The media relations director over at CarsDirect just emailed us to share that they’d confirmed the 2021 Jeep Compass would not be available with a six-speed manual. Which made me realize, hey, there was a 2020 Jeep Compass available with a six-speed manual!

cited Jeep spokesperson Amy Grundman saying “there wasn’t much of a demand for a manual transmission.” A revelation indeed. The site went on to share that: “National inventory listings indicate that less than 1 percent of Compass configurations involve a manual transmission. That’s roughly 100 vehicles in the entire U.S.” (Even that sounds like a lot to me?)

The Compass is, of course, one of those cars I’ll never understand personally but normies love to buy. “Looks like an SUV” plus “low MSRP” is a surefire sales formula in 2020 America, so, yeah. I guess I understand it well enough.

If you’re wondering why Jeep bothered to offer a manual at all, I suspect that it let the automaker sneak in a super-low “starts at $XX,XXX!” list price to lure people into Jeep stores. I should probably look up what the actual price is, but I just, cannot bring myself to care.

Ugh, fine! God, you’re such a bunch of sticklers. A front-drive Compass with no options except for orange paint (the only color besides white that you can spec without an upcharge! Bizarre!) lists out at $22,280 on Jeep’s build-and-price site. So that’s a 2.4-liter MultiAir four-banger hooked up to a C635 six-speed manual with front-wheel drive.

The six-speed auto, an Aisin F21-250 Gen 3, adds $1,500 to the list price. I would imagine the company has crossed a threshold where the math for offering a manual to keep advertised lowest-price down lower no longer works out, so goodbye to an oddball poverty-spec sport utility vehicle.

Run, don’t walk, to your nearest Jeep store and get a stick-shift Compass before they’re gone! Just kidding, don’t do this, the people working there will probably laugh at you and say they’ve never seen one.