Toronto, Ontario — DesRosiers Automotive Consults Inc. has released its year-end sales report for the Canadian auto sales industry in which the company boils down the past year to the following idea: if 2020 year was the year of no customers; 2021 is the year of no cars.
A year into various forms of COVID-19 lockdown measures across the world, demand for new vehicles was back on the rise in 2021, but supply chain constraints, most notably a shortage of semiconductors, caused sales to stall in Q2.
DeRosiers managing partner Andrew King said that “While 2020 was a year beset by demand problems, 2021 was hit by problems on the supply side of the equation.”
Though overall light vehicle sales for 2021 were up 6.6 percent from 2020, sales rates are still a far cry from the market highs seen in 2017, when growth peaked at 19.6 percent.
Ford, General Motors and Toyota wield the greatest market sales volumes of the OEMs, representing a combined 40 percent of sales for the year.
Light trucks made up 81.2 percent of new light vehicle sales in 2021, up from 79.9 percent in 2020 and breaking through the 80 percent level for the first time.
