Here's a question: Which four U.S. market brands are tied for the longest consecutive streak of monthly year-over-year sales increases? The streak now stands at 20 months.

 It's a great question and the answer is probably not the brands you think. I wish I was clever enough to have asked the question, but I'm not. Eric Mayne, senior news operations editor at WardsAuto.com posed the question today in his blog, Who's Really Hot?

I have to give some props to the folks at Ward's. For the record, I was employed there for 10 years, and there may not be a finer, harder working group of journalists in the business (and not because I worked there!).

 I don't want to steal too much of Mayne's thunder, but I'll give you the answers (you'll have to check out his blog to to learn why these four brands are so strong, though). Big surprise -- neither Hyundai or Subaru are on the list.

 The four brands are: Mercedes Benz, Cadillac, Buick and Land Rover. Surprised? I am.

 Mayne offers another great tidbit of history in his blog: The brand with the longest streak of monthly year-over-year sales increases? Hyundai from 1999 - 2002 with 45 months.