How the RVIA should measure Growth (Shipments)

Let’s talk about how the RVIA should measure growth (shipments)!

I’ve talked before about doing a five-year average on shipments so you could get a clearer picture of how the industry is doing. Why is this important? Well, it tells you the real health of the RV industry. While shipments in no way equate to sales, it does give you an indication of up and down movement in the industry. This can be important if you want to know when the market is soft, in order to leverage your purchasing power. Take this year as an example. When travel trailers are in negative territory for the year, it may well be a buyers’ market.

The RVIA is always measuring their “growth rate” to the previous year. So, if you are measuring this year against a bad year, the picture looks quite rosy. However, thats often not the case.

These are the shipments since 2008. I couldn’t go back any further. I’ve highlighted the five years leading up to covid, which I will use as my five-year average:

Those numbers result in a five-year average of 439,855 units per year.

I excluded covid numbers from my average since they really were an anomaly. Although 2020 was probably a normal year at 430,412

However, 2021 was 600,240, 100,000 over their best year of 2017.  The following year, 2022, had 493,268 units shipped, another huge year, but probably a tapering down of the covid 19 influence.

Then comes 2023 with 313,174.  They really hadn’t experienced a number this low since 2013.  It’s interesting to note that from 2008 to 2013, the RV industry only exceeded 300,000 shipments once, and that was 2013 when they hit 307,300 units.

In 2009 the recession hit the RV industry in a big way when they only shipped 165,700 units.  From 2010 to 2014 they made steady gains and leveled off with an average over that period of 288,867 units.

So, what does all of this blather really mean.  Well, certainly you can see that prior to 2015 the industry has had worse years.  However, they showed real growth from 2015 forward, all the way up to the pandemic.  Then during the pandemic two things happened:

1. The dealerships had record sales
2. And the manufacturers had record quality complaints, which one could argue is still plaguing them today.

The RV Manufacturers just couldn’t keep up with the demand. There are three RV dealerships near us, and their lots were empty during covid. In addition, we were getting solicitations to sell our RV to them because they had nothing to sell. Meanwhile the manufacturers were pushing them out so fast the quality suffered, as did the consumers who bought them. If you were watching the market during covid, you probably remember buyers complaining about the wrong or substituted parts installed in their rigs, missing parts, and repair nightmares.

More recently, their shipments in 2023 and 2024 are a return to numbers prior to 2014, which isn’t good.

I think there are a couple issues that affect their current sales (not shipments).  One is of course quality, which gets bashed on-line daily.  The second is a glut of used models hanging over from the pandemic. I’ve have never seen the RV lots near us so full of used models.  When you infuse as many as one to two hundred thousand extra RV’s into the marketplace, there’s going to be an impact to new sales. 

You may or may not agree with that.  However, the RVIA hasn’t had shipments exceed 400,000 since 2022.

All things being equal, you would think that a normal year for the RV industry would by around 430,000 units shipped.  This just from the figures of the five years before covid.  They have a way to go to get back there again.  It’s doable for sure and will be even more doable if the manufacturers can address the quality issues that still present themselves on new units.  Ask me how I know, more about that in an upcoming video, I’m sure.

I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that 2026 shipments may push up a bit (not wildly) for no other reason than the average number of shipments has leveled off at a lower level.  That plus the fact that travel trailers are in negative territory and they’ll probably do a lot more deals at the dealerships to move that inventory now.

As I said, it could be, if you are brave, a buyers’ market.