By Mike Colias

Ford dealers have been asking the company for years to make a rugged off-road vehicle to compete with Jeep's Wrangler. Finally, they're getting one.

After nearly a decade of plotting its return, Ford on Monday night will unveil a new Bronco -- the U.S. auto maker's latest attempt to carve into a share of Jeep's dominant position in the off-road adventure category. The showing will take place virtually on YouTube and other media, starting at 8 p.m. ET. Ford will also start taking $100 reservations for the new model.

The Bronco is coming off the sidelines at a tricky time. U.S. vehicle sales are expected to contract around 25% this year largely due to the coronavirus crisis disruption, analysts project, and car companies are crowding showrooms with new SUV models, putting pressures on profits.

The Bronco's release illustrates broader challenges companies face now: products under development long before the pandemic are rolling out into a changed market, potentially forcing companies to remake marketing or production plans carefully laid out years in advance. And convincing Wrangler buyers to make the switch won't be an easy task, especially with pandemic-related disruptions making it more difficult for vehicle shoppers to browse showrooms and take test drives.

The model's long gestation period has allowed Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV's Jeep Wrangler to have a lock on the market for rock-clambering vehicles with removable doors and roof panels. Wrangler sales have tripled over the past decade, a stretch of good times for the auto business, and SUVs in particular.

"For the longest time, the other auto makers just kind of gave up and said 'Well, Jeep owns that'" category, said Brian Moody, executive editor of research site Autotrader.com. "The Bronco has the heritage to have a real opportunity."

A Jeep spokesman declined to comment.

Reviving the Bronco is a key piece of Ford Chief Executive Jim Hackett's turnaround plan. Mr. Hackett, put in the top job three years ago, put a sharper focus on more-profitable pickup trucks and SUVs, while purging passenger cars from Ford's U.S. showrooms.

"This is our opportunity," Ford operations chief Jim Farley said at a conference last month. "Bronco is an iconic and beloved franchise."

The Bronco also is core to Ford's strategy to transform the company's most popular nameplates, such as the F-150 pickup truck, into subbrands with multiple variations. For example, Ford is expanding its well-known Mustang nameplate for use on an electric SUV, which goes on sale later this year.

First introduced in 1965 at the behest of famed auto executive Lee Iacocca, the Bronco garnered a cultlike following among off-road enthusiasts and were solid sellers for decades. The company ended Bronco production in 1996.

Two years before it was phased out, the Bronco gained unexpected notoriety when former football star O.J. Simpson led Los Angeles police on a low-speed chase in a white Bronco.

Enthusiasm for the Bronco has endured long after Ford killed off the older model, leading to a hot market for collectibles from the 1960s and '70s. Valuations of the vintage SUVs have soared 75% in the past three years, and routinely change hands for more than $100,000, according to Hagerty, an insurer of classic cars.

Write to Mike Colias at Mike.Colias@wsj.com