LITTLE ROCK — Chrysler is getting ready to roll out a manly minivan. (Your one-liner goes here.) The carmaker isn’t talking, but the Wall Street Journal got the low-down from dealers who’d been briefed about the plan to splash testosterone on America’s favorite Mom Mobile, the Dodge Grand Caravan.
According to the Journal, the “man van” will likely be based on a prototype displayed at the 2008 North American International Auto Show in Detroit. That model featured a hood scoop with an air vent over the engine, a macho orange exterior and black leather seats with red stitching. Suggested moniker: The Chrysler Viagra.
It won’t be an easy sell, especially against the resonant authenticity of Toyota’s “Swagger Wagon” campaign. Those ads-a suburban-square family’s hip-hop ode to its faithful Sienna-celebrate the essence of the minivan’s appeal: It’s all about cup holders and cargo space.
The minivan’s soccer-mom niche is so pronounced that Chevrolet once underwrote a magazine, Kick, to serve as a vehicle for its ads.
We’ve never known anyone, man or woman, who reveled in driving a minivan, but that didn’t stop it from selling like gangbusters for 20 years, peaking at 1.4 million in 2000. The thing has room for a stroller, 12 bags of groceries and six kids who aren’t touching each other. So what if it looks like a lunchbox on wheels?
We’re not the only ones who think so, by the way. An October 2009 article in Journal of Mammology found that hungry bears prowling the parking lots in Yosemite National Park late at night went straight for the minivans. Researchers hypothesized that this was due partly to the high likelihood of a payoff-cold french fries between the seat cushions, halfempty juice boxes on the floor-and partly because bears are adept at popping open those side windows, kind of like a beer can. Now that’s manly.
Judging from the Internet feedback, the man van is DOA, unless Chrysler somehow finds a way to make it look like a Camaro. “For most men, a minivan means castration,” said thesmokingtire.com. “Call us when it’s got a hemi,” cracked jalopnik.com. No respect. That’s been the story since the mid-’90s, when SUVs started muscling the minivans aside. Sales have dropped by more than half in the last five years. But minivans get better mileage than the SUVs, and that could fuel a comeback. The hood scoop? Not so much.
The minivan is always going to be the car you need, not the car you want. That’s true for drivers of either gender. A new study by truecar.com, which measures industry trends, shows that women are attracted to cute little girly cars like Volkswagen’s New Beetle or the Mini Cooper, or to small SUVs like Kia’s Sportage or Honda’s CR-V. In study after study after study, guys go for the Ford F-series pickup, Chevy Silverado, Toyota Tundra-anything that looks like it’s on steroids, basically. The minivan isn’t near the top of either list, and we all know why. It’s never going to be your first choice, unless you’re a bear.
Perspective, Pages 78 on 07/25/2010