BMW is celebrating a major milestone: The German company has built six million cars in the U.S. since opening its factory in Spartanburg, S.C., in 1994. The milestone car is an eye-catching X6 M that was sent directly to the company’s historic collection.
BMW made the announcement exactly 30 years after it broke ground to build the facility, the first in the United States. Since then, the company notes that it has invested nearly $12 billion in the plant and that it exports about 60% of Spartanburg-built cars to 120 global markets.
While reaching the six million mark in less than 30 years is impressive, it’s even more astonishing how quickly BMW ramped up the plant’s output. The millionth Spartanburg-built BMW (a Z4 M Roadster) was built in February 2006, roughly 12 years after the facility opened. The two millionth car (an X3) rolled off the assembly line in January 2012, the three millionth (an X5 M) was made in March 2015 and the five millionth (an X5 M Competition) was completed in June 2020. It took just over two years for BMW to build a million cars.
Do you notice a pattern? Most of the milestone cars are SUVs, which the Spartanburg plant has specialized in for several years, and those are the ones that sell especially well. It’s no coincidence that the sixth million BMW with a “made in the United States” label is an X6 M painted in Java Green Metallic and powered by a twin-turbocharged, 4.4-liter V8 with a capacity of 600 horsepower. It is equipped with a black leather interior.
But it certainly wasn’t always BMW SUVs that came out of the factory. The first South Carolina-built BMW was an E36-generation 318i, a car that preceded the brand’s first SUV, the X5.
BMW X6 M Information
