Snowmobile sales trends dip after warm winter
Snow Goer, our sister magazine, has shared that after an unusually warm winter across most of North America last season, new snowmobile sales declined, as expected.
Snow Goer Editor John Prusak shares, “After a winter of record warmth and low precipitation across the vast majority of snow-starved North America last season, virtually all observers expected new snowmobile sales to trend downward. Really, the only question was how far south they would slide.”
He says that sales in the U.S. were decent, while sales in Canada were not as good. “The numbers in European countries also slid slightly, despite decent snow on that side of the Atlantic Ocean. Other parts of the world picked up some sales,” he shares.
The International Snowmobile Manufacturers Association (ISMA) reported a 9.7% decrease in snowmobile sales worldwide for the 2024 selling season (May 1, 2023, to April 30, 2024). “The figures reported by ISMA include sales and delivery of new, model year 2024 snowmobiles plus ‘non-current’ new snowmobiles from recent model years retailed during the 2024 sale season… The figures do not include any spring orders of 2025 snowmobiles,” Prusak shares. “Looking forward, dealer inventories of unsold new snowmobiles are high, and spring pre-orders this year were sluggish. Therefore, some manufacturers have already announced they are significantly cutting the total number of 2025 units they will build.”
U.S. snowmobile sales
“Winter got off to a late start across all of the U.S. Snowbelt in the winter of 2023-24,” Prusak shares. “Some parts of the Mountain West eventually received decent snow. But from the Dakotas through Michigan, the Upper Midwest was virtually skunked of ridable snow all winter. Plus, most parts of the Northeast suffered their third subpar winter in a row. In fact, historians are struggling to find a winter that compares in terms of warmth and dryness.”
Despite the unfavorable winter weather, new snowmobile sales in the U.S. totaled 51,987 units, a 2.97% decrease over the 2023 selling season. The Midwest sold 42% of the total U.S. snowmobile sales, the West sold 38%, and the Northeast sold 20%, according to ISMA.
“With the horrible (by snowmobilers’ standpoint) winter that was experienced, most knowledgeable industry observers (dealers, aftermarket vendors, investor researchers) were expecting far more dire numbers,” Prusak shares. “Those sort of figures, though, were reserved for north of the international border.”
Click on the link to read the full story from Snow Goer, which includes more U.S. figures and a report on Canadan and international snowmobile sales:
