Driving By Numbers: Canada's 10 best-selling luxury SUVs in 2021's first quarter

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It’s time to recalibrate. Remember when the luxury vehicle market was defined by nameplates such as the Lincoln Continental and Cadillac de Ville? What about the Jaguar XJ6 and Mercedes-Benz 500E, or the BMW 3 Series and Lexus ES?

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Here’s the problem. Those are four-door cars: relatively low with an enclosed trunk and, more often than not over the course of history, two driven wheels. In 2021, cars barely account for more than one-quarter of all sales in Canada’s luxury car, ahem, luxury vehicle showrooms.

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Sport-utility vehicles and crossovers – SUVs and CUVs as they’re often labelled – now define the premium vehicle market. However, it’s not because their sales are growing so fast (and they are), nor is it because certain corners of the mainstream automotive press decided they were cool (usually quite the opposite). Rather, automakers have created a market and are now feeding it with an increasingly broad variety of goods that shoppers want.

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As a result, 72 per cent of the vehicles sold by premium brands in Canada during the first quarter of 2021 were utility vehicles. While overall auto sales are shooting out of 2020’s Q1 doldrums with 15 per cent year-over-year growth, luxury car sales are up less than 2 per cent. Luxury SUVs and crossovers, on the other hand, are up 27 per cent, growth of more than 7,000 sales compared to the first three months of 2020.

This is where all of the action’s at. At the high end, vehicles such as the Cadillac Escalade (up 112 per cent), Land Rover Range Rover (up 62 per cent), and Mercedes-Benz G-Class (up 88 per cent) combined for 1,450 sales in January, February, and March. That’s a period during which Mercedes-Benz sold a grand total of 50 copies of the S-Class, BMW managed 42 of their 7 Series sales, and Audi sold a grand total of 18 A8s. At the low end, once popular cars such as the Audi A3 are hanging on for dear life with fewer than 50 sales per month while its stablemate, the Q3, finds 14 times as many buyers.

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There is no margin of error here. Tastes have undeniably changed. Demand has shifted at every price demographic. Who are the ringleaders? These are the 10 best-selling premium brand SUVs and crossovers in Canada through 2021’s first quarter.

10. Cadillac XT5: 1,181, up 84 per cent

Cadillac is flying high. Sales across the brand are up 85 per cent this year, a 1,723-unit gain in only three months. Modest success from Cadillac cars is helping. Cadillac’s other SUVs are doing just fine, too, thank you very much (total Escalade, XT4, and XT6 volume is up 74 per cent). But the real driver is, not surprisingly, the brand’s top seller. The XT5 accounts for just under one-third of Cadillac sales, and the XT5 has already added over 500 sales to the company’s ledger this year.

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9. BMW X3: 1,264, up 7 per cent

In a class now controlled by the BMW X3 ’s compatriots – namely the Audi Q5 and Mercedes-Benz GLC – the BMW X3 stands out as the segment’s original player that can’t quite measure up in the marketplace. X3 volume is strong, of course. It’s the best seller at Canada’s No.2 premium brand. But having laid the groundwork in 2003 for a wide variety of competitors, the X3 has long since been superseded by those very same competitors.

8. Acura MDX: 1,264, up 161 per cent

Among premium brand vehicles that come standard with a third row, none produce the kind of volume Acura generates with the MDX . Newly launched this year for the 2022 model year, the fourth-generation MDX is more performance-oriented, more aggressively designed, more evidently premium, and quite suddenly more popular. MDX sales exploded in the first-quarter, growing by an average of 260 units per month in 2021’s first quarter.

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7. Lexus NX: 1,456, up 11 per cent

How important is the NX to the Lexus brand? Put it this way: the ES, GS, IS, LC, LS, and RC combined for 867 sales during the first three months of 2021. The NX produced 68 per cent more volume than all of those cars combined. Relative to the rest of the luxury arena, it also means the NX outsells the entire Lincoln brand, produces more than twice as many sales as Genesis, and generates nearly triple the volume of Jaguar.

6. Acura RDX: 1,559, up 13 per cent

With affordable vehicles such as the Integra serving as a key component in Acura’s formative years, the brand’s status as an outright premium marque has often been called into question. The recent success of Acura’s two SUVs, and especially the brand’s No.1-selling RDX , is certainly elevating the prestige of Honda’s premium division. The RDX goes toe-to-toe with vehicles such as the BMW X3, Mercedes-Benz GLC, and Lexus NX

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5. Mercedes-Benz GLC-Class: 1,595, down 10 per cent

Two years ago, prior to the pandemic, the Mercedes-Benz GLC was Canada’s top-selling premium brand utility vehicle. 2020 hit the GLC hard; sales fell 36 per cent in a market that was down only 20 per cent. Fast forward to the first-quarter of 2021 and the Canadian auto industry’s rapid recovery – the GLC isn’t participating. Sales are down 10 per cent compared to 2020’s first-quarter; down 34 per cent compared to the same period in 2019.

4. Mercedes-Benz GLE-Class: 1,697, up 6 per cent

Now the best-selling vehicle in Mercedes-Benz’s sprawling lineup, the Mercedes-Benz GLE is the only vehicle in the top 10 with a base price over $60,000 (the entry-level GLE actually nudges $70K). Due to its ML-Class lineage, the GLE is also the longest-running vehicle among the 10 luxury SUV leaders in Canada. The Lexus RX is the only other member of the group launched in the 1990s.

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3. Audi Q3: 1,727, up 37 per cent

Although it’s sized like a Subaru Crosstrek, it’s priced like a Subaru Ascent. That’s the formula behind a premium badge, and it’s working wonders for the second-generation Audi Q3 . The first-gen Q3 arrived in Canada in the latter stages of its lifecycle yet produced meaningful sales volume despite the numerous ways in which it felt outdated. The latest Q3 plays a different, more modern game, and in this game it’s absolutely crushing its rivals. BMW sold a total of 725 X1s and X2s in the first quarter, for example, while Volvo sold 694 XC40s.

2. Lexus RX: 1,780, up 6 per cent

The Lexus RX is an easy No.1 south of the border. Through 2021’s first three months, the RX outsold its next-best-selling rival by 64 per cent. In fact, Americans made the RX the 21st best-selling SUV/crossover overall in Q1. Undeniably, the RX is a popular vehicle in Canada, as well, but as the No.2 luxury SUV in this country, it isn’t broadcasting its influence quite so strongly. Sales in the U.S. market, which is 10 times the size, are 16 times stronger.

1. Audi Q5: 1,947, up 37 per cent

Aside from a one-year lapse in 2019, the Audi Q5 has been Canada’s favourite premium brand utility vehicle since 2015. Even without assistance from Audi’s other popular crossovers – including the third-ranked Q3, surging Q7, and increasingly popular Q8 – the Q5 outsells Audi’s entire car lineup. In terms of overall SUV popularity, the Q5’s 1,947 first-quarter sales place it just outside the top 30, ahead of vehicles such as the Dodge Durango, GMC Terrain, and Hyundai Palisade but behind the Chevrolet Trailblazer, Toyota 4Runner, and Kia Sorento.