Truck Woes: Who Will Turn It Around?

With the price of gas climbing higher, consumers are climbing down into smaller cars and gas-sipping subcompacts. It’s not just trucks that consumers are walking away from: SUVs are on a downward slide as well. For the longest time the SUV held the market share that once belonged to the family station wagon, but now crossovers that incorporate the best of both kinds of vehicles are drawing consumers away from traditionally bloated, gas-guzzling SUVs. Double-digit drops in light truck sales are reportedly linked to the US housing slump: fewer new homeowners means fewer people requiring trucks. With Ford recalling some 100,000 F-Series pickups, it might seem wise to stay away from those trucks for awhile, and this is good news for Toyota, Nissan, and Chevy, whose numbers still trail behind Ford in the truck segment. It’s any truck’s game in the first quarter of 2008—which one will become the #1 truck this year?