Whether it be for farming, recreating or some other purpose, side-by-sides have been growing in popularity. The trend looks to continue beyond 2019. Offroad customers aren’t the only ones excited about the upcoming season—powersports store owners, sales staff and others within the industry are equally stoked about the potential of UTVs. To help find the right machine for you, we asked ATV dealers across Western Canada about their most popular side-by-sides and what trends they see coming on the horizon. Here’s what they had to say about Can-Ams.
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Tom Reichert is general manager of Reichert Sales & Service in Tulameen, B.C.
What is your most popular/best-selling side-by-side?
Can-Am Defender.
Why do you think that is?
The workforce around here. Farming, stuff like that. Guys are coming off of other machines and absolutely loving the ease and suspension. The farmers are not all beat up at the end of the day. It’s a smoother ride. The Defender carries more on the back end than the other machines. They’ve been like that since day one. Each year this series has been getting stronger and stronger.
The demo program that Bombardier has been running is really working out. There are a few people who have them for recreation because three people can sit in the front seat but mostly the workforce and farmers have them. Maybe a quarter of our sales are recreational.
What current or upcoming product are you excited about?
In the side-by-side world, the performance machine has taken another huge step by upping the horsepower into a machine that’s almost race-ready.
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Chrissie Davis is service manager of Thomas Homes & RV Center in Peace River, Alberta.
What is your most popular/best-selling side-by-side?
Can-Am Defender.
Why do you think that is?
For our area, it’s absolutely what everybody uses for acreages and farms and companies.
The Defender’s got a utility dumping box and a bent seat. It’s Can-Am’s only bent seat side-by-side that has a fold-up centre console. Everything else has a bucket seat.
Longevity-wise, there’s been no issues: no first-year issues, belt issues. Everybody’s been happy with how reliable they’ve been.
What current or upcoming product are you excited about?
We have a Defender 6x6 coming out, which is pretty exciting. It’s going to be a nice addition to our lineup. We have an Outlander 6x6 ATV, and the independent suspension on it makes the travelling so smooth. We’re looking forward to that in the Defender as well.
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Ryder Grenier is parts and sales associate for Riderz in Edson, Alberta.
What is your most popular/best-selling side-by-side?
For work, the Can-Am Defender has been really big for us this year. They’ve been going out the door for work and farming.
If you’re aiming for the sport unit, the Can-Am Maverick X3, the XMR—the mud version—has been a really popular unit.
Why do you think that is?
The Can-Am Defender is considered the workhorse, but it’s still sporty. So if a guy wants to work a bit and still play on the side, it works very well.
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Rylan Plante-Crough is sales associate of Basecamp Motorsports Inc. in Calgary, Alberta.
What is your most popular/best-selling side-by-side?
Can-Am Maverick Sport 1000 DPS.
Why do you think that is?
It’s the best all-around. Mostly because of the power and the handling. The power steering is very good. It has different settings of power steering. It has more than enough power. It’s only 60 inches wide. It makes it around all the trails that we have around in Alberta and near B.C. It has some utility space. It has all the performance of the sports ones.
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Travais Johnson is sales manager of Grassland Trailer Sales Ltd. Grassland, Alberta.
What is your most popular/best-selling side-by-side?
On the sport side of things, the Can-Am Maverick X-3 is a popular one. Whereas the sport aspect, the guys under 30, those guys want the fast machines that do 110 kilometres per hour. They go with our X-3s with the turbo. The new X-3 Turbo RR pumps out 196 horsepower. Those are the popular ones. It all depends on the demographics you’re going with. Most of the young guys want an X-3.
On the other side is the Can-Am Defender. The over 30 or 40 crowd, the hunters, those kind of guys that want some performance with play, those guys go to the Defenders. They’re using the machines all year round for hunting and fishing, around the farms working, they’re taking our HD-10s or HD-8s in the Defender lineup. It’s the best of both worlds. You can have the performance and fun to play and it’s very capable for work.
It’s split, but we sell more Defenders than the X-3s. It’s a bigger market. It appeals to that age group. The Defender, across the board, is the most popular one.
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