Here's What You Need to Know About the U.S.-Bound VW ID. Buzz

June 2, heretofore just another day, the 153rd day of most years and the 154th of a leap year, has now been designated as International Volkswagen Bus Day. Who did this designating? Apparently, there’s a thing called the “National Day Calendar” where such things can be somewhat officially certified and kind of cataloged. Sounds like a good racket – though how a day expands from “National” to “International” is a mystery.

What inspired this designation is the debut of the longer, three-row version of the new ID. Buzz sort-of-revival of the bus at an event held this seaside in Huntington Beach, California this Friday. This is the version of the all-electric van that will go on sale sometime next year in the United States of America. Yes, comedian Gabriel Iglesias was there with all his Fluffy-ness and notorious van-obsessiveness to goose up interest. And interest was goosed.

By now, the ID. Buzz is familiar. It was first shown in concept form back in 2017 at the North American International Auto Show and the two-row version has been on sale in other parts of the planet since 2022. This was the first chance to see the Stateside version. And it won’t go on sale for another year and a half… in the fall of 2024 and likely as a 2025 model.

That will be almost eight years after the concept was shown. This is such an agonizingly long and teasing vehicle launch, what’s surprising is that it’s not for a Tesla.

With about 400 vintage buses on hand, the love for the original, air-cooled, internally combusted Microbus is amazingly widespread, intense, genuine and ongoing. Not leveraging that affection would be marketing malpractice. So here is a VW event that references Woodstock (incessantly), surfing (intensely) and even the appearance of a van in Fast Times at Ridgemont High (obliquely). A crowd of maybe 2000 showed up to ogle the new van and bask in Vee Dub solidarity. Social media representation ranged from gyroscopically stabilized high-definition cameras down through hundreds of smartphones and way deep to that most elemental social media, dogs sniffing each other’s butts. Lots of good vibrations.

Lofted up on the crowd’s goodwill, the ID. Buzz long wheelbase appeared looking immensely attractive. The longer wheelbase – just shy of ten inches compared to the two-row – flatters the van’s shape. There’s almost a Disneyland monorail/Japanese bullet train air about it. Even if it didn’t have a huge, lighted VW logo embedded in its nose, it would look cool and sleek.