Big truck sales shrink along with car buyer budgets

Demand for full-size trucks has deteriorated in 2024 as affordability issues have pushed consumers to shop for cheaper options.

What’s changed:

• Purchases of large trucks dropped 4% in Q1 of this year, despite a 5.6% increase in overall vehicle sales.

• This decline has whittled away full-size pickup market share down to just 2.4%. For comparison, trucks have accounted for an average of 12% of U.S. car sales for most of the last decade.

• While not unique to this year, the loss of interest in big pickups has been meaningful in 2024. Last year, full-size truck sales actually increased for high-profile brands, helped by a resurgence in inventory.

Consumer interest has depleted faster for popular models than it has others. The Ram 1500 shed 10% of sales in Q1 2024 compared to last year, followed by Ford’s F-150 whose sales fell roughly 10%. However, it is possible that this decline in demand is starting to change course. 

In May, purchases of F-Series pickups slid only 1.6%. And while larger trucks are performing worse, demand appears to be up in other parts of the segment. For example, smaller and cheaper models, such as Ford’s Maverick (up 82% year-over-year), have seen demand skyrocket in recent months.

Bottom line: For years, Americans have been buying bigger, more expensive vehicles as low interest rates and incentives helped drive affordability. With rates now much higher than before and incentives still worth less than they were before the pandemic, it’s only natural that full-size trucks aren’t as popular as they once were. As affordability makes a comeback, it will be interesting to see whether demand will go back to normal or if the trend of buying smaller vehicles lasts for an extended period of time.

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