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Subaru just sold its 10 millionth car in the US

It took 41 years for Subaru USA to sell its first 5 million, but just over a decade to double that.

Kyle Hyatt Former news and features editor
Kyle Hyatt (he/him/his) hails originally from the Pacific Northwest, but has long called Los Angeles home. He's had a lifelong obsession with cars and motorcycles (both old and new).
Kyle Hyatt
2 min read
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This little celebration feels decidedly appropriate for Subaru, which just sold its 10 millionth car in the US.

Subaru

is, by most measures, a fairly small car company. It builds slightly quirky but hugely practical vehicles and sells them to an audience made up, in large part, of repeat customers, but it's not selling in volumes that would make GM quake in its boots, for example.

Still, despite its small footprint, Subaru announced on Friday that it has just managed to sell its 10 millionth vehicle in the US, and while that's cool by itself, the most interesting part is that it took the company 41 years to sell its first 5 million cars here, but the second 5 million only took around 10 years. That's serious acceleration. By comparison, Toyota sold 2.4 million cars and trucks in the US in 2018 alone.

"Accomplishing this milestone reflects our commitment to providing customers with vehicles made to the highest standards of safety, reliability and dependability," said Thomas J. Doll, president and CEO of Subaru of America, in a statement.

So, what was the 10 millionth US Subaru? It wasn't a fire-breathing WRX STi or a drift-ready BRZ. Instead, it was a relatively pedestrian white 2019 Impreza and it was -- we think rather appropriately -- sold to the long-time Subaru-owning Harmon family as a car for their daughter.

The car was picked up by Dr. Craig Harmon at the country's oldest Subaru dealer -- Nate Wade Subaru in Salt Lake City, Utah -- and during the handover he was surprised by Kirk Schneider, owner of Nate Wade Subaru as well as Jessica Tiedeken, David Airington, Barry Jellick and Andrew Sidel from Subaru of America.

Watch this: 2017 Subaru Impreza: 5 things you need to know

The 2019 Subaru Impreza is stable and efficient

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