Ask the Editors: Is the Side-by-Side Market Saturated?
This is an excellent question- one that warrants a deeper examination. Side-by-sides have been a round a lot longer than most people realize. In fact going as far back as the early 1980s companies like Cushman and Toro were creating side-by-side seated equipment designed for landscaping/ outdoor work. Often times these early UTVs contained dump beds, 4-stoke engines and 3-wheels. John Deere also got into this market fairly early with their 5-wheeled AMT line (which dates back to 1987).
The Japanese companies dabbled in the market as well with machines like the Kawasaki Mule (released in 1988) Honda was experimenting with performance upright-seated off-road vehicles as far back as 1987 with their Odyssey (and later Pilot) but what really heated things up were when Polaris released the Ranger in 1997 and Yamaha the Rhino in 2004. What machines like these did was prove that side-by-side vehicles could do more than just work the grounds of baseball stadiums. There was performance to be found in a design that put driver and passenger inside rather than atop of and emerging technologies like all-wheel-drive and CVT automatic transmissions meant they could potentially go just about anywhere their ATV cousins could as well.
Like anything that inspires consumer spending on a grand scale, the SxS market exploded. Before long most of the major ATV manufacturers had entries in the segment and because there was still a very large work/ utility base, we had entries from manufacturers who typically shied away from the ATV side of things; brands like Bobcat, Kubota, Cub Cadet, John Deere, Bush Hog, Case, Massey Furguson, New Holland, Husqvarna and so on.
As if this weren’t enough, another segment was born amidst all this- the performance category. Lines the Polaris RZR, Can-Am Maverick, Arctic Cat Wildcat and most recently, Yamaha YXZ proved that side-by-sides were capable of intense speed, snappy performance, catching air and ruling wide open spaces (like the desert) as well as tackling technical terrain.
Even still new niches and categories are constantly being added to the fold. In recent years Polaris has introduced the Sportsman ACE – a single seater sporty model that doesn’t even fit into a category (after all, you can’t really call a single seat model a side-by-side) while brands like Yamaha and Can-Am have been introducing models designed to carry six passengers. Other newly formed marques like Hunt-Ve are targeting electric motor and hybrid UTVs.
Market saturation occurs when there are so many choices, consumers simply stop purchasing. Amazingly, while the side-by-side scene is indeed up to options well into the hundreds with more arriving by the month, it seems consumers are still showing support with their checkbooks. We can see why going in to buy a new model could be intimidating but remember that somehow sales are remaining consistent enough to keep all of these companies in the red.
Take a look at a sampling of the Side-by-Side offerings for 2016 by clicking here.
