Pulled this one out of the “What the Hell Is That?” archives.
If you don't remember the Chevrolet SSR, you're not alone. Chevrolet sold only 24,180 of these between 2003 and 2006, so it's not like you saw many of them back then, either.
“SSR” stood for “Super Sport Roadster.” It was a two-passenger, retro-themed pickup truck with a retractable hardtop, designed to evoke Chevrolet's hot-rod pickups of the late 1940s and early 1950s. You either get that, or this makes about as much sense as a Volkswagen Thing.
On the heels of General Motors breaking our hearts by canceling the Chevrolet Camaro and Pontiac Firebird after the 2002 model year, they give us an impossibly impractical pickup truck?
In a 2003 Autoweek article, Tom Wallace, the GM vehicle line executive responsible for the Chevrolet SSR, explained the three reasons GM decided to build it. “First, it's pretty cool, a halo vehicle for Chevrolet. Second, journalists all said we should build it. Third, Rick [GM chairman Rick Wagoner] said we should build it.”
Hoo-boy. You built it because journalists and the guy running the joint said you should? Didn't anyone ever tell you that the person in the corner office is often the least qualified person to even work in the place? And auto scribes are notorious for blowing smoke up manufacturers' wheel wells, particularly when those manufacturers are spending big bucks advertising in their publications.
Now, no one ever said the automobile industry was for the modest or faint of heart, but clearly Mr. Wallace, Mr. Wagoner, and the rest of the gang running General Motors at the time had lost their grip on what “cool” meant.
Which begs the question: What is cool? Frankly, I don't know, but I know it when I see it. And, sorry, the SSR doesn't even glide along the fine edge between cool and not cool. It crosses over into the goofy lane and hits oncoming traffic head-on.
Through my foggy goggles, the Chevrolet SSR was an attempt to be, first and foremost, “cool.” That's a slippery slope to climb, given that “cool” is a personal, oftentimes visceral reaction to something.
Adding insult to injury, the SSR wasn't very good at doing anything. No self-respecting tradesperson would be caught dead in one, and it wasn't much of a performance vehicle, either.
Based on a modified version of GM's midsize-truck platform, the SSR was underwhelming in its original form, with a structure that, to my mind, felt like cooked spaghetti and awful ergonomics.
On top of all that, it cost about as much as a Corvette.
By the time Chevrolet updated the SSR for the 2005 model year with a Corvette-derived V-8 and a host of chassis and suspension refinements, the die had been cast. The SSR was a loser.
In all fairness, I think the passage of time has softened the what-the-hell-is-that-ness of the SSR, but I still don't think it's handsome or cool in any way. This one, with 78,000 miles on it, is currently being auctioned by Hagerty. The last time I checked, bidding was stuck at $10,600.
A 2004 Corvette with 78,000 miles on it could bring somewhere in the high teens to low twenties.
Let's also not forget that GM had just canceled the Chevrolet Camaro and Pontiac Firebird. While the SSR was in no way a replacement for them, it did make us pony-car pundits wonder if we should take the keys away from Rick Wagoner and the decision-makers at GM.
Patience being a virtue, that would all come to pass with GM's bankruptcy in 2009.
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