Are we just ignoring data now? Giant pickups have silly sales- silly in the crazy high sense of the word. I love my EV but I have never wished for less range. The Slate is a toy for the wealthy, like kitted up Jeeps that have snorkels
Yes, it has less utility than many other vehicles in many ways, but the bed length (5 ft) is longer than a lot of trucks I see on the road which enables carrying certain kinds of loads that aren't easy in cars or trucks with very short beds as seems fashionable now.
150 miles isn't a ton of range, but it's 50% more than a first generation Leaf and those sold.
The Slate clearly isn't trying to check all the boxes, but every vehicle doesn't need to try to do everything.
Slate's 5 foot bed is on the shorter end of common bed sizes. Certainly shorter and worse on every other metric than the F-150/Silverado/1500 'short bed' so commonly seen hauling air in the US.
The Slate would be the absolute perfect truck for me if it had a 4WD option. Being RWD-only is the only thing making me unwilling to replace my Tacoma with it.
Very few of the giant pickups I see have mud on them.
These are two separate questions.
I off-road an average of once a month, specifically to reach my usual shooting spot on BLM-maintained land. I don't necessarily need 4WD for that, but it's a good excuse to turn it on anyway.
I “need” 4WD when it snows, since 4WD/AWD + snow tires = not being required to chain up when chain controls are in effect, and because 4WD > AWD > FWD > RWD when it comes to snow driving (especially here in Reno/Tahoe, where the snow/ice happens on hills and having more drive wheels is a strict improvement over fewer).