Advertisements
5 Chevrolet SSR
One of the most classically misguided attempts by an American manufacturer to create a hip, retro styled vehicle is the Chevrolet SSR. Nearly every aspect of the SSR’s design and conception is mind-boggling, but more mind-boggling is the fact that no one at Chevy realized they might be making a huge mistake. The first ridiculous feature is a hard top convertible on a pickup truck – which does the SSR the disservice of drastically reducing storage in the truck bed. Next, a matching hard top bed cover means the SSR can’t haul anything more than about a foot tall.
The SSR’s retro-inspired fender flares at the front and rear further cramped the overall utility of the truck, forcing the truck bed to remain narrow.
Even though the SSR shared an engine with the Corvette, which should have drawn in the young and sporty crowd (as its design was intended to do), the big engines under the hood and complicated design meant that Chevy was forced to sell the car for more than $40,000 – effectively pricing the target consumer base out of the market. In the end, the cartoonish convertible truck only lasted for three years, which is actually a long time considering GM announced layoffs at the factory in the first year of production.
Advertisements