Americans love big cars. Big EVs, however, are a harder sell.
Stellantis, the multinational car conglomerate, acknowledged as much on Friday.
The company said it would be discontinuing production of Ram’s much-hyped REV 1500, a full-sized EV pickup truck that was supposed to be the brand’s flagship response to Ford’s F-150 Lightning.
Stellantis said in an announcement that it’s “reassessing its product strategy” as demand for full-size EV trucks “slows in North America.”
The company was already facing its own set of issues, relying on fading brands such as Chrysler and Jeep without offering buyers a fresh product line. A new CEO stepped up in May as Stellantis embarked on a multi-year turnaround plan.
However, Stellantis is not alone in its challenges selling Americans big electric trucks.
Some of the most popular EV trucks in the US, from Ford’s F-150 Lightning to Tesla’s Cybertruck, have seen year-over-year declines in sales this second quarter, according to estimates from Cox Automotive.
It’s a trend that reaffirms what Ivan Drury, director of insights at Edmunds, told Business Insider about the EV truck business: “The hype versus the reality just wasn’t there.”
Full-sized pickup trucks were once seen as the “holy grail of EV adoption,” Drury said in an interview. But a combination of challenges — some related to selling trucks in general — has slowed that down, he said.
“It’s such a loyalty-based market, and because people are so deeply ingrained with their current brand, there was a lot against them from the get-go,” Drury said of automakers. “But couple that with very high costs compared to ICE (internal combustion engine) equivalents … just the outright cost being much higher is already a problem.”
Automakers need to understand truck buyers
The ending of the EV tax credits, which essentially gave drivers a $7,500 discount on qualifying EVs, doesn’t help, as it signals weaker federal support for electrification.
Drury, however, notes that the impact of the tax credits on full-sized EV trucks was already limited. Given their high price tag, EV trucks largely didn’t qualify for the credits unless they were leased, which is not something full-sized truck buyers often do.
Data from Edmunds, which relies on dealership reports, shows a stark contrast in purchasing behavior between ICE truck drivers and EV truck drivers: In August, the lease rate for ICE trucks was around 10%; for EV trucks, it was about 54%.
“Full-size truck buyers do not lease trucks because when you use a truck, it gets a little beat up if you use it in the right way. You do aftermarket stuff to it to make it fit the purpose of why you bought it,” he said. “You can’t do that to a leased vehicle. You have to give it back the way it came.”
Truck buyers also have specific needs that the industry-wide push to electrification has to address, Drury said.
Range anxiety is a perennial issue for all EVs. For trucks, automakers face buyers who can be based in rural areas where the charging infrastructure may not be as strong as in an electrified state like California, Drury said.
Tesla aimed to address that segment with its long-range, rear-wheel drive package for the Cybertruck.
Drury said the problem is that rear-wheel drive is a limitation in states with colder weather and slippery roads.
“In cold-weather states, if you offer all-wheel drive and you offer rear-wheel drive, it’s almost a 99% take-rate on all-wheel or four-wheel drive,” Drury said.
On Friday, Tesla influencers pointed out on X that the EV maker quietly scrubbed the long-range option from its website.
Stellantis and Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.
Automakers haven’t completely given up on EVs. The pivot has just slowed down.
Honda is just one example. In May, CEO Toshihiro Mibe said the company will reduce its EV investment from $69 billion to $48.4 billion as the automaker pivots with 13 new hybrid models starting in 2027.
That’s not to say EV trucks are a complete loss. The expectations were just higher than reality, Drury said.
“It’s like they overpromised and underdelivered,” he said.
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