Honda Tops American-Made Index on Cars.com

The Cars.com American-Made Index
By Kelsey Mays, Cars.com

What Are the Top American-Made Cars?
Cars.com's American-Made Index rates vehicles built and bought in the U.S. Factors include sales, where the car's parts come from and whether the car is assembled in the U.S. We disqualify models with a domestic parts content rating below 75 percent, models built exclusively outside the U.S. or models soon to be discontinued without a U.S.-built successor.

Rank Make/Model U.S. Assembly Location Last Rank

1. Toyota Camry Georgetown, Ky.; Lafayette, Ind. 1
2. Honda Accord Marysville, Ohio; Lincoln, Ala. —
3. Ford Escape Kansas City, Mo. —
4. Ford Focus Wayne, Mich. —
5. Chevrolet Malibu Kansas City, Kan. 3
6. Honda Odyssey Lincoln, Ala. 4

Excludes hybrid variants (applies to Camry, Escape and Malibu). The Camry excludes the related Venza; the Accord excludes the related Crosstour.
*Quad cab and crew cab only. Excludes Ram 1500 single cab, which is assembled in Mexico.
Sources: Automaker data, Automotive News, dealership data, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
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In today's global economy, there's no easy way to determine just how American a car is. Many cars built in the U.S., for example, are assembled using parts that come from elsewhere. Some cars assembled in the U.S. from strictly American-made parts don't sell well, meaning fewer Americans are employed to build them. Cars.com's American-Made Index recognizes cars that are built here, have a high amount of domestic parts and are bought in large numbers by American consumers.

Accord Up, F-150 Down
The Toyota Camry, which dethroned the Ford F-150 pickup in last year's AMI, remains at the top for 2010. But the No. 2 model, Honda's strong-selling Accord, surged unexpectedly. Since the AMI's 2006 inception, we've scrutinized two generations of Accords. In the past, Honda sold few imported Accords to U.S. buyers — "a percentage below 10 percent for many years," spokesman Ed Miller said — but the Accord spent several years with its domestic parts percentage in the 60s. That's not the case this year. With all Accords sold in the U.S. now assembled in either Ohio or Alabama, the Accord's 75 percent domestic content and strong sales came close to unseating Toyota for first place.

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