices and orders, on the other hand, the production capacity released by Japanese factories during the epidemic has been transferred to support the Chinese market, and the best-selling models ES, RX, and the upcoming replacement of NX have all had good positive growth.

In contrast, the after-effects of trading price for quantity seem to have cost Cadillac. During the inventory clearance of national five models in mid-2019, Cadillac sold new cars at a minimum discount of 50%, causing terminal prices to collapse, and the collapse in the value of used cars also caused complaints from some car owners and had an inevitable impact on brand premiums.

With the major adjustment of the product line, Cadillac sought the recovery of the price system, including the launch of CT5, CT4, XT6 new cars, from the formation of a domestic "3x3" product lineup. Among them, the price of CT4 is the lowest since Cadillac entered China, with an official guidance price of 2.397-259700 yuan, but the car still continues the brand tone of price reduction competition, with a general market discount of about 30, 000 yuan. The upgrading of the product line did not bring much surprise to the brand, with the luxury car market bucking the trend and Cadillac still fell by more than 19% in July.

Wang Yongqing, general manager of SAIC General Motors, once said that as consumers begin to return to rationality, the concentration and loyalty of brands are getting higher and higher, and customers' requirements for enterprises are getting higher and higher. only a "price war" is out of date. He further said, "I hope Cadillac will achieve double-digit growth in 2020, which is what I ask of Cadillac Minister."

Now it seems that Cadillac's market performance is not as expected, but disappointing.

After operating in China for many years, the brand tonality of Cadillac and Lexus has indeed opened a large gap, which has also formed the trend and pattern of the second-tier luxury market. Cadillac, which lost its position as a second-tier luxury champion, will also face greater pressure from market competition.

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