Santa Cruz's Are Starting to Arrive

[bombast]

I'll give the Santa Cruz exterior a small acknowledgement to looking somewhat outdoorsy, but adventurous? Not so much. Haven't seen any sort of off-road-ish videos on YT either - the most off-road video is their own ad where someone drives it on a dirt road into the foothills of Santa Cruz - adventure maybe, but not really off the beaten path.

By adventurous, I mean "Let's go walking on the Appalachian trail for a couple days, then take our Kayaks down to the river," not mudding. I live in the woods near said trail, and I see that kind of vehicle all the time. SUVs that have never seen a mud puddle but who's drivers spend a lot of time outdoors.

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[TruckGuySC]

By adventurous, I mean "Let's go walking on the Appalachian trail for a couple days, then take our Kayaks down to the river," not mudding. I live in the woods near said trail, and I see that kind of vehicle all the time. SUVs that have never seen a mud puddle but who's drivers spend a lot of time outdoors.

Sorry but Subaru already has that market.. and they actually have light off-road chops too!

 

[JASmith]

The SC = pint-sized Ridgeline. End of story. And RL sales speak for themselves.

LOL, that's the argument that "real truck" hardliners made because the Ridgeline is unibody crossover/suv based and not on a frame, same as the Maverick...

It will be interesting to see the % of Mavs ordered w the FX4 package - that is the percentage of buyers SC has chosen to reject.

Well, I mean what is the FX4 package really? Its selective drive mods like sand mud and ruts for its AWD system, hill decent control, skidplates, and a wheel/tire package. SC has those drive modes, the same 8.6" of ground clearance, I believe it has slightly better departure angle, hill decent control, underbody plates although plastic rather than metal.

You don't have to like the SC, but the SC is objectively more similar on paper to the Maverick than any other vehicle, and certainly as close competitors as a Ram and F150 or Civic and Corolla.

 

[Rxturbo7man]

I understand, my argument is that you're a victim of marketing, not actual major differences in the hardware. Like stamping a piece of plastic with a slogan "Built Ford Tough" doesn't really change anything but the image they are trying to project.

Speaking of slogans, IMO the reason for not calling the Santa Cruz a "pickup" is because they are trying to capture part of the market that rejects traditionalist pickup culture, hence why it uses a more left-wing appropriate "Made in California" logo stamped into the brake lights like you'd see on an apple product, instead of "Made in America" logo perhaps w/ an American flag that would appeal more to right-wing nationalistic types. Their commercials unlike say a Ram 1500 one instead of showing some middle-aged farmer putting the vehicle to work shows a young hipster girl band loading up their gear in the back of what looks like some San Francisco venue.

The whole reason that it took 6 years for the Santa Cruz to come to market after its initial concept car was that they determined the at the time new (now last gen) Tucson platform was not strong enough for truck duty. The new Tucson/Santa Cruz platform was thus designed from the ground up to be more heavy duty, and some of the components on the SC are from the larger Santa Fe.

Generally speaking, the main purpose of a pickup isn't its offroad worthiness (I'd argue most pickup sales are for on-road focused trims) but to tow and haul stuff, and the payload and tow rating of the SC are comparable to the Maverick, turbo vs turbo. On the base trims, the SC actually tows 1500lbs more. Here's a video showing the SC towing a boat and the AWD system handling a poorly maintained launch area, seems to do fine:

Was listening to Newt Gingrich's podcast the other day, was surprised to hear a Santa Cruz ad played, if Hyundai is marketing to a "left-wing" audience, Gingrich's show is probably not the place to advertise.

 

[Nw_adventure]

I'll give the Santa Cruz exterior a small acknowledgement to looking somewhat outdoorsy, but adventurous? Not so much. Haven't seen any sort of off-road-ish videos on YT either - the most off-road video is their own ad where someone drives it on a dirt road into the foothills of Santa Cruz - adventure maybe, but not really off the beaten path.

Then there is the interior. Which screams I don't know, latte and soccer practice? Nary an adventure to be found inside that cabin. I would say it looks good against a 10 year old Infiniti, and the top line trim does look like luxury, which is nice...but not adventurous. Everything below the leather interior (i.e. spend less than $40K) and it looks like utter garbage. Just a trash boring interior. They had a concept, call it adventurous, and make it look like anything else from their line-up in the last decade on the inside. Sorry, whoops, your bad!

Then you have the Maverick - looks good (great to me!), nothing to complain about - might not turn every head, but turning heads can be both good and bad! The interior? Looks like they hit their target market 100% - interesting, rugged, functional - that plays to everyone. Yeah its unique, and the Lariat interior is a little more of a risk (don't like it myself), but there is enough contrast between all 3 interiors that you can love one, hate the other, and Ford still comes out with a happy buyer.

