My badge is bigger than yours...

Via Instapundit comes this hard-hitting look at badge inflation - the growing size of badges on full-size pickup trucks.

Badge inflation is not new, however - manufacturers have been doing it for years, and not just on bigger trucks. Here is a picture of the back of a 2001 Ford Ranger - the link shows a heavily modified SEMA one-off, but the tailgate and badging is the same as the production. here is a picture of the back of MadAnthony's 2006 Ranger - note not only the giant Ford logo in the middle, instead of the tiny one in the corner, but the addition of a fairly prominent Ranger badge.

So what are my thoughts on all this? Meh. It makes sense - with the advent of wind tunnels, aerodynamics, and the like, vehicles tend to look more similar, so it makes sense that car companies want potential buyers to be able to identify them - there is no better ad for a vehicle than seeing it on the road and saying "wow, that's cool, what is that?". Of course, that applies less to trucks, which tend to be less aerodynamic and more distinctive - but still, there is only so much you can do with what is basically three boxes (hood, cab, bed). Pickup buyers also tend to be very brand-loyal, so many of their customers LIKE having a giant logo.

I can't really complain that they look tacky, not when I drive a truck that's painted double-yellow-line yellow. And given the amount of blank space on a pickup's tailgate or grill, it doesn't really look that bad. I'm less a fan of the trend of putting stickers on the back of the bed on the side over the rear axle - not so much because they tend to be big as because they tend to be obviously stickers, which I think looks cheesy - my Ranger has a silver 4x4 badge (which you can kind of make out in this pic which I've debated pulling off. I wish they would replace those with a simple badge.