Driving By Numbers: Canadian auto sales recovery in 2021, province by province

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According to Statistics Canada, auto sales in Canada jumped 25 per cent through the first seven months of 2021.

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That’s a year-over-year comparison, the kind of relativity we apply across all manner of industries. But has it ever been more invalid? 2020, you’ll recall, produced devastating outcomes from Canada’s auto industry, albeit not quite as disastrous as predicted early in 2020’s second-quarter.

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Driving By Numbers: Canadian auto sales recovery in 2021, province by province Back to video

Compared with the first seven months of 2019, on the other hand, Canadian auto sales are actually down 13 per cent, a decrease of 153,000 sales, or about 720 fewer sales per day.

Yet, the 2019-to-2020-to-2021 tidal changes in Canada’s new vehicle market is hardly geographically uniform. There are regions where growth is substantial; regions where the struggle is still very real. There are areas of the country where 2019’s sales pace remains a distant memory; areas where the automobile market of 2021 is moving along at or near a pre-pandemic pace.

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Rather than surveying the vehicles, we’re instead studying the provinces. Is your local market bouncing back, or is demand still faltering? We have all the necessary numbers straight from the government.

Ontario: 400,310, up 19 per cent

Canada’s largest auto market, Ontario, is home to 92 times more people than Canada’s smallest auto market, Prince Edward Island. Ontario’s COVID case count, however, is more than 2,200 times greater. That public health fact alone does not explain Ontario’s lackluster growth, but it undoubtedly plays a role. No province in the country is bouncing back from 2020 so slowly. Compared with 2019, auto sales in Ontario during 2021’s first seven months are down by more than a fifth.

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Quebec: 251,857, up 29 per cent

Much of the country’s year-over-year results show the most dramatic turn in April. In 2020, that was the first full month in which lockdowns took full effect, unemployment skyrocketed, and COVID erupted. But in Quebec, that dramatic turn is, well, especially dramatic. April 2021 volume jumped 544 per cent. The nation as a whole did not fall nearly so hard in April 2020 and thus reveals a less consequential rebound: 252 per cent.

British Columbia: 124,423, up 39 per cent

Sales results in British Columbia, which include vehicle sales in the three territories, are recovering at a quicker rate than all but one other province in the country. After the two big markets produce nearly two-thirds of the nation’s auto sales, B.C. and Alberta are the mid-tier provinces: far less volume than the big markets, far more than the small markets. B.C. is now off 2019’s pace by just 3 per cent, equal to roughly 500 fewer sales per month.

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Alberta: 120,880, up 23 per cent

Though typically Canada’s third-largest market — Alberta generated 7-per cent more demand than B.C. in 2020’s first seven months and 5-per cent larger two years ago — Alberta’s recuperation has faltered in comparison to its western neighbour. Given the province’s positioning as Canada’s pickup capital, the sheer lack of inventory in that segment has done overall provincial volume no favours this year.

Manitoba: 30,425, up 22 per cent

Perilously close to losing its fifth-ranked positioning to a province with 40-per cent fewer residents, Manitoba’s 2021 rehabilitation ranks third-worst in the country. Total Manitoba volume through the first seven months of the year represents a 13-per cent drop from 2019 levels when Manitobans were buying 5,000 vehicles per month.

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Nova Scotia: 28,062, up 35 per cent

On the Canadian mainland’s far east coast, Nova Scotia’s auto sales volume remains far off 2019’s pace but is soaring past 2020’s output. Not surprisingly, much of that swing occurred during March and April, when 2020’s collapse was most notable. While April produced the worst of 2020 at only 1,625 sales, in 2021 April has proven to be the best month yet with 4,847 sales in Nova Scotia.

Saskatchewan: 26,374, up 21 per cent

Under most circumstances, a 21-per cent year-over-year growth rate would be more than enough to produce positive headlines in the automotive press. But in Saskatchewan, it’s modest movement in 2021 given the nation’s accelerated recovery. With inventory constraints becoming more serious as 2021 has worn on, Saskatchewan’s auto sales began sliding in the spring. March volume, for example, was 18 per cent stronger than July volume, an atypical move that rejects common seasonal trajectories.

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New Brunswick: 23,387, up 28 per cent

New Brunswick’s auto sales decline in 2020 was not as severe as much of the country endured, dipping less than 16 per cent by year’s end. As a result, the recovery is not as dramatic as in some corners of the country. New Brunswick’s best month of 2021 to date was April, with over 4,100 sales. That was actually the best month of auto sales in New Brunswick since August 2019.

Newfoundland and Labrador: 17,960, up 23 per cent

If you want to get an idea of just how seasonal the Canadian auto industry can be, just look at the difference in Newfoundland between auto sales in January and auto sales in June. Over the last six years, Newfoundlanders have bought 117-per cent more vehicles in the early summer than in the mid-winter. The entire nation’s market is seasonal, to be fair, but the gap in seasonal marketplace swings across the country isn’t nearly so severe at just 70 per cent.

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Prince Edward Island: 5,112, up 42 per cent

One province, and only one, is generating more new vehicle traffic in 2021 than even in pre-pandemic 2019: Prince Edward Island. Granted, P.E.I. is a tiny market by the standards of, well, every other province in the country. P.E.I. averages scarcely more than 700 new auto sales per month. Ontario moves that many new vehicles in an afternoon. Nevertheless, compared with 2019, Island auto sales are up 4 per cent. Perhaps not coincidentally, while often faced with sharp pandemic restrictions, P.E.I. has scarcely been affected by the actual COVID-19.