Mahindra to bring real mini trucks back to the US

A blog that I like called Kicking Tires had a post about a real compact pickup that an Indian company called Mahindra is trying to build in the US and sell here. It’s kinda on that ugly tip, if you know what I mean, but it’s as close to that ’80s mini-truckin’ ideal that I’ve seen in ages. The first model is supposed to have an economical 4 cylinder engine that gets about 35mpg on the highway, and a diesel hybrid with unknown specs is due out after that. It’s small, but if it’s halfway tough, I could use it on my little ranch pretty easily, don’t have to worry much about street cred when you’re hauling alfalfa.

When I was a teen, the mini truck lowrider thing was big, and I had dreams of a little Toyota (with Toy on the tailgate?) lowrider, or maybe a Nissan Hardbody with a whopping 134 horsepower engine. They were actually fun and could even be used as trucks until they were dropped super low, and if I remember right, they got close to 30mpg with a manual. The Americans and the Japanese have moved away from real mini trucks, a Tacoma or Frontier from today are definitely a notch up, and while the Colorado from Chevy is about as close as anyone makes these days, they’re still a bit too big for their engines according to reviews, and I’ve read things like “don’t place too much weight across the top of the bed, like in a toolbox, because it collapses the bed.” Anything on the internet can be taken with a grain of salt, but it’s definitely affected how I look at them. I remember when I could have bought a brand new Isuzu pickup in 88 or 89 for like $7,500. No A/C, no power windows, maybe a radio, and it’s pretty hard to find something like that these days. (They’re theoretically available from all the expected manufacturers, but just try to find a stripped Tacoma on a lot somewhere.)

This Mahindra, which is expected to be manufactured in Ohio to avoid the dreaded Chicken Tax, is not an automatic buy for me, it would be an expected $22,000 for a small, not-luxurious work vehicle, manufactured in the US by an unknown (to me) manufacturer, etc. But I’m interested. And a diesel hybrid could get 60 or 70 mpg in a small vehicle like this, that would be hard to overlook when I’m comparison shopping. General Motors continues to say that hybrids are too expensive to manufacture and that the public isn’t interested; granted, people buy pickups and Suburbans even with rapidly rising prices. But Toyota can’t keep the Prius in stock. It could be a Japanese thing, like Sony did with the Playstation III and Nintindo did with the WII at Christmas – just hint that there might not be enough to go around, and watch people pound your door down.

The big manufacturers aren’t really listening to their customers; if you told the local coffee shop that they should start to sell Red Bull, they’d say, “No, people don’t want Red Bull, they only ask for coffee when they come in here, so that proves there’s no demand for Red Bull.” People buying what you happen to sell doesn’t mean that you’ve perfectly met their needs. There’s something to be said for sticking to what you know, and more companies ought to, actually, but fuel-efficient cars and trucks can be sold, right here, right now. Car companies are like the record industry these days – they don’t want a broad product range that addresses many different customers’ needs, they want to repackage two or three vehicles into 10 different cars and hope for one breakout, superstar success. A moderate seller isn’t worth keeping on the roster.

That leaves the niches wide open. A small, independent company will not come up with the next Civic. But they could come up with the next Jeep, something that started out very simple and purpose-built. And a smaller, independent company will definitely come up with the next EV1. I don’t blame the big guys for being profit focused, but whenever I hear things that hint that “market forces” steer them just fine, I have to laugh. If Dodge sells big pickups, big SUVs, big Jeeps, and big minivans, that’s what people will buy from them. If that’s not what I want, and that’s all that they have, I can’t exactly help them steer their product lines to meet my needs. “Hi, consumer! We’re here to give you anything you want! Huge? Poorly built? How about an extended warranty? Can we tempt you with something gas guzzling? Empty promises of reliability? Whatever you want, anything!” The big guys may be right – maybe not a single person in the US wants an electric car, for example. The best proof they have is that nobody’s buying them right now, though, so it’s a little silly. Know why more people don’t buy beer at McDonalds in the US? THEY DON’T SELL IT.

That being said, I don’t envy the big automakers. If they take a chance on something different, smaller for example, the media complains “it’s too small.” If they make it bigger, the reviews all say, “it’s OK, but it’s too bad it had to get so much bigger.” I remember when every Saab review ended with a complaint about the weird-looking hatchback and the position of the ignition switch. So Saab did some cars without the weird-looking hatchbacks, and suddenly all the reviews said, “It’s an OK car, but I sure miss that quirky Saab look that came with the hatchback – boy was that practical.” Can’t win. That partly comes from the superstar mentality; every car and truck from the big automakers needs to be loved in every way by everyone everywhere. A little company could thrive on selling 2,000 vehicles, even less, and maybe we’ll see some competition. Between 1900 and 1908, there were almost 500 car manufacturers – how cool would it be if we had smaller, regional companies that made vehicles that their local customers wanted? Alaskans probably need different cars than New Yorkers. Someone in Nebraska could have a vehicle that suited them and so could someone who lived in Gulf Coast Florida or Baja California.

If I was smarter, richer, better educated, more skillful, and more motivated (a totally different person, basically) I’d have to seriously consider taking a stab at it myself. It’s hard to believe that all entrepreneurial activity should be strictly in the realm of MySpace clones and internet advertising.

Popularity: 7% [?]