HOLY TOLEDO! New Jeep Pickup Will Be Built Alongside New Wrangler
Yesterday, we shared with you the great news from the 2016 North American International Auto Show that FCA’s CEO Sergio Marchionne confirmed that a Jeep pickup truck was going to happen shortly after the launch of the new Wrangler around 2017. Now, we also know that the Jeep pickup will be alongside the Wrangler in Toledo.
According to Mr. Marchionne, “The conclusion that we have as of today is that we can actually fully meet our objections for both Wrangler and the pickup by using the existing installations.” Mr. Marchionne was responding to questions about whether Jeep would need to expand to handle both the new Wrangler and the pickup truck.
Toledo launched a huge campaign in order to keep Jeep production in the Glass City after Marchionne implied that it’d make better business sense to build a new plant than to convert the current plant over to the new Wrangler. The city even purchased over $1.5 million in property around the current facility so Jeep would have room to expand.
Marchionne acknowledges that Toledo loves Jeep, and that it made sense to keep Jeep in Toledo, but still didn’t like feeling his hands were tied. “And we were boxed into that notion because of the desire to keep the Wrangler. And once you made that sort of the unequivocal choice as Toledo and you said ‘you must keep it here,’ I complied. And I complied in a way that does not tax the state and does not tax the city,” said Marchionne.
We’re itching to see the new truck, that’s for sure!
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via [WTOL]
