Yes, this is one of the biggest challenges with EV mandates, because you see different uptake levels and demand levels depending on where you are in the country. In urban areas, you'll see dealerships that have significant demand for this. In rural areas, in some instances you'll be lucky if you sell a single EV in a year. This is the problem with trying to force a mandated sales target.
What happens as a manufacturer is that you have to balance this equation among your sales. If you have a dealership in a rural part of Canada where 90% of vehicle sales are combustion engine pickup trucks, for example, when that dealership goes to order its vehicles, it now will be told, “We can't give you that full order. We have to give you electric.”
That's even if you have never had someone come through the door saying that they would like to purchase an electric vehicle. The result is that the dealer has to carry that inventory and then eventually end up selling the vehicle at a loss.
If this is truly about inventory, that problem has been solved. There are more models than ever. We just released a survey this morning from Leger, in which we asked Canadians what their biggest barrier is to EV adoption. The last choice they picked—11% of respondents—was inventory challenges. It is a non-factor. If you want an EV, you can find one. You can buy one.
We need to actually focus on helping people make the switch and not forcing them to.