On Dec 29, 1:07�pm, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:
of myself.

Tried a F-250, 5.7 liter Ford pickup - towed the boat fine, but for
some reason, I'm not really happy with Fords at the moment.

Tried a 2500 Silverado Diesel - not happy with it - wasn't
comfortable, didn't like the seat belt set up and I didn't like the
interior design. �Towed ok.

Tried a Dodge Ram 2500 Quad cab - 5.7 Hemi sucks.

Tried a GMC 2500 Sierra - eh - fancy Silverado and I had the same
complaints.

Tried a Toyota Tundra just for yucks.

You will not believe what I ended up buying pending the resolution of
the F-150 issue.


Things change. Every so often it pays to resurvey the market. What we
all think we know about the relative merits of various brands can
become outdated.

It's understandable that people are slow to come around to Toyota
pickup trucks. What's more red-neck, down home, red-white-blue, and
apple pie on a red checkered Independence Day picnic table cloth than
a pickup truck? Can we really trust "The Japs" to build one (even in
Kentucky, Alabama, Tennessee, or what not)? Weren't we trying to kill
off as many of these folks as we could manage, just a bit over 60
years ago?

You shouldn't be ashamed, Tom. The two groups of people who should be
ashamed are. 1) Domestic truck makers who figure they can can corners
almost endlessly without disrupting the core "patriotic" market
segment. 2) The less-than-adequately discriminating consumers who
financially enable and support the manufacture of medicore or
substandard products by shopping with nostalgic prejudices rather than
objective analysis.

If more people buy Toyota trucks, we will see Ford, Chevrolet, and
Dodge improve substantially in response. It happened with cars, and it
will happen with trucks. Typical American industry- reactive rather
than proactive. (Reactive:OMG! There goes our market share! Guess we
better put some content back into the trademark before we lose any
more. Proactive: What can we do, while we're ahead, to make it tougher
for the competitors to realize any inroads?)