Manoli Katakis 
General Motors recently announced plans to invest $1.5 billion to bring its next generation Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon midsize truck siblings to market. The GM Wentzville, Missouri plant, which builds the current trucks as well as full-size vans will receive $1 billion of this investment to upgrade the facility. The investment is expected to retain 4,000 jobs at the Wentzville site.
Since reintroducing the Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon in 2013, GM has sold more than 700,000 midsize pickups in the United States. GM sees the Colorado and Canyon pickup trucks as important players to both its balance sheet and its sales statistics. With all the truck sales from both the Chevrolet and GMC brands combined, GM says that it has sold 600,000 more pickups than its closest competitor in the United States from 2013 through Q3 2019.
The next chapter in GM’s midsize truck story will be the 2021 GMC Canyon AT4, which will be available early next year.
As we’ve originally reported, General Motors will be launching the next-generation Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon by the 2023 model year, but they will largely be based on the existing 31XX architecture underpinning the current-generation midsize truck siblings, known internally as 31XX-2. The rumored 32xx program has been either delayed or cancelled. Unfortunately, this decision also meant the demise of a unique GMC product in the form of a body-on-frame midsize SUV.
Being that the current-generation trucks are under the 31xx program, it would be safe to assume that the next round of midsize trucks would be evolutionary, rather than revolutionary. Which, to us, is just fine. The formula worked out well for the Corvette (C5-C7), and Dodge has seen success with the Charger and Challenger by slowly evolving the vehicles each year. Current safety regulations are also in sync with what these platforms can support, as well.
