Seeing this Scout II looking out over Eugene naturally made me think of VW’s plan to resurrect the Scout brand, as an EV-only brand, with an SUV and a pickup. VW’s board just committed the $2 billion investment in a new dedicated plant just outside of Columbia, South Carolina.
It’s an interesting move, and represents a lot of faith by VW in the growing market for EV SUVs and pickups, as well as the US market in general, although I assume they will be exported to Europe and other places.
US VW dealers are hot under the collar, though, because they strongly suspect the Scout will be sold directly to buyers, a la Tesla.
VW released this rendering when they first announced it. Obviously, the bodies will share their front two-thirds, or so.
Others have taken those renderings and made them more explicit.
It evokes some basic Scout design language, but obviously the SUV is a four door. Given the popularity of Ford’s two-door Bronco, one wonders about that choice. But in order to fit in an underfloor big enough, a shorter wheelbase was probably not technically feasible.
Funny, I just read about it today in a german magazine. It was an article about the growing activities of german car makers in the US due to political impacts from the EU, high energy prices etc. Before that I had no idea about VW and the Scout.
I sort of suspect that the dealers would not be nearly so worried if they had treated their customers better in the past???
I find it ironic that this is going to be a plug in electric vehicle. The original Scout was for getting you to where there was no electricity. Doing that with this new Scout will result in a one way trip with a long walk home.
I was kind of thinking the same thing, though it hit me that the majority of people who buy off-road capable vehicles don’t end up using them in ways even they envisioned they would. I think a goodly number of Jeep Rubicons and Broncos end up doing the daily office grind while their owners quietly daydream about getting the heck out of dodge, while the majority of actual adventures end up being reasonable enough to make it there and back on a full tank.
I have been on a couple excursions where I had to stop and add “range” out of a Jerry can, and one that I can remember having to turn back when I had used up half of my fuel before making it halfway to the next gas stop. That sucked. It would be interesting to see what the real world range of an EV would be off road, and though I don’t envision owning one myself, they might be pretty acceptable for people who aren’t operating at the more extreme end of the field.
I think VW management have looked more at the Monteverdi Safari, than the original IH Scout.
It will share a platform with whatever VW / Skoda / Audi / Porsche, that will be in this market segment.
If it succeeds they’ll be happy. If it fails, then they will push the VW marque for basic versions.
Or Audi for Sports Utility & Luxury.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monteverdi_Safari
I think a plug in hybrid would have been a better choice for this application. It is difficult to understand how current technology supports a fully electric vehicle for long distance of road use. What do you do if you are in the middle of nowhere and your battery is dead, run your gas generator for a day or two to charge it creating vastly more pollution than any modern automotive engine would?
When I read about Volkswagen AG buying Navistar a few years ago, I immediately looked into whether that sale would give VW the rights to the old IH trademarks (answers: yes for the Scout and Travelall brand names as well as the International truck make they were already using, but not “International Harvester” , “IH”, or the iconic IH logo. (those belong to Case IH, after Case bought out International’s tractor business). Weird thing is VW doesn’t plan to extend the International brand to the Scout as in the old days, rather the new entity is being called Scout Motors. So will their be a Scout Travelall in the future to compete with the Suburban and other XL-sized SUVs?
As for the new Scout itself, I’m getting tired of long, tall, straight hoods on SUVs and crossovers that don’t let you see anything within 30 feet ahead of you from the driver’s seat.
The stand-alone Scout brand may be due to the fact that International is part of Traton, VW’s truck business. VW AG has begun to spin off Traton, so in the future the International name may belong to another entity.
As both a branding specialist in my day job and a Scout owner, this kind of thing makes my brain hurt. Sort of like Ford making the Mustang Mach-E its own spinoff brand, or Dodge making all their trucks “Ram” something.
Not to mention going to the parts counter to get stuff for my Travelall will have the counter jockeys all scratching their heads and asking “Scout Travelall? They made that in 1963?”
So what are you suggesting? That the new Scouts be sold at Navistar dealers? That’s never going to happen. The demographic that these EVs are targeting will not be interested the slightest in going to a Navistar truck dealer. In fact, they don’t want a dealer at all, just like Tesla buyers.
If something goes wrong, they’ll expect mobile service to show up. Too bad Navistar doesn’t make vans. 🙂
In any case there certainly won’t be Scout parts counters.
