Which automaker sells the second-most plug-in vehicles in the U.S.?

The Ford lineup of electric vehicles has posted strong sales numbers so far in 2014, and the trend continued in August.

They don’t get a lot of hype, and we have previously been critical of them in this space, but Ford has sold more plug-in vehicles in the United States this year than every automaker except Nissan. The two big sellers, the Fusion Energi and C-Max Energi, have been on a roll lately.

Fusion Energi sales

In August, Ford sold 1,222 Fusion Energi models, barely off the July pace and good for a 104% increase over the 600 units moved in August 2013. It is the fourth consecutive month above 1,200 sales for the Energi, with a high mark of 1,939 sold in June.

The Fusion Energi yearly tally is now at 8,683. After a slow debut in February 2013, the plug-in Fusion has steadily grown its sales and now appears to have begun leveling off above 1,200 units prior to the inevitable end-of-year dropoff.

For the month of August, Ford sold 29,452 Fusions nationwide. Of that total, 4% were the plug-in Energi variant – this is consistent with year-to-date results, as the Fusion Energi’s 8,683 sales represent 4% of all Fusions. The current ratio is up from 2.2% in the last 11 months of 2013.

C-Max Energi sales

The Ford C-Max Energi had its second-best month since its debut, selling 1,050 units for a 69% increase over the 621 vehicles moved in August 2013. It was the C-Max Energi’s best month since selling 1,092 units last October.

For the year, 5,809 C-Max Energi models have left dealer lots. This represents a 64% jump over last year’s total of 3,536 through August, and puts the C-Max Energi on pace to sell over 11,700 vehicles this year.

In August a total of 3,501 C-Max vehicles were sold, 30% of which were the plug-in variety. On the year, the ratio is 29% Energi – in 2013, just 7,154 out of the 35,210 C-Max vehicles sold came with a plug, or just 20%.

Focus Electric

Though Ford doesn’t make an effort to sell great volumes of its Focus Electric, it has been incredibly steady between 100 and 200 monthly sales for 18 consecutive months. That streak was broken as the Focus Electric topped 200 for the first time, totaling 264 sales in August to bring its yearly tally to 1,358. Its sales are up 11% from 2013.

The second highest-selling EV maker in America

Ford now has sold 15,580 plug-in vehicles in the United States this year, firmly in second place behind only Nissan and the best-selling LEAF at 18,941 sales through August. Chevrolet sits in third with 13,990 Volt and Spark sales, while the Energi competitor Toyota Prius Plug-In has sold 11,489 units in 2014 after a down month of August. Tesla lags behind somewhat as the company has directed its attention to foreign markets in recent months.

Notably, a significantly higher percentage of Fusion and C-Max vehicles have been of the plug-in variety in 2014 compared to 2013. This bodes well for the future of Blue Oval electric vehicles as the automaker continues to fly under the publicity radar of the EV industry.