Despite a rough year in 2020, most automakers have recorded incredible sales figures. Rolls-Royce has set a new sales record, GM has had a brilliant start to 2021, and BMW M smashed records in 2020 too. So as a whole, the pandemic's effects on the auto industry have not been excessively negative. However, at this time last year, executives at these large corporations were beginning to worry. April 2020 was in the middle of the most uncertain period of the pandemic's worst days, but just how bad were things then? A new report by Automotive News has shone some light on just how much better things have gotten in just a year.

Things haven't been going perfectly though - a chip shortage is eating away at dealer reserves, and there seem to be very few solutions to the problem out there, but still, most automakers have performed very well. Overall, "industry sales rose 110 percent last month". At Toyota alone, April volume increased by 183 percent to 239,311 units - a record for the company. At Ford, deliveries rose 65 percent, spurred on by SUV and crossover volumes more than doubling while pickup sales rose by 48 percent. American Honda also saw improvement, with its April deliveries increasing by 171 percent, giving the brand a best-ever volume figure of 140,023. Subaru set an April sales record too, delivering 61,389 vehicles, an increase of 101 percent.

Korean automakers have stood out too, with Hyundai seeing a 146-percent rise in retail volume. Sister company Kia recorded a 121-percent increase to 70,177, while Hyundai Motor Corporation's luxury arm Genesis saw a whopping increase of 309 percent, thanks mostly to the GV80 SUV outselling the brand's three sedan offerings. Essentially, pretty much every automaker has had a much better April this year than they did last year, but the issue of inventory is still a large elephant in the room: the report says that light-vehicle supplies have fallen by more than 1.25 million units across the industry. Hopefully, the global chip shortage is resolved soon and automakers can capitalize on spring sales once again.