Odd as it may now seem, for decades IH did sell all their wares together, in a dealership building designed by Raymund Loewy. One such building is standing vacant nearby my area (Wheaton, MD) awaiting future use. These would have sold everything from 18-wheelers to Scouts to dump trucks to farm tractors to refrigerators. They standard-design IH dealers opened after WW2 and closed in the mid-80s when IH was split into four parts. Alhough it doesn’t bring much sysnergies, having Scouts bought and serviced qt the same place the big rigs go may have helped build their image..
We had one of those buildings. Never knew it was a corporate design. Our neighbor was a salesman there. Always had a new Travelall. They also had a IH window AC unit, the only one in lthe entire neighborhood. I remember it well because the condensation made a neat little river down to our backyard. I think IH made a variety of appliances at the time.
We had one of those buildings. Never knew it was a corporate design. Our neighbor was a salesman there. Always had a new Travelall. They also had a IH window AC unit, the only one in the entire neighborhood. I remember it well because the condensation made a neat little river down to our backyard. I think IH made a variety of appliances at the time.
Not at all, Paul. I know they won’t be going to Navistar, and I know they’re competing directly with Tesla.
I just counsel my clients to build their brand and make sure it stands for something, and have clear positioning in the marketplace. It would be like another manufacturer creating the Bronco Explorer or maybe a Mustang Thunderbird.
So you’re saying that “Scout” by itself isn’t enough for proper brand identity? I would disagree; there is a clear trend towards fragmentation with brands, and a brand like Scout used for a couple of clearly positioned vehicles sure works for me. I assume they may have a second name to identify the SUV from the pickup.
I like it, but I wonder if the name and style will have any resonance with potential buyers who either weren’t born when the last IH Scout rolled off the line, or didn’t pay attention to them because they were trucks. But of course that’s what I thought about the Mini and Fiat 500 revivals, and they are doing, or in the case of the latter did, OK. Our town just got a $600K Mack electric garbage truck with help from a $200K grant from VW, presumably associated with Dieselgate fines.
Wow, very timely. I happened to be in Wolfsburg at VW’s Autostadt just yesterday. They had a very small exhibit re the Scout in a somewhat out of the way location consisting of a 1980 Scout (fairly original with some modern modifications), a couple of display cases of old marketing materials from the 60s and 70s and a screen with some more basic info and a movie showing the Scout doing very light offroad work on a VW test track. Most people sort of avoided it for the most part, I was a little excited at first, then lost most interest after snapping a few pictures of the Scout and the info screen…
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Looks pretty much the same as the current Bronco with a little Rivan thrown in the mix.
To the naysayers questioning the EV side of this, times have changed. The Wrangler, the Gladiator, the Bronco, Raptor and TRX pickups and soon this are used in the most rugged places in the world… the suburbs!
I would imagine that the Ford Bronco’s recent success is playing a big part in VW bringing a retro-Scout to market. Competitors have always wanted a piece of the lucrative, Wrangler/Outback, outdoor-lifestyle vehicle pie for decades with limited success and VW going the EV route could very well work out since I think the Wrangler 4xe PHEV is still selling quite well.
One of the more recent attempts where it didn’t really work was the Toyota FJ Cruiser. Ironically, used examples are fetching very high prices on the resale market.
I believe Toyota was too early to the retro SUV party and left right as it got started, it would probably be a success today
I was thinking that myself…
A propos of nothing in particular, I just got home from a 30 minute walk to the library and grocery store. I saw two Rivians and no electric VW’s, not even an eGolf.
Their has never been a “Scout” marque.
International Harvester’s Scout model, was discontinued in the early 80’s after the group got into trouble.
This also led to the Swiss company Monteverdi, to stop building its luxury version that had various Chrysler V8 engine options (426 Hemi, 440 RB, 360 LA & 318 LA).
When did VW buy International Harvester ?
It wouldn’t matter to the UK market anyway.
Jaguar owns rights to the Scout name via the BSA Motor Car marque.
The BSA Scout series 6 Tourer was made until WW2 broke out in 1939.
There will be one now, in 2026.
VW’s Traton truck unit bought Navistar in 2020.
That’s a long time ago. Do they still actually own the rights? Not that it really matters much.
Hadn’t heard of the VW purchase of Navistar.
