[aboodman]

I live in Hawaii where the Toyota Tacoma is basically the state mascot. I owned almost exclusively sedans before I moved here. A friend from the bay area moved here several years ago and argued he wouldn't need a pickup, but ended up getting a Rivian within a year or so.

The pickup is more practical than a van here because you end up hauling a lot of dirty/sandy/wet stuff. Yes, you could put this in your van, but hooray now you have sand and water in your van that you need to clean out (and you do need to because the heat will turn it into mildew immediately if you don't). The bed of the truck is outside. It dries out on its own. The sand falls out on its own.

I can't speak for other parts of the US, but use cases can be subtle and I would be slightly cautious about deciding that 300M people and a several trillion dollar market has been completely irrational for decades.

[mckn1ght]

Alaska checking in. Nobody is hauling a skidoo around here in a van. You also won’t see anyone towing a trailer with one or two machines with anything other than a truck, because nothing else is going to hack it in the mountains with all that. I currently just drive mine up a ramp into the truck bed, I can quickly park and get off and go and back on again. Very versatile combo to get around with.

Right tool for the job. I drive an AWD Prius with winter tires to get groceries in the snow.

[lokar]

When I lived in anchorage ages ago Subarus were really popular.

Everyone with a truck had to put a bunch of weight in the back to manage the roads in the winter.