It’s a stereotype more threadbare than a pair of old chaps, but just like 72-ounce steaks, Stetson hats, and the God-given right to poke bullet holes in road signs, it’s no exaggeration: Texas likes its trucks.
Pickups account for roughly a quarter of the state’s new-vehicle sales, counting for a remarkable 20 percent of the nation’s truck market. Plying the state’s ever-expanding highway network, gearheads like us can’t help but notice rows upon rows of pickup trucks, parked as they are on both stagnant Dallas freeways and dealer lots.
It’s no wonder then that pickup truck manufacturers market these trucks specifically to Texans.
At the moment, every single purveyor of pickup trucks in America offers some sort of Texas-exclusive trim line or optional package. Ram claims to have started the trend way back in 2002 with a special edition built for the Lone Star state. As any good marketer will tell you, there’s no plate like chrome and Texas-exclusive packages tend to make the entire truck a lot shinier.
Ram showed its newest trim level reserved solely for the everything-is-bigger market, the Lone Star Silver Edition, available with either a Pentastar V6, Hemi V8, or EcoDiesel V6 in a myriad of cab and box configurations. The $900 package piles on the exterior chrome, adds polished six-spoke 20-inch wheels, front tow hooks, and special badging that customers couldn’t wait to get their hands on. Inside, customers can choose from buckets trimmed in cloth and vinyl or a Texas-sized bench seat, allowing your buckle bunny to scoot alongside while driving to the rodeo.
Capitalizing on the broad overlap on the Venn Diagram of truck owners and football fans, Ford introduced a Dallas Cowboys edition of its best-selling F-150 at the State Fair, replete with the Cowboys star on its flanks and rim caps, which are affixed to chrome 20-inch wheels. Unlike the Limited trim, which is limited to exactly how many Ford can make and customers will buy, the Cowboys edition will reportedly only have a total run of 400 trucks, and each truck will bear a “1 in 400” interior badge. Ford has been Official Vehicle of the Dallas Cowboys for more than two decades, so this marketing tie-up makes a lot of sense in the nation’s largest truck market. Texas customers can lasso this package on the XLT trim of the F-150.
Even the Nissan Titan, which sells at the rate of glacier progression when compared to the Detroit Three, introduced a Texas-exclusive trim at the State Fair, called the Texas Titan. Nissan doubled down on its Texas two-step by announcing its intention to offer the trim on both its Cummins-powered and Endurance V8 Crew Cab models with the choice of two- and four-wheel drive. Pardon me while I grin, as signing the note on a 2WD Texas-edition anything is akin to ordering a salad at a steakhouse. In its effort, Nissan ladles on the chrome and installs a Sirius XM radio permanently tuned to Prime Country.
For its part, Toyota doubled down and moved its entire operation to Texas, assembling every Tundra in San Antonio. Their 1794 Edition, available anywhere, takes its name from the year the ranch — on which the Toyota plant now sits — was founded. Interestingly, the Texas-specific trucks “made by” Toyota are not made by Toyota. They’re reportedly put together by Toyota’s private distributor for the Gulf coast states, Gulf Coast Toyota, and are not necessarily officially marketed through Toyota’s U.S. corporate operations.
We all know about GM’s Texas Edition: Jack gave away badges earlier this year to a few lucky (?) readers. We hear the winners now wear spurs to work and have a habit of lighting matches off their face. For 2017, the chrome-bedazzled Texas Edition shows up as an option on LT and LTZ trims of the Silverado, adding dual-zone climate control, a remote starter, and other goodies along with the requisite Texas Edition badging. It’s very similar (minus the badges) to the All-Star Edition available in the rest of the country. Deviating from its competitors, GM applies this trim not just to pickups, but to the Tahoe and Suburban for the not-insignificant sum of $3,110.
Driving a Ram 1500 up to Southfork Ranch (review later today) gave me a lot of time to think about this unique market. In some cases, special edition trucks built and marketed specifically for roads just north of the Rio Grande are simple badge jobs. Some, like the Cowboys F-150, are created for a specific marketing goal. One thing’s for sure: the unassailable Texas pride is enough to guarantee these trucks will play in Plano.
[Images: © 2016 Matthew Guy/The Truth About Cars, FCA, Ford, GM]
“Texas likes its trucks.”
How is that special when light truck variants account for 60% of new US vehicle sales?
Pickups are about 12% of the US new car market. “Trucks” are almost everything that’s not a straight sedan or coupe.
WSJ says “light trucks” so I’m guessing frame-mates. Gotta ass a meeting now or I’d re-find the link.
“there’s no plate like chrome”
Nice.
If it don’t go, chrome it.
Can one call “shiny plastic” chrome since chroming is a metal electroplating process?
just an interesting footnote, my dad used to affix a 4×8 sheet of plywood to the front of his pickups when towing them behind his dump trucks. He’d attach them directly to the chrome grill. You’d never be able to do that today.
Chrome can also be a color. ;-)
Her Favorite Color is Chrome – Trace Adkins.
Funny.
Someone asked “Finishing.com” Is chrome a color?
Answer:
“Chromium is an element, a metallic element. Chrome is slang for chromium.”
Trace Adkins is too big to argue with anyways.
Next you’re gonna tell me there’s no such thing as a “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk.” :-P
Badonkadonk – An ‘ebonic’ expression for an extremely curvaceous female behind. Women who possess this feature usually have a small waist that violently explodes into a round and juicy posterior (e.g., 34c, 24, 38). Other characteristics would be moderately wide hips and a large amount of booty cleavage (i.e, depth of butt-crack).
