The UK Sells Brand New Suzuki Carrys for £15K. America Is Still Waiting 25 Years

A farmer in Wales can call a dealer today and order a brand new Suzuki Carry 4x4 with a warranty, zero miles, and a number plate that lets it drive on any public road in Britain. An American farmer wanting the same truck has to buy one built before 2001 and hope his state lets him register it. Same truck, same 658cc engine, two completely different realities.

Ian Seabrook of HubNut, one of the most watched classic car channels in the UK, spent fifteen minutes driving one of these new Carrys and came away charmed. The truck came through SP Vehicles, an importer that normally deals in Land Cruisers and RAM pickups, with brand new Carrys starting at £14,995 plus VAT, roughly $19,000 before tax at current exchange. That is not cheap for a kei truck. It is remarkable that the option exists at all.

What £15K Buys You in Britain

The truck HubNut drove is the current generation DA16T Suzuki Carry, the same platform Suzuki has built since 2013. The 658cc R06A three cylinder makes around 50 horsepower, drives through a proper four wheel drive system, and carries the same 350kg rated payload every kei truck wears because Japanese law caps it there, not because the chassis gives up. The same truck leaves the same Shizuoka factory wearing Mitsubishi Minicab, Nissan Clipper, and Mazda Scrum badges, a rebadging carousel we covered when Nissan facelifted the 2026 Clipper.

Pricing climbs from there. SP Vehicles lists a 2025 Carry with 100 miles, a suspension lift, and bigger wheels at £20,950 plus VAT. That is serious money, nearly $27,000 before tax, for a truck that costs about $7,500 new in Japan. The markup covers shipping, compliance work, registration, and the simple fact that nobody else in Britain is selling them new.

The used market softens the blow. UK Mini Trucks, a farmer owned importer in Herefordshire, starts used Daihatsu Hijets at £6,000 plus VAT and quotes brand new stock at £15,000 to £16,000 plus VAT. Their customer base is exactly who you would guess: farmers, gamekeepers, and estate managers who need something smaller than a Gator that costs less to run than a pickup.

Why Britain Can Register Them and America Cannot

Here is the part that should annoy every American kei truck fan. The UK runs an Individual Vehicle Approval scheme that inspects a single imported vehicle against national standards and registers it if it passes. Any Japanese import under 10 years old takes an IVA test, typically £200 to £300, and the most common failures are trivial: a rear fog light, a speedometer reading in kilometers. New kei trucks go through that process and come out with plates.

The United States has no equivalent for a new kei truck. Federal law requires anyone selling a new vehicle for road use to certify compliance with every Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard, and a kei truck's dimensions make several crash standards effectively impossible to meet. A December 2025 legal alert from Covington & Burling lays it out plainly: new kei trucks designed for highway use are de facto banned. The low speed vehicle category does not fit because most kei trucks are too fast and too heavy, and temporary exemptions are capped at 2,500 vehicles per year with a slow approval process.

That leaves the 25 year rule as the only real door, which is why every kei truck in our import guide is a 1990s survivor rather than a new truck with a warranty. The NHTSA import rules exempt vehicles over 25 years old from FMVSS certification entirely, and the whole American kei scene lives inside that exemption.

The Running Costs Are the Quiet Headline

The HubNut comments filled with Brits asking where to buy one, and the ownership math explains why. UK Mini Trucks quotes road tax at £325 per year in the Private Light Goods class, dropping to £220 for trucks over ten years old at import. Insurance through their NFU Mutual partnership typically lands between £400 and £600 per year. Fuel economy runs 40 to 45 mpg in real use. A tow bar option adds 460kg of legal road towing.

Compare that to what British farmers actually cross shop. A new UTV costs more than a new Carry, cannot legally drive on most public roads, and drinks fuel doing farm work a kei truck handles in second gear. We made the same argument for American buyers in our kei truck vs UTV comparison, and the UK market is proving it at scale. Farmers Guide called kei trucks the next little big thing on British farms, and dealers keep selling out of stock.

What This Means for American Buyers

The obvious question: if Britain figured this out, can America? The political noise says maybe. President Trump announced in December 2025 that he had authorized Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to approve kei truck production in the US, and Duffy claimed the department had cleared the deck of blocking regulations. We were skeptical when we covered the kei trucks coming to America announcement, and Covington's lawyers back that skepticism: press conferences do not amend the FMVSS, and until NHTSA writes an actual rule creating a kei class the de facto ban stands.

So for now the UK model is a preview, not a promise. Americans who want a kei truck buy a 25 year old one, and honestly that is not a bad consolation prize. A clean 1999 Carry costs a third of what SP Vehicles charges for a new one, and the fuel injected generation hitting eligibility now is better than the carbureted trucks that built the scene. The folks at r/keitruck have spent years proving these trucks shrug off decades of work.

If the new truck envy stings, channel it into the used market. Our dealer directory lists importers across the country with landed, titled trucks, and the state legality guide tells you whether your state will actually let you drive one. Britain gets the warranty. America gets the character. For $8,000 instead of $27,000, character wins.