Why There Are So Few Pickup Trucks In Europe

there's nothing more American than

cowboy hats hotdogs Walmart and of

course pickup trucks Chevy pickups have

helped change the way America works and

plays with the best gas mileage and it's

built for take the Ford f-150 for

example it's America's best selling

vehicle and has been for 42 consecutive

years of course across the pond things

are different the best-selling cars are

typically small hatchbacks like the

Volkswagen Golf in fact you'll rarely

ever see a citizen of Denmark driving a

pickup truck so how did America fall in

love with the pickup and why didn't your

oh let's take a look

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in 1915 Chevrolet manufactured the model

490 which was aptly named after the

vehicles listing price 490 dollars but

these vehicles came with one downside

they were sold with only the frames so

customers had to purchase the body bed

and cab separately and mostly from

independent companies for an additional

hundred dollars plus the all-american

pickup truck began to pick up momentum

among the general public with the

burgeoning automotive industry after

World War one American industrialist

Henry Ford first noticed the pickup

trucks used by the US military during

the war and he predicted there to be a

market for something similar among the

American working class so here M top

production on factory built trucks like

the Ford Model T runabout which unlike

its predecessor included a pickup bit

due to this early success Ford released

its new line of pickup trucks in 1948

the f-series the f-series encompasses

both light duty and heavy duty trucks

with the continuous success of the

f-series other car companies began to

pick up on America's growing call for

pickups the chevrolet c/k now known as

the silverado was introduced in 1975 and

the first generation of the Dodge Ram in

1980 and over time they got bigger and

bigger but Europe was not taking part in

this pickup truck boom a smaller market

for pickup trucks existed but even that

consisted of more compact Japanese

models for example in the first half of

2017 eighty thousand three hundred

pickups were sold across Europe compared

that number to the pickup market in the

US where during the same period over two

hundred thousand midsize pickups and

over 1 million full-size pickups were

sold so why hasn't a pickup game steamed

in Europe well first let's get the easy

answer out of the way gas prices across

Europe are more than twice as high as

prices in the United States as of this

year in the u.s. the average price of a

gallon of gas

dollars and 40 cents in countries like

France and Italy average prices can

reach as high as six dollars and eight

cents per gallon most of the most

popular pickup trucks in America have

large fuel tank capacities so this would

set back European car owners a sizable

amount of money a year just for gas they

do use more conventional just because

aerodynamics are great they're heavy as

well so yes you do end up using more

fuel take a look at the Ford f-150 it's

tank can hold up to 36 gallons at a time

on average a driver in Europe would have

to pay around a hundred and eighty

dollars per tank fill for the f-150 but

fuel per se is not a major problem but

it will be in the future where

commercial vehicles have to reach tough

at co2 targets meaning that they have to

be at fuel efficient and there's no way

you're going to be able to do that

easily in a pickup truck because they're

pretty simple things you know if you

start adding a load of hybrid or

electric technology in there it's gonna

push the prices up to the point where

people won't be interested if you

followed even anything about French

politics presses the last let's say

year-and-a-half

you've seen probably something about the

yellow best protests happening around

cities and countries and that was

actually started because of

raising of the gas tax and so people

living in rural areas have to drive

further they spent more time on the road

and so while the gas tax was motivated

by a desire to reduce consumption

improve the environment it hit those

people much harder but gas prices don't

explain it all let's compare these two

streets which one do you think is in

Europe and which one is in the United

States it's simple

many urban European streets are thin and

pickup trucks are usually wide with the

rearview mirrors the Ford f-150 measures

a little over 6 feet tall and about 8

feet wide these measurements are

considerably larger than most European

vehicles take Europe's best-selling car

the Volkswagen Golf which is one and a

half feet smaller in both directions now

the u.s. interstate highway system calls

for standard 12 foot wide lanes in

Europe while Road measurements do vary

from country to country the minimum

width can range anywhere from 8.2 feet

to 10 point 7 feet so driving one of

these pickup trucks in an 8.2 foot lane

would definitely come with its own set

of challenges some of the urban road

systems go back to medieval times where

you know they're very nice they're very

tight when arrow and it's very difficult

to maneuver a pickup truck at some times

I mean it's not doable and people you

know but it takes a certain type of

person to the confidence thanks most

people just an actress confident enough

to to drive one of these easily every

day another reason why the pickup truck

is not as popular in Europe comes down

to Texas before consumers can start

driving their truck around they first

have to go through an extensive and more

often than not

customs clearance process the initial

step in the process involves paying an

import tax and Duty out of all the

different types of vehicles pickup

trucks have the heaviest import duties

depending on his cargo loading size the

duty can cost anywhere from 10 to 22

percent of the cost it took to important

along with this additional expense

consumers are also responsible for

paying an import tax or value-added tax

that ranges from 19 to 22 percent

depending on the country generally the

total added expenditure of the import

tax and Duty will be around a third of

the purchase price of the pickup and

once these are paid multiple forms and

documents are then required for

processing these documents are filed in

order to officially register the vehicle

within the country so this part of

customs clearance can take a significant

amount of time to complete

lastly the cultural significance of the

pickup truck in America doesn't have the

same effect on consumers in parts of

Europe the pickup truck is sort of

connected to almost this I would say

cowboy image but this sort of very most

Western independent rugged individual

persona through its appearances in films

and commercials the pickup truck has

become an icon of the rugged American

outdoors this particular aesthetic

doesn't resonate to that extent with the

large population in Europe although many

people in Europe love the outdoors they

know not necessarily wanting to present

themselves in the car they drive the

vehicle they drivers this sort of

hunting shooting fishing type in the

same way that perhaps they do in the

States also you know we don't tow in

this quite the same way despite all of

these reasons the pickup truck has seen

some spurts of growing popularity in

recent years according to data gathered

by jeido dynamics sales for the midsize

pickup in Europe increased by 19% in the

first half of 2017 this can be credited

to changes in government regulations

European countries started to enact

strict

fuel economy laws and emission standards

that cause the market for the

traditional body-on-frame SUVs like the

Land Rover Defender to dwindle these

SUVs were primarily used to haul large

cargo like trailers and boats and now

that they were discontinued European

customers had to look elsewhere for such

work crossovers forget it

their small displacement engines

wouldn't be able to provide enough

torque needed to tow heavy equipment and

thus enters the midsize pickup truck

most notably the Ford Ranger with the

exception of the Ranger there still is

little American presence in the European

truck market instead European automakers

began to build their own versions of the

All American vehicle they formed

alliances with Japanese companies to

build pickup trucks based on existing

models there are cars like the

mercedes-benz x-class and then Renault

Alaska to name a few which were both

built upon the skeletons of the Nissan

Navara unfortunately this market has

been seeing little success to continue

production so manufacturers like

mercedes-benz expect to cancel their

pickup truck lines within 2020 the

Ranger has done well at the back of that

that's about as American as it gets the

fact that the American pickup that has

defined a generation of the country's

working class and its outdoor adventure

seeking families may just continue to

struggle to see progress across Europe