Last of their Breed

RobertRyan wrote:

ShinerBock wrote:

RobertRyan wrote:

No death of the car base killed them and the increasing sophistication of the Asian sourced Pickups. They still have many admirers who bought them instead of Pickups.

They may still have admirers just like there are some that still admire El Camino's or Ranchero's. However, there is either not enough admirers or the Asian sourced smaller versions of the American 4 door pickup is more practical for more people.


Most ute's were single cab's just like most pickup trucks were back in the day so you had to trade off a pick up bed for room for the family. Once frame material was strong enough and smaller pickups started having more than a two doors, then people who wanted a pickup didn't have to sacrifice family space as a trade off. Then Australia and the world finally found out why we American's like our pickups so much. Most ute's continued to be majorly single cabs (due to their unibody no frame car design) and were less practical for a family than the smaller 4 door version of American pickups.

We already had Pickups( including the F150, F250/F350 plus the Japanese Pickups) in Australia they and they did not sell well at all . In recent times Asian sourced Pickups have become more sophisticated and car like. Still Pickups have a patchy performance in Australia, SUV's being preferred. If there had been Australian management teams in both Ford and Holden they would have retained the traditional utes as well as the Pickups. In Holdens case that has become painfully clear.Ford and Holden have lost an enormous amount of market share shutting down local production and products