Last time I saw the VW Group, shouting the odds about its Marques it was,
Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Ducatti, Lamborghini, M.A.N., Porsche, Scania, Seat, Skoda, and VW.
While the Scout was always an International Scout they initially sold “Scout” dealerships that carried the Scout as their only IH product. Later many of those that remained did take on the full “Light Line” and all light line dealers eventually sold Scouts but weren’t initially required to.
A brief summary:
I think of these like I think of electronics products sold under the Crosley or Zenith brands in the US. Crosley and Zenith, as companies, have been gone for a long time, but they now are back on shelves to milk some money out of those with a thing for nostalgia – almost all of them people who were either kids or not yet born when the original companies were in business. If the product is what you are looking for, buy it because it is what you want, but not because it is a Crosley or a Zenith.
The original Scout was never sold as a fashion accessory but as a workhorse built by a company that made trucks and farm/construction machinery. A new Scout offered by VW will be little more than a fashion accessory, though one that will be a functioning and stylish EV.
The original Scout was never sold as a fashion accessory
Tell that to Stephanie,who really wanted one when we were living in Santa Monica, CA, in 1978-1980 because it was so “cute”. And how did she know about them? Because a few other moms her age were driving them, and not as “workhorses”.
The rugged SUV as a fashion accessory was already in full bloom in California. But not just in CA; it was anywhere. Just look at Scout ads from the time. They’re all about the hot new fashion of SUVs:
https://www.google.com/search?q=international+scout+ad&sxsrf=AJOqlzWQJJR2fKCg3mIUV4p-EAEqXCe6Zw:1679153237046&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiRwd6h5eX9AhUbHjQIHehdBdEQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1536&bih=762&dpr=1.25
I don’t think the neo-Scout will sell all that much on nostalgia; it’s just a hot segment of the market, and the name brings a certain amount of heritage with it.
There is a segment of the population that embraces the outdoor lifestyle, especially out here in the West, and wants to do it in an EV if possible. Rivian is actively and successfully targeting them, and I’ve seen several at cam[grounds and trail heads. No, they’re not going to be bought by the really hard core offroad-exploration type, for obvious reasons, but getting into nature (and back) can be done quite well with a 250-300 mile range.
Is this “fashinable”? Yes, but then SUVs have been fashionable for doing that ever since the Scout came out, and even earlier.
I recently found out that the Willys station wagon was the hot car for a segment of the population in the Bay Area in the mid-50s, as the sole family car, to be able to get into remote camping and other sites. And it was just…cool!
If you remember that 1961 Scout review we had here recently, the point was made that it was ideal for the family man who wants to get out into nature on the weekends, with his family (or buddies). This is hardly a new phenomena; in fact a major lure for folks migrating to the West since WW2 was the opportunity to get out into serious nature on a regular basis. I understand where you live, that’s not so much a thing, but it has been a major thing out here for a very long time. And all those Scout ads showed folks doing just that.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/vintage-reviews/vintage-car-life-road-test-1961-ih-scout-who-is-going-to-buy-the-scout/
Then there’s this post we did:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/vintage-ads-and-brochures/vintage-ad-1980-international-scout-sensible/
The Scout name and legacy isn’t likely to gain it all much in sales in today’s market.
But it’s certainly not going to hurt it, either. Well played, VWoA.
The same doesn’t mean squat quite frankly, you can peruse Craigslist and FB marketplace and find well worn but running Scouts all day long for well under $5,000, here’s two I found just now!
https://westslope.craigslist.org/pts/d/norwood-1969-international-scout-price/7597338800.html
https://cosprings.craigslist.org/cto/d/gardner-1971-international-4×4-pickups/7593690988.html
By comparison a first gen Bronco in the condition of these or even as an undrivable husk is going for $15,000 at a minimum.
It goes back to that old auto industry adage: timing is everything. As mentioned earlier, the Toyota FJ Cruiser flopped. Yet, the new Ford Bronco, which would seem to be aimed at the exact same demographic, is a big hit.
While the execution will certainly be a big factor, it simply remains to be seen if VW made the right call or not.
Yep that’s why the Swiss built Monteverdi Safari, that used the Scout as its basis, and then fitted them with Chrysler engines, providing a challenge to Range Rover.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monteverdi_Safari
Just can’t replace the original.