Tough spring for Canadian car companies, sales drop again

[Summitric]

May 7, 2019 by Renee Montague

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[h=1]Tough spring for Canadian car companies, sales drop again[/h]

Following a difficult March, Canadian passenger vehicle sales dropped again in the month of April.DesRosiers Automotive Consulting is reporting that passenger car sales dropped a steep 15.6% and light truck sales saw an increase of 1.8% for a total industry decrease of 3.5%.While GM, Ford, and FCA saw decreases (-4.4%, -4.3% and -9.8% respectively), Toyota saw an increase of 5.6% and rose to the fourth highest volume spot.Car makers that saw double digit increases include Infinity, Jaguar, Lexus, Volkswagen, Genesis and Volvo representing an overall increase in the luxury market despite the huge decreases experienced by Mercedes (-19.6%) and Audi (-17.7%).U.S. auto sales also saw a 2.3% decrease even with an extra selling day, the high employment rate and a strong stock market.Forecasters anticipated a decrease due to high interest rates and vehicle prices, but the decline was steeper than anticipated bringing the sales rate at its lowest since Feb. 2014.The decreasing sales rates have car manufacturers reducing incentives in an attempt to offset the decreasing sales.www.desrosiers.com

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[Stompin Tom]

maybe if they wernt so freaking expensive.

 

[Chronic Cat]

maybe if they wernt so freaking expensive.

And built with such chitty overall build quality hey. Everything is engineered these days to not be able to be worked on by the consumer, requires special tools in lots of cases that only dealer techs have and the scanners and computers to scan and program them. Leaves a guy stuck to pay the $100-$175/hr labour rate depending on what you need and where you're taking it to have it done.

Id be livid to spend upwards of 100k on a fancy new loaded up 1 ton and have the chrome bumpers rusting within the first year. But it is happening.

 

[Caper11]

Between high priced new cars and trucks, lots of recent recalls and reliability issues, its tough to even consider a new ride with these problems. The creature comforts are nice but these new cars and trucks have to much electronics in them that’s expensive to repair.

 

[Chronic Cat]

I wish Mitsubishi built light and medium duty pickups, I'd be all over one. My family has been running their cars and SUV's the last several years. In the spring they off a 10 year factory warranty. Anything on the lot. Pretty damn tough to beat that. Once your rig is paid for you still have 5 years of warranty left. Makes resale actually worth something when the rig isn't a diesel.

 

[ABMax24]

I would agree with all the above comments, it's beyond thought for most households to replace vehicles as often as they used to. Both vehicles we last bought were on the assumption that we would keep them for awhile, my truck is 5 years old already and I can't yet foresee the day I'll be replacing it. Her small truck wan't bought to be the biggest or most fun so we left the fancy interior options out to have the more efficient diesel engine.