Ford, GM and Chrysler cash in on posh pickups
......... Detroit is cashing in -- and not necessarily because of brands like Lincoln and Cadillac. Rather, it's because of high-end pickup truck and SUVs. The "luxe truck" phenomenon, dressed-up ...
Forum Discussion
Bionic Man wrote:
Again, I am not comparing dollar for dollar. If you go that route, a base truck with the diesel option is the best value for a tow vehicle, but I don't want to drive one. What I am saying is I feel there is a market for more upscale vehicles in a smaller package. Put a trim similar to (or better than) the High Country, Platinum, Longhorn, in a mid-size sedan or SUV.
Look at how many RDX/Macan/Cayenne,Q5, Q7, CLS, 3series are out there. There is a market, and it has high margins.
My truck resembles your value tow vehicle. I would not be able to afford the capacity I have with all those extras. Even the base pickups have increasing features that raise the price and lower the payload.
Although I believe there is a demand for higher trim models, I also believe that many are not affordable to average wage earners. This results in people either overextending themselves financially (a whole other issue) or the demand is not great enough to produce these vehicles in sufficient quantity to make efficient production runs on larger scaled manufacturing lines. Higher end car makers have smaller more flexible lines that can make limited product runs but could not keep up with the volume the larger manufacturers produce.
It would be interesting to see which trim models sell the most. I know I am at one extreme while this thread is asking for the opposite.
