{"id":1876104,"date":"2026-04-10T13:25:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T10:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1876104"},"modified":"2026-04-10T13:25:00","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T10:25:00","slug":"which-automaker-should-make-a-new-pickup-truck-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1876104","title":{"rendered":"Which Automaker Should Make A New Pickup Truck Next?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Pickup trucks are by far the most popular vehicles in the\u00a0United States \u2014 Ford alone sold more than 828,000 F-Series models last year \u2014 and it seems like new trucks are getting introduced or teased all the time. Just this week Kia confirmed it’s working on a body-on-frame pickup<\/a>, and Hyundai is doing the same<\/a>, both to be introduced by 2030. Ford is soon coming out with a new compact electric truck<\/a>,\u00a0Ram is bringing back the Dakota<\/a>,\u00a0and we’re waiting with bated breath for trucks from startups like\u00a0Scout<\/a> and Slate<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But which automaker should be next to introduce a new pickup truck? That’s the question I’m posing to you today. Your answer can be from a company that’s never made a pickup, one that used to make pickups but doesn’t anymore, or from a brand that makes lots of trucks. I’ll accept answers from all sorts of different segments too, whether you want a cheap, affordable truck from a mainstream automaker, or something wild and expensive from,\u00a0I don’t know, Lamborghini.\u00a0A Lambo truck would be pretty cool.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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There’s one company that’s made pickups in the past but no longer does that I think needs to get back to it: Subaru. Where the hell is a new Baja, Subaru? It seems like such a no-brainer. Produced from 2002 to 2006, the Baja<\/a> was essentially an Outback with a bed and more whimsical styling cues. It had a useful midgate feature, a surprising amount of cargo space, and an available turbo engine and manual transmission. Plus it just looked freakin’ cool, and you could get it in yellow<\/a>!<\/p>\n

The Baja wasn’t exactly a sales success, but these days I think a new Baja would be a more palatable proposition. Midsize trucks have seen a surge in popularity in recent years \u2014 just look at the Ford Maverick \u2014 and I think the latest generation of Outback<\/a> would be a great basis for a new Baja. It would certainly look truckier and perform well off-road, especially as Subaru would have to do a Wilderness version<\/a>.\u00a0Or maybe Subaru could spin a new Baja off of the great Trailseeker EV<\/a> to do battle with\u00a0Ford’s upcoming compact truck. Regardless of how Subaru does it, I think the industry is ready for a Baja revival.<\/p>\n

But what about you? Which automaker do you think needs to make a new truck, and what sort of truck should it be? Let me know in the comments, and I’ll round up my favorite answers next week.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pickup trucks are by far the most popular vehicles in the\u00a0United States \u2014 Ford alone sold more than 828,000 F-Series models last year \u2014 and it seems like new trucks are getting introduced or teased all the time. Just this week Kia confirmed it’s working on a body-on-frame pickup, and Hyundai is doing the same, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,247],"class_list":["post-1876104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-jalopnik-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1876104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1876104"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1876104\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1876104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1876104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1876104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}