A god-tier goal at any brand is to attract customers who’ll buy into the experience so fully and completely they essentially turn into extended members of the marketing department. This goes for food establishments (we all know an evangelist or two for a particular eatery), clothing brands, and — of interest to us — automotive makes.
This phenomenon is very prevalent at Jeep. Witness the hordes of owners who descend on the tiny town of Moab in Utah for a week’s worth of off-road wheeling and friendly camaraderie at the annual Easter Jeep Safari. Aftermarket parts companies proliferate like roadside alders while customization shops make bank turning wrenches for customers who want to morph their Jeep into a one-off creation. Jeeps are a big (and profitable) business — even after they leave the showroom floor.
The majority of Jeep junkies are Wrangler or Gladiator owners but hard-core fans have slowly been buying into other models as Jeep ups its game in different segments. Witness the burgeoning aftermarket for Cherokee and Grand Cherokee, both of which are offered ‘roided out from the factory in Trailhawk trim and often built up further by owners from that already solid foundation. It’s a testament to the Jeep development team who staunchly refuse to append the brand’s badges to a milquetoast vehicle in the name of chasing sales volume.
But what’s the allure? Why Jeep? To find out, we pointed a 2022 Grand Cherokee 4xe towards the trailhead of Hell’s Revenge, a tough and technical off-road route near Moab popular with the Jeep set. It is rated by the local Red Rocks Four Wheelers Club as a ‘6’ on their 10-point scale, meaning the route is laced with hazardous terrain and lots of brown-pants factor through the obstacles along its 6.5-mile length.
Fun fact: this trail, and others such as the entertainingly named Fins ‘n Things, are part of the Sand Flats Recreation Area in Utah, a nationally significant public lands treasure filled with jaw-dropping scenery ripped straight from an artist’s rendering of what Drumheller would probably look like if it wasn’t minus eleventy billion degrees all the time. A grand expenditure of $5 gains a day’s access to Sand Flats but ten bucks takes care of a week’s worth of visits. Bring yer tent or RV to the first-come-first-serve campsites and stay amid beautiful sand and slickrock for the wholly reasonable sum of $15 per night. Value, thy name is Utah.
Back to the Jeeps. Half a dozen gonzo machines lined the Hell’s Revenge staging area, primarily Wranglers and Gladiator pickups. King-brand shocks, 42-inch flotation size tires, and winches galore were on full display, with banners reading ‘Tactical Offroad’ peppering the windshields of some rigs. Turns out that’s the name of a Jeep customization shop near Houston, and it didn’t take long to find their lead fabricator amidst the throng of gearheads, a stout man who’s been building off-roaders for a good half decade. A few grins and handshakes later, we were being given lessons on the finer details of building a Jeep that can tackle Hell’s Revenge with ease.
“They’re so capable out of the box,” he enthused, waving his arms in the general direction of a battleship grey 2021 Rubicon peppered with yellow-lensed off-road lights. “Hardly anything else can do what a Wrangler does from the factory, especially a Rubicon.” A specially hewn suspension built by Tactical permits extra wheel travel, it was explained, thanks to unique geometry and the selection of King shocks plus tires that would have looked at home on Bigfoot only a few years ago. The welds performed by Tactical look like rows of dimes, such is the precision poured into these machines. It’s worth noting the company will gladly hop up new vehicles like the ones in these images but also tackle older gear, like the ‘83 CJ8 Scrambler on which they did a frame-off resto and rebuild.
This type of loyalty doesn’t happen by accident. While the Jeep brand has always had its share of fans in the consumer arena, it’s worth noting much of the crew toiling in Jeep’s design and engineering departments are dyed-in-the-wool gearheads as well. Just the day prior, while wheeling concept Jeeps across the Utah slickrock, top brass at Jeep told us how the original Rubicon trim on Wrangler got its start two decades ago. There was apparently an enthusiastic cadre within the brand who felt Jeep could sell ‘built’ version of the venerable Wrangler right out of the showroom. They toiled, sometimes on their off-hours, adding off-road parts onto a stock Wrangler with an eye towards pitching it to the powers-that-be as a new trim for the model — one aimed at hardcore off-roaders who usually went and added all this stuff to their Wrangler after buying it, anyway.
Such was their enthusiasm for this kinda-sorta off-the-record project that some team members bought parts and pieces for the Rubicon concept on their own personal credit cards to get the job done. Execs ended up greenlighting the idea but felt they’d sell less than 5,000 of these things annually. Twenty years later, Rubicon now makes up a significant chunk of Wrangler total sales. That level of enthusiasm inside the company pays dividends, bleeding out into the product and creating die-hard fans. It wouldn’t take long for Jeepheads to sniff out bogus intent on the part of a manufacturer.
Back in Moab, a simple walk down Main Street drove the point home, with street-parked Jeeps dripping in aftermarket off-road gear dotting the landscape like rice at a wedding. Sure, the Easter Jeep Safari lends a carnival atmosphere but there’s no faking the enthusiasm shared amongst owners of these rigs. Setup tips are shared, stories are swapped, and friendships are forged.
“The biggest thing is the community,” our man from Tactical said as he checked the fluids on someone’s older Jeep before setting out for Hell’s Revenge. “Everyone’s friendly, pitches in to help out. It’s like a big family.”
Keyword: Jeep Dates: Why some Jeep owners are such ardent fans of the brand