Ram needs a midsize truck, and CEO Tim Kuniskis knows it. He hasn’t been quiet about it either, insisting to the press and quite likely his employees that the best time to build one was yesterday; the second best time is now. But it’s not enough to simply build a rig that’s smaller than a half-ton with an MSRP just below. Rather, as Kuniskis explained to The Drive in a recent interview, it needs to be a “proper truck” that punches above its weight at $40,000.
That price point is important to Kuniskis. He mentioned that ever since the 1500 Classic went away Ram has been hurting to get back. The thing is, he argues, that’s not possible on an everyday basis with a full-size truck. It’s crazy to think that, but in the post-COVID car industry, we’re seeing that it’s true.
“When we had the two truck strategy, when we had the DS (1500 Classic) and the DT (current-gen), we really had a sweet spot in the industry where we had the old truck and the new truck, and the old truck was competing at a price point, quite frankly, wasn’t that far away from the midsize segment,” Kuniskis told The Drive. “So we could capitalize on a half-million unit segment with all the capability, size, and functionality of a full-size truck. Well, those days are gone.”
Without a midsize, Kuniskis argued that Ram isn’t even competing on a “third of the battleground” when you consider half-tons and heavy-duty pickups. Very clearly, there’s demand in that segment or else Toyota wouldn’t have sold 274,000 Tacomas in 2025. Now, the Tacoma has long been the strongest seller in its category, but a year like that is no coincidence when you consider the pickup takes a lot more inspiration from the full-size Tundra than before.
In some ways, that supports Kuniskis’ claims about needing to go all-in:
“It needs to be a credible truck, in case you gotta walk from that to a light-duty truck, and there can’t be a disconnect. So it’s gotta be a real truck, gotta have real capability, just a little smaller and a little bit more accessible.”
Still, Kuniskis is holding his cards close to his chest in terms of how Ram will achieve that. We poked and prodded about what engine it might have, but he didn’t take the bait.
“Powertrain-wise, we haven’t said anything about what we’re going to do,” Kuniskis said. “Obviously, hybrid is becoming, pretty much, a really important sweet spot in the industry.”
He took pains to say he was not confirming that electrification is in the cards, but he added, “[T]hat’s why I’ve been watching the Cherokee, the biggest segment in the world with a dedicated [hybrid] powertrain. You know, we made that choice on purpose. So, do we need one in the midsize truck? I don’t know, TBD, we’ll see.
“But back to capability. It needs to be a proper truck. It needs to have the towing capabilities, needs to have the payload. It needs to have everything that a truck buyer is looking for. It can’t be, you know, a car that you put a bed on.”
When asked about a V8, Kuniskis shut that down pretty quickly. “I don’t know that it needs a V8,” he responded. “And, I mean, look, go back 15 years. A midsize truck today is the size of what a full-size truck used to be, right? Not that far away. So, is the midsize segment in the next couple of years gonna act any different than the light duty segment? I don’t think so.”
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