VW slams open-top SUVs, then reveals one

Slamming convertible crossovers like Range Rover's Evoque Convertible and Nissan's slow-selling Murano CrossCabriolet is a sport in the car industry.

Everyone outside Land Rover and, at least in North America, Nissan has questioned the point of the entire soft-top SUV genre.

That list includes Volkswagen brand CEO Dr Herbert Diess, who teed off on the frivolous nature of convertible crossover SUVs just months before announcing one of his own.

Volkswagen last week released a sketch of the T-Roc Cabriolet it plans to launch in 2020.

With the T-Roc covering roughly the same footprint as the Golf hatch and sitting on Golf architecture and mechanicals, the T-Roc Cabriolet will, effectively, replace the Golf Cabriolet that Dr Diess himself killed off in 2016.

Yet at the T-Roc (hard-top) launch in September last year, Dr Diess was dismissive and derisive of not just the Evoque Cabriolet but also the genre itself.

He was also genuinely unaware that Nissan had beaten Range Rover to the punch with the Murano CrossCabriolet by years.

Being quizzed on future SUVs and crossovers, Dr Diess laughed off questions about whether Volkswagen needed to follow Range Rover's lead with a convertible SUV of its own.

"No, we don't. This is something not to follow," he said, disdainfully.

"Does anybody think this a successful car?" he asked.

"Have you seen one? I've only ever seen one or two."

Perhaps significantly, the announcement of the T-Roc Cabriolet was made under Volkswagen Group Supervisory Board umbrella, rather than under the Volkswagen brand's letterhead.

"Volkswagen is evolving into an SUV brand. With the cabriolet based on the T-Roc, we will be adding a highly emotional model to the range," a statement from Dr Diess read.

Volkswagen will build up to 20,000 T-Roc Cabriolets a year in Osnabrück, Germany, in the old Golf Cabrio's old plant, with the Volkswagen Group approving an €80 million investment in the plant.

At the T-Roc's original launch, though, Dr Diess admitted his company had considered the soft-top crossover genre, but insisted it was a low priority - as recently as September.

"We did consider it. A T-Roc would work much better as a convertible [than the Evoque]," he insisted.

"[But] Convertibles are not the first priority," he said.

But now, apparently, they are.