I love the “violently explodes into a round and juicy posterior”
LOL
2wd trucks are very common in TX. At one point 10 years ago I remember reading it was the largest market for 2wd pickups.
I’d certainly hope 2wd is common there. Texans are supposed to know their trucks, 2wd trucks drive meaningfully nicer than a a 4wd ones stuck in 2hi, and in most of the state, it never snows, and the tallest hill in sight, is a freeway overpass.
Side note: Chaps are two pieces of leather with fasteners. The can’t get threadbare.
I just wanted to join the crowd of nitpickers who troll this website… Nice article.
No no, this is actually good to know, and helps improve writing for the future.
FOG – “cruisers” on Harley’s and of men thank you for that factoid.
You guys remember that scene in “Casino” where the rich Rancher-cum-Commissioner shows up to tell Sam Rothstein that he’d better rehire the troublesome-but-connected nephew of his? There’s that pan over the designer cowboy boots.
That’s what I imagine the guys driving the high-end versions of these “Texas” edition vehicles are like.
Most of the “Texan by the grace of God” people are all hat no cattle.
Of all the odd tribal identities to cling to, that one seems the most persistent. Scandinavians in Minnesota don’t claim to be actual vikings and wear axes and pelts, Mexican Americans in LA don’t claim to be actual conquistadors dressed like Cortez, Boston blue bloods don’t go to work in a tri-cornered hat. But Texans wear the signifiers of a culture their ancestors belonged to every day. To the office, to weddings, to mundane trips to the post office, they’re playing dress up in the course of their ordinary suburban lives. Its really strange if you think about it.
Because the cowboy hat and boots are 1. Much, /much/ newer than any of those other clothing items you mentioned, and 2. Able to be integrated well into modern Western business or workwear (I mean Western as in “the Western world,” not just the American West).
I myself own a pair of roper boots, and my father actually wore a pair (until very recently) as his only work boots, because they’re quicker to get on and off than laced boots.
I see a problem with your logic. Texan’s are doing what their ancestors have done IN TEXAS. People living in Minnesota moved away from where the Vikings were, but you can bet many of them still walk around in farming boots and overalls as “fashion” statements. Have you seen how some of the Mexicans in LA dress and how they dress up their rides? Nothing even needs to be said about the blue blood comment, it is just foolish.
I haven’t played baseball in forty years but I don a ball cap and spikes once a week to mow my lawn because the hill is fricking steep. I wear a fedora at times when I go out to more formal settings to keep the hole in my hair from peeling because of the sun, but I not packing a tommy gun (probably because I don’t own one, to be honest).
Wearing a cowboy properly in Texas is just plain smart. Cowgirls like it. You go with what works.
Talk of fedoras and folks wearing the clothes of their ancestors makes me think of my orthodox Jewish neighborhood. Kinky Friedman would stand out here.
Actually, I do have a pair of steel toed cowboy boots left over from one year’s shoe allowance when I worked at DuPont. I’ve never felt comfortable in them because the relatively high heel makes me feel like I’m pitched forward.
“Pardon me while I grin, as signing the note on a 2WD Texas-edition anything is akin to ordering a salad at a steakhouse.”
They probably serve quite a bit of salad along with their steaks. 2WD trucks, and even Jeeps are very popular in Texas. If someone is buying an interstate cruiser, no need for 4×4 in a Gulf state.
Up here, people use the 3 days a year where there is actual snow covering the road to spend an extra couple grand on their truck parasitic driveline losses to justify 4×4 boulevardier.
danio3834 – very true. My dad worked in some extremely remote areas and never owned a 4×4. I do recall as a child though being with him and getting towed behind a Cat. One did get good at putting on tire chains. Even myself, I don’t use 4×4 that much. If the roads are that bad I’d rather keep my family home. I went to plenty of funerals for friends of my dad’s who died in bad weather. That is the point people don’t realize, you don’t need to be out there.
Danio3834-off topic, I would like your advice, I want to buy a used Chrysler 300, and if correct, you owned two. What set up would you recommend?, I am leaning toward the V6, I just need something I can take on 5 hour trips. What do you think of the 300 in general? I hear all the reliability problems but I have always been a Chrysler fan.
Any thoughts are appreciated.
Thanks
These trucks will play in Plano, Frisco, The Colony, etc, but will they play in Highland Park, University Park, and Preston Hollow?
So is someone from TTAC giving away some RAM badges?
Speaking of which, I never got my “Texas Edition” badge from Jack? WTH?
I meant to say, he never actually sent them out. Sorta like the t-shirt I won three years ago.
“Even the Nissan Titan, which sells at the rate of glacier progression when compared to the Detroit Three”
That is damning commentary on Titan sales since glaciers in North America are regressing not progressing.
Had to look it up at Tim’s site. Titan seems to be turning up in Sept. Best month in a while over 2,400, nothing for any of the other fullsizes to worry about thou.
mopar4wd – 14k on the hood in Canada. That will help sell a few Titan XD’s.
if they don’t break out the XD’s figures separately, that would explain why. the Cummins diesel would be a huge “why buy” for some people.
What really is akin to getting salad at a steak house, is ponying up for a Texas edition of the most Texan vehicle available, and only getting something as mundane as a chrome grill. You can get that anywhere. Talk about scam! What happened to gen-u-wiine Texan cattle horns? And what about standard gun racks and/or scabbards? And a bumped roofline for the Stetson? Heck, and while we’re at it, what about swapping the pedals out for some cable connected stirrups?
As a Texan, pickup truck lover and former pickup truck owner (ok, ok it was a Nissan Hardbody but still….), the King Ranch perfectly fits all you need in Texas. “Texas Edition” is just cheesy.