RV Industry Sales and Order Backlog

Just a quick post to mention that RV industry (boats too) sales continues to be at a record pace. From the new article below, I see that THOR's order backlog is $14B. That's 14 billion dollars in backlogged orders. That's huge. I'm used to this figure being in the few hundred million range in past years.

Other trends I (and most reading this) have seen in the past year are:
- Longer lead times on new RV orders
- Higher values for used RVs
- Near empty dealer lots for new and used RVs
- Parts shortages for RV repairs (and new RV builds)

Trends I believe we will see down the road:
- Difficulty getting campground reservations
- Higher use of non-campground camping (BLM land, Harvest Host sites etc.)
- Longer lead times on getting RV repairs made
- More independent and mobile RV repairers popping up
- Expansion plans for some private campgrounds and larger campground ownership groups

Link to RV Business

Was reading about this last night. I'm sure glad our Cyclone is less than 4 years old and we plan on keeping it for a long time! Now to try and find a campsite to take it to...........

jbeletti said:

Just a quick post to mention that RV industry (boats too) sales continues to be at a record pace. From the new article below, I see that THOR's order backlog is $14B. That's 14 billion dollars in backlogged orders. That's huge. I'm used to this figure being in the few hundred million range in past years.

Other trends I (and most reading this) have seen in the past year are:
- Longer lead times on new RV orders
- Higher values for used RVs
- Near empty dealer lots for new and used RVs
- Parts shortages for RV repairs (and new RV builds)

Trends I believe we will see down the road:
- Difficulty getting campground reservations
- Higher use of non-campground camping (BLM land, Harvest Host sites etc.)
- Longer lead times on getting RV repairs made
- More independent and mobile RV repairers popping up
- Expansion plans for some private campgrounds and larger campground ownership groups

Link to RV Business
View attachment 65639

Click to expand...

“Difficulty getting campground reservations”. Definitely have already experienced this! Is amazing to see so many paper tags on new RV’s at some of the RV parks we go to!

I just cant believe this trend continues to climb. You would think in time the amount of RV's being bought would fill up the market. I thought 5 years ago it was insane, now its even crazier.

One other big trend now that the new 'lifestyle' seems to be selling their homes and moving the whole family in to RV's, many campgrounds and RV parks are now becoming trailer parks (ie - permanent living parks)...and are no longer a campground.

I've seen a small increase in dry camping, but only from experienced campers who are leaving the regular campgrounds because they are too full of the, as we say, "covid campers" (the new-to-market campers spurred by covid restrictions & stay-at-home $$).

Campgrounds definitely packed now. Used to be our Club was welcome at a campground as we'd fill ~30 spots, now finding one with enough sites is getting darn near impossible.

Boat industry is in the same, eh hum, "boat". Friends that own dealerships have zero inventory (sold out) and unable to buy more from manufacturer and they bought everything they could when the purchase window opened last fall.

Off Road vehicle dealerships in the same predicament. Our trails are taking a severe beating from the massive increase in traffic. The Clubs have to put substantially more time in trail maintenance/grooming to try to keep up.

Last year I expected the used market for all of these segments to see a glut of machines/boats/campers for sale starting this fall, but looking like it's another year out at the soonest.