Once upon a time, Volkswagen assembled and sold pickups in America. Branded simply as the “VW Pickup,” known elsewhere around the world as the Volkswagen Caddy, the Rabbit derivative assembled in Pennsylvania was the brainchild of American executives in an era where front-wheel-drive trucks were popular due to high gas prices. After selling 77,513 models between 1979 and 1985, VW left the U.S. pickup market to others.
Today, we ask: What might happen if Volkswagen brought a pickup back to the United States?
This is the Volkswagen Atlas Tanoak concept, a hypothetical answer to that question. Built from the same MQB platform architecture that’s used on new vehicles from the Atlas to the 2019 Jetta, the Atlas Tanoak makes a dramatic statement of VW’s design skills and engineering flexibility – along with some fresh ideas of what a real pickup could be.
