NEW YORK MOTOR SHOW: Volkswagen unveils Tanoak ute

The solution to any sales target is, increasingly, more SUVs and more pick-ups.

Especially if that pick-up is built in the US, where pick-ups roam unchallenged at the top end of the sales leader boards.

Bigger than the Amarok, the new Tanoak concept car is more than five metres long and will be the first pick-up built off Volkswagen’s incredibly versatile MQB architecture.

Used everywhere from the Golf all the way up to the Atlas, Volkswagen will test the MQB’s versatility by asking it to take on superminis in Europe with the Polo and, at the other end of its range, to take on the huge selling Ford F-150 and the Chevrolet Silverado.

It’s not Volkswagen’s first pick-up, though, with the first-generation Touareg originally previewed in 2000 with the Advanced Activity Vehicle concept.

The 206kW Tanoak will be the second model of a three-model range based off the Atlas (also known as the Teramont in China and Russia), with the Atlas Cross Sport also debuting in New York.

The dual-cab concept pick-up is not confirmed for production yet, even if the Atlas Cross Sport is, though Volkswagen North America has been given unprecedented autonomy in its decision-making.

It is a concept to test the market reaction to the project, with Volkswagen insiders insisting they could turn it into a production reality in its Chattanooga, Tennessee plant “pretty quickly”.

While the big selling ladder-on-frame Americans hold sway in the North American pick-up market, there is a surging subset of Asian contenders that use unitary body construction – just like the Tanoak.

The more realistic targets would include Honda’s Ridgeline and Hyundai’s yet-to-be-released Santa Cruz pick-up.

Like its intended foes, the Tanoak isn’t being considered as a hard-core working pick-up, but as a lifestyle machine with a greater focus on luxury and comfort and equipment and a more secondary focus on carrying ability.

That will set it apart from the Amarok, which uses a ladder-frame chassis to compete with mixed success against the Toyota HiLux and the Ford Ranger.

It even takes plenty of visual hints from the Atlas, rather than the Amarok, even if its rear-end is obviously and necessarily very different.

There’s a new grille, new daytime running LEDs and a more sculpted look to the front quarter panels than the Atlas, while the illuminated Volkswagen badge on the grille is actually illegal in Germany, but legal in the US.

It looks beefier than the Atlas from the side, with the wheel-arches scoring more cladding for greater muscle, swallowing the 20-inch wheels and 275/55 tyres easily.

The rear doors are very, very short, and barely noticeable as doors at a glance, with their handles buried within the C-pillar.

Its 5438mm length is almost the longest (non-commercial) vehicle with a Volkswagen badge, bested only by the long-wheelbase version of the T6 van. It adds length to the Atlas’s 2890mm wheelbase, stretching it out to 3260mm.

It’s also 2030mm wide and 1844mm high, making it 45mm taller than the Atlas (mostly through a lift in its ground clearance). Volkswagen uses the extra size to create seating for five, and there is talk of a possibility for a two-door version, too. As enormous as that sounds, the Ford F-150 Supercrew is more than 400mm longer.

While Volkswagen hasn’t given a payload figure for the Tanoak, its tray is 1627mm long, 1450mm wide and 530mm deep, with 1280mm between the two wheel-arches. It also claims an extra 633mm of cargo length by dropping down the tailgate.