Supply chains are quite complex and one or two issues like supplier plant shut downs or inventory planners making bad forecasts can create a domino effect that can take some time before things get straightened out.
A year ago, the automakers made future production plans based on the thinking we were in a big recession because of COVID.
The big recession was actually somewhat of an artificial recession caused by government ordered shut downs and stay at home orders that came in the middle of what had been a boom time in the economy. When things started to loosen up, a lot of the economy bounced back quickly, much different than how it slowly recovers from a typical recession.
Add to that people being flush with cash from government stimulus handouts and savings from being home for months not being able to take vacations, go out to dinners and shows etc, and now eager to spend the money buying things like cars.
Since the automakers had incorrectly forecast lower demand, they’d told chipmakers in Asia their orders were going to be lower and the chipmakers shifted a lot of production over to chips for electronics and such which was also increasing in demand due to people working from home and kids logging in for school from home. They can’t just shift back overnight and even if they could, delivery from Asia takes time.
Even the storm and cold causing the grid to go down in Texas messed things up as some suppliers shut down. I talked to someone recently who said he still can’t get 55 gallon barrels of bedliner material because their source in Texas shut down and had frozen pipe damage from that weather they are repairing.
It’s been a perfect storm type chain of events that will still be having repercussions long into the future.
Finding a vehicle in dealer inventory that you like will be tough for a while, you can still order vehicles if you don’t mind waiting months for delivery. Customer orders get top priority for build at the plants.