Will you be moved?
As long as the price is not too outrageous, as long as the car with the concept of “crossover” is mass-produced, it will be a “popular” reservation. Li Bin wanted to be silent when he saw it, but Li wanted to cry when he saw it.“The best car within 5 million yuan” is too light, it should be “the best car within 100 million yuan”.
Americans, pickups are really good
In fact, as early as 1925, this kind of car was made in the United States: Ford Motor Company used its own invention of the T model as the basic structure, and transformed the rear passenger compartment into a cargo space. Henry Ford himself drove the modified car with potatoes, carrots and tomatoes on the back of the driver’s head to visit family on a suburban farm. He named it on the way: Ford Model T Runabout with Pick up Body.
The world’s first mass-produced pickup was born, and at $281, it didn’t sound cheap at all. Fortunately, its chassis, suspension, and body have been greatly reinforced, and thick reinforcements can be seen everywhere. It looks much stronger than the mass-produced T-type car, and the load capacity has also been greatly improved, reaching 0.91 tons. Although it can seat people in the front, Ford still positions it as a true truck.
The English word “Pickup Truck” began, and it quickly spread on the American continent together with the image of the “tool truck” that can be pulled by the pickup truck.
More than 30 years have passed. Over the years, Pickup has always assumed its taciturn, diligent and hard-working character as a “production tool”. The seats are uncomfortable, the cabin is not soundproofed, the steering wheel is too heavy, all these are all right. Who told us to serve the working people faithfully?
Until 1957, in order to satisfy the demands of middle-class Americans who accumulated wealth rapidly and liked to live in the countryside and suburbs, several products that laid the foundation for the transformation of pickup trucks began to come to the forefront. Ford launched the sedan-based pickup model Ford Ranchero, and Chevrolet launched El Camino, a pickup truck based on a mid-size sedan, with an exaggerated appearance and a flat design. Since it is derived from a sedan, this pickup generally has only two doors.Very much like the “illegitimate child” of sedans and traditional pickups.This crossover has an exclusive title in the United States: coupe utility. Almost all American car brands, except for the Chevrolet and Ford mentioned above, Cadillac, Dodge, Chrysler, and GMC have produced this “nondescript” product.
Since this year, pickup trucks have gotten rid of a single purpose of pulling goods, and their attributes have become diversified. But it was also from this year that the convenience of loading in the large cargo compartment of the pickup truck began to be favored by ordinary American families. After all, the number of middle-class people with money and leisure is limited, and if they want to have a surge in sales, they have to take the mass line.
In 1982, in response to the global oil crisis, General Motors, one of Detroit’s three giants, launched the full-stack self-developed compact pickup S-10 for the first time on its Chevrolet brand, with the main theme of “eat less and pull more”. Ford followed with the Ranger, a cost-effective pickup.
In 1990, the oil crisis passed smoothly, and Chevrolet began to play new tricks on pickups again, stuffing a 7.4-liter engine into a full-size pickup to create a high-performance pickup. Three years later, Ford’s high-performance division took the initiative to dominate the world with the F-150 SVT lightning, and its second generation was the famous Ford Raptor. Subsequently, the high-performance pickup was pushed to the peak by Dodge. In 2004, an 8.3-liter V10 engine was installed in the cabin of the RAM pickup, with a maximum power of 500 horsepower and an acceleration of 100 kilometers in 4.9 seconds. When a sports car sees it, they must be in awe.
The evolution history of pickup trucks in the U.S. auto market is essentially a highly condensed history of the U.S. national development: from a production tool that pulls goods to make money to make a living, it evolved to a comprehensive tool for improving the quality of life, and eventually became the most popular travel tool.Pickup trucks are the most Americanized models in the world, and they are also the cars that best represent the “American spirit”.
In the eyes of today’s American consumers, pickups are the most versatile travel tools: daily commuting, weekend vacations, stocking up in supermarkets, moving homes, towing RVs, loading kayaks, jet skis, and bicycles.Pickups can do what sedans and SUVs can and cannot do.
The trend even succeeded in mentally brainwashing the German auto industry. In 1986, a BMW M3 owner transformed his performance car into a pickup truck. In the 26 years of service of this BMW pickup, it has always been the number one transporter in the owner’s heart, because its cargo compartment is really Mrs. can be installed.
In other words, how much do American consumers have a preference for pickup trucks? Sales are proof.
In 2021, the world’s top-selling pickup truck Ford F-Series sold 878,000 units, the second-place RAM Ram series sold 649,000 units, and the third-place Chevrolet Silverado series sold 617,000 units. In the first quarter of this year, the Ford F-Series sold more than 140,000 units in the United States. A comparable data is that Tesla, which everyone thinks will sweep the world, registered 114,000 new cars in the United States in the first quarter of this year.
As the words of the American people often say reveal the truth:Play to play, play to play, don’t make jokes about pickups.
Chinese, pickup is really down
From an aesthetic point of view, pickups are tall, large and wide, and when they sit up, they have a sense of majesty in the world; from a displacement point of view, pickups start with at least a 3.0T six-cylinder, and the accelerator kicking off at a red light envy the Corolla next to them; From the above, pickup trucks have been tested by the American people for a long time. They can pull yachts and hold bricks.Except for the rough interior style, the pickup fully meets almost all the needs of Chinese consumers for a car.
Use the fashionable new car marketing language to package it inside and outside, and it can be exported like this: Pickup is an explosive model built by the product team who understands the Chinese best. temple”. No one is more afraid than us,The best car within 8 million, if you don’t believe me, take the Cullinan for a test drive!
