Perhaps this news upset by the penanti Ram hybrid present in the market. “Truckers don’t want to buy hybrids” Ram Trucks CEO Fred Diaz firmly put that notion on ice when he bluntly said.
Not that fans of the anti-hybrid Ram, I think is a wrong decision if Ram reports will not offer a hybrid to consumers. General Motors’ full-size hybrid trucks have failed to set the market on fire, and there’s little indication Chrysler’s would either, unless the automaker were to offer them at an extremely favorable price point. That seems unlikely.
But for now, it seems that the only hybrid pickup trucks Ram will offer are the recently announced plug-in models that were developed using federal stimulus funds via a $48 million American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grant and a separate $5 million grant from the Canadian government. A total of 140 PHEV Ram trucks will be offered to fleet customers within the next several months.
Either way, the good news for mileage-conscious pickup truck buyers is that Diaz suggested other technologies from Fiat are likely to make their way to the Ram Trucks division at some point.