The growth in light truck/SUV sales has been a key driver for the aftermarket for decades. Passengers cars may still have their place in Canadians’ hearts, but less and less of them have a place in Canadian driveways.

The sheer volume of pickup trucks and their covered-top SUV cousins has been game-changing, for both automakers at the front end, and the aftermarket further down the road to today.

But the days of the full-sized light truck/SUV as a market dominator appear to be numbered.

According to Canadian sales figures as collated by DesRosiers Automotive Consultants, small SUVs are dominating, even as the entire light truck segment continues it’s growth against declining passenger car sales.

In 2024, says DAC, light truck sales increased 10.1% against the passenger car side of the market, which decreased 2.8%.

As if to emphasize the passenger car replacement trend, compactd SUVs, already the volume leader, saw a 20.9% increase year over year, with more than half a million new units hitting the roadways, and making up 30.5% of total vehicle sales.

Even subcompact SUVs grew their year-over-year sales significantly, by 16.2%.

It is notable that two other segments that saw big growth as a percentage were small vans and large vans, seeing sales rise 28.9% and 16.6% respectively, but overall volumes are relatively small at only about 76 thousand units.

According to DAC, the resurgent Sienna from Toyota was a signifant player, with overall fleet sales rebounding after years of lackluster performance.

Regardless, it is passenger cars that are taking it on the chin:

• Compact luxury cars down 11.3%;
• Subcompact cars, down 11.1%;
• Luxury cars, down 10.9%.

The year overall saw the luxury market continue to struggle relative to the mainstream market.

Overall luxury sales did see an uptick in the fourth quarter but still finished the year down 0.4% but still lost ground in an overall market that gained 8.2%..

“The market at a segment level was highly dynamic in 2024,” commented Andrew King, Managing Partner at DAC.

“Affordability concerns pressed down on the luxury side of the market, as Canadians continued to show their preference for smaller mainstream SUVs as their vehicle of choice.”