But in fact, pickups in China have nothing to do with words such as fun, freedom, passion, ideals, and feelings.earthy truck. Not to mention the confrontation with Cullinan, even if it is compared with Wuling Hongguang, there is no chance of winning.
There are both reasons for the pickup itself and policy-oriented factors behind this: First, the size of the pickup is too exaggerated. The length of the third-generation Ford F-150 is 5930 mm, and the length of the Rolls-Royce Cullinan is only 5341 mm. mm. According to the “Regulations for On-Street Parking and Parking Spaces on Urban Roads” (GA/T850-2009): “Small parking spaces are 6000 mm long and 2500 mm wide”. The Ford F-150 barely fits within the size of an urban parking space, which is not at all friendly to pickups in urban environments.
Secondly, before January 1, 2018, if the pickup wants to drive on the road normally, it must be sprayed on the body and reflective strips like the truck. After that, although compulsory spraying was canceled, the specific measures to be implemented are different in different regions, and some places need to be sprayed. After the Ford Raptor, which has a landing price of nearly one million, was sprayed with words, the style of the painting has not been as powerful as a city SUV.
Finally, before January 1, 2019, pickups belonged to light trucks, which required not only an operating license, but also a driver’s qualification certificate. In addition to road restrictions, annual inspections, license plate restrictions, etc., ordinary users lost their desire to buy pickups , car companies are naturally reluctant to spend their time on the development of “thankful” models such as pickups, resulting in low supply and demand.
After the loosening of the policy, although the situation of pickup trucks has improved, the market feedback is still not positive enough: in 2021, the overall sales volume of pickup trucks in China will be 550,000 units, the highest in history.This year, China’s car sales were 26.275 million units, and pickups accounted for 2.1%.
Among the 550,000 units, most of the best-sellers are lesser-known niche models such as SAIC MAXUS, JAC Hutu, Foton General, and Jiangling Yuhu 7. The only one that broke the circle in both sales and volume was the Great Wall Cannon, but the sales volume was only 185,000 units, half of that of Haval H6.
In the first five months of this year, pickup trucks sold 207,000 units in China, and the sense of presence did not rise. You know, this is still in the context of the times when national policies are vigorously pushing forward.
At the end of April this year, the “Opinions on Further Unleashing Consumption Potential and Promoting the Continuous Recovery of Consumption” proposed to “implement refined management of pickup trucks entering cities, and study to further relax restrictions on pickup trucks entering cities”.
Up to now, Tianjin, Guangdong, Liaoning, Yunnan, Henan, Hubei, Shandong and other places have given the green light for pickups in large areas. On June 10, Xi’an eased restrictions on gasoline pickups. This is the first city in China to lift the ban on pickups in accordance with the General Technical Conditions for Multi-Purpose Trucks. The speed of pickups in China has been changing faster than the growth rate of sales.
Sales have not kept up with the heat.The fundamental reason is that Chinese consumers are not ready to pay for the American culture of “hardcover trucks”.Since the 1930s, pickup trucks have always been firmly labeled as “not upscale” trucks in the eyes of Chinese consumers. This label is easy to put on, but difficult to remove.
Typical usage scenarios of pickup trucks in China
To put it bluntly, pickups are excellent “tools” and “toys”, but they cannot become the “masks” that Chinese consumers care about most.
“An SUV or a sedan, even if it is the lowest configuration, has more face than a pickup truck.” Zhang Jianjian, who lives in the private sector in Guilin, told Huxiu, “There is no need to buy a pickup truck if you don’t go to the construction site.”
Consulting firm Roland Berger analyzed in the “White Paper on the Development Trend of China’s Pickup Truck Market” that the development of China’s overall pickup truck market is mainly due to the increase in the needs of users in urban and suburban areas. Wholesalers; freelancers in suburban areas; high-income groups who love to modify off-road culture.
Among them, self-employed/wholesale households with high-frequency transportation needs are the main growth point. They are the core user group of cost-effective domestic models such as Great Wall Pao and Foton General.
The high-income group who loves modified off-road culture is a high-potential “second car” consumer group. The Ford F-150 Raptor, Jeep Gladiator and other imported models with a starting price of 686,800 are the first choice for this group. The high price determines that what they buy is not a car, but the happiness and excitement brought by wealth.
You will see that China’s current pickup truck market is a typical “dumbbell-shaped”, with both low-end and high-end products and volume, but there is a lack of mid-range price models. In other words, when the Chinese pickup market began to appear Camry, Accord, Passat-style products, and the overall trend turned to “spindle”, it marked that the market really began to mature.
write at the end
In China, the pickup market is a potential soil that needs to be tapped urgently. A lead-bullet model such as the Ford F-150 is needed to break down the three-layer demand pyramid of Chinese consumers at one time.At present, it seems that the fuel pickup trucks of Chinese local brands do not yet have this capability.
But on this piece of soil, there is actually a vacuum zone that few people focus on——Pure electric pickup.Overseas, Tesla Cybertruck and RIVIAN R1T are the first to land in this category. Traditional car companies such as Ford F-150 Lighting and GM HUMMER EV pickup trucks are also turning the rudder quickly. These expensive electric toys are quickly released. It has gained triple attention from the market, capital and public opinion.
In China, apart from Geely RADAR, which was the first to sell, there is no second local auto company trying to break into the blue ocean of high-end electric pickup trucks. I hope they can be more courageous and produce less low-speed industrial waste, more for Chinese consumers. Build a real best car for $5 million.
