Even though the year is drawing close to the end, BMW and Mercedes-Benz are still separated by only a few hundred cars in their on-going luxury sales war. Mercedes-Benz USA posted disappointing results last month, allowing BMW to creep closer in this unofficial race, as the Bavarians posted a small but important increase in sales compared to September 2017. While Mercedes dropped by nearly 10 percent, BMW grew by 1.3 percent.

On a year-to-date basis, Mercedes-Benz and BMW are now separated by just 319 cars, making this one of the most heated ‘sales wars’ in history for the two German arch-rivals. BMW sold 25,908 cars last month while Mercedes-Benz sold 26,169 units. Lexus came in third with 24,597 units which marks a shrinkage of 6.1 percent compared to the same month of last year for the Japanese manufacturer.

The luxury segment overall isn’t doing so great in the US. Sales have shrunk by 0.2 percent overall on a year-to-date basis, adding up to 1.47 million units at the end of September. Acura, for example showed an overall drop of 4.4 percent even though its SUV sales have gone up by 14 percent throughout September. Audi sales went up just 0.2 percent last month, which translates into selling 42 units more than last year. At the same time, Porsche recorded an increase of 0.9 percent. The Macan was the brand’s best-selling model, 44 percent of all cars sold by the German brand in September being Macans.

Crossovers and SUVs are really dominating the market right now. For BMW, more than half of the cars sold last month were SUVs, with the X3 being the most popular choice. Over at Mercedes-Benz it’s the same situation with the best selling model being the GLC-Class followed by the C-Class and E-Class. Even so, the appetite US customers have for electrified cars doesn’t seem to slow down. BMW recorded a 6.7 percent increase in demand for such models in September, while on a year-to-date basis that figure grew by 4.3 percent, nearly double compared to conventional models.