 

[JASmith]

Was listening to Newt Gingrich's podcast the other day, was surprised to hear a Santa Cruz ad played, if Hyundai is marketing to a "left-wing" audience, Gingrich's show is probably not the place to advertise.

Who knows how that works, it may just be ad sense or something, where as long as its not explicitly blacklisted it will just pull from a list of ads in a central database. Here's an example commercial to show the image the marketing team is trying to project, which focuses much more on "chill brah" image and feelings with the latter half being "woke":

Ford Maverick commercial by contrast is more about simply selling the utility if it, like a multitool for the city:


Its not that they aren't both similarly capable, just different marketing teams involved, and I like Ford's MUCH better but at the end of the day its just a commercial. Personally, I never cared much for marketing anyway, I wait for trusted reviewers to really put the machines through their paces to provide some fact over fantasy!

 

[Old Ranchero]

Ultimate test of which 1 is more "trucky"

Does the Maverick look more like an Escape compact SUV with cargo space behind rear seat opened up to make a bed?

or....

Does the SC look like more a Tuscon/Santa FE compact SUV with cargo space behind rear seat opened up to make a bed?

The Ford clearly was designed to look like other Ford trucks in existing lineup from the beginning

 

[TruckGuySC]

LOL, that's the argument that "real truck" hardliners made because the Ridgeline is unibody crossover/suv based and not on a frame, same as the Maverick...

Well, I mean what is the FX4 package really? Its selective drive mods like sand mud and ruts for its AWD system, hill decent control, skidplates, and a wheel/tire package. SC has those drive modes, the same 8.6" of ground clearance, I believe it has slightly better departure angle, hill decent control, underbody plates although plastic rather than metal.

You don't have to like the SC, but the SC is objectively more similar on paper to the Maverick than any other vehicle, and certainly as close competitors as a Ram and F150 or Civic and Corolla.

Plastic skids plates? WTF?
Well, I guess they go w soy latte and skinny jeans!
Even their ad misses the mark. It’s like it was put out by the City of Santa Cruz tourist authority… nothing about the vehicle at all…

 

[WesM]

LOL, that's the argument that "real truck" hardliners made because the Ridgeline is unibody crossover/suv based and not on a frame, same as the Maverick...

Have you seen the undercarriage of the Maverick in the recent SEMA video? You can call it unibody all you like, but the Maverick has some pretty hefty box beams built into its unibody. I would be curious to see if the SC has something similar or if they went a different rout with their engineering/design.

Products tend to be designed/engineered for a market. While I would not go by the marketing departments spiel, it does indicate what the product is trying/designed to be. Time will tell how well either of the unitrucks achieved their design goals.

 

[mav_can]

Plastic skids plates? WTF?
Well, I guess they go w soy latte and skinny jeans!
Even their ad misses the mark. It’s like it was put out by the City of Santa Cruz tourist authority… nothing about the vehicle at all…

I completely agree. It seemed to be less and less about the car as each section progressed. I mean I’m 100% sure it was intentional, but do they think it’s effective to really advertise the city the vehicle is based on, rather than the vehicle itself?

Like if the Maverick advertisement was set at a ranch with some cowboys talking about how much they love horses.

 

[Ratbones2002]

I saw one over the weekend at the Ikea in Frisco, TX

 

[TruckGuySC]

I saw one over the weekend at the Ikea in Frisco, TX

It reminds me of a better looking Subaru Baja

 

[mav_can]

It reminds me of a better looking Subaru Baja

100%. I think it's the sloped C pillar that's also on the Baja and Ridgeline that do it. Ford must have had to put a lot of effort to reinforce the C pillar while still having it more or less vertical, and I think it was an intentional choice to distinguish it from other current or historical vehicles of the class.

Hopefully it sells better than the Baja.

 

[JASmith]

It reminds me of a better looking Subaru Baja

Yeah, the Baja's party trick with being able to pass through into the cab is a really nice missing feature though.

100%. I think it's the sloped C pillar that's also on the Baja and Ridgeline that do it. Ford must have had to put a lot of effort to reinforce the C pillar while still having it more or less vertical, and I think it was an intentional choice to distinguish it from other current or historical vehicles of the class.

Hopefully it sells better than the Baja.

A vertical back is more practical though for people that want to add a bed rail system. You can still do it with a angled one but you lose some space.

 

[balucipher]

saw a full truckload of them heading into Miami yesterday, looked pretty good on the truck

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