Why Chrysler is utterly doomed

It wasn't just cool it was badass!.

If only Olds was still here today we would probably see one.

 

If Olds was still here today, it'd be based upon some abortion of a minivan with one wheel drive.

The reason why Chrysler is doomed is because they hate their customers and assume they have the same IQ as a steaming pile of donkey shyt. The Sebring is camel afterbirth plastified. It handles and sounds like a K Car, but with less pleasant interior plastics and panel fits and interior trims fits that would make a Trabant look like a Lexus. These vehicles are an insult to the market and to the buyers shopping around for new wheels.

Execs of US automotive industry, here's a hit: Don't assume that your average buyer has an IQ of 4. Just because you have a Golden Parachute doesn't mean that they do, and that they won't carefully consider their purchases with an eye towards overall value and resale price. You insult them with poor to bad quality, shamefully bad interiors, backwards technology and MPG that would make a farm tractor blush with embarrassment.

You insult your buyers with crap on every level of measure. The cars you produce are often not one or two generations behind the competition, but 5 generations out of sort.
Your newest vehicles are a bad dream of 80's engineering and quality. You insult our values and our dollars yet you refuse to make any progress towards producing a product that is on equal footing with anything coming out of Japan, and more recently, South Korea.

In an ocean of rising gas prices you release gas guzzlers. HEMI tough or whatever. SUV's based upon 1790 suspension technology with cubic inches as the main selling point. The market demands 35 MPG yet you deliver 10 MPG and ***** when the CAFE standards in 2020 (lol) get raised to 35 MPG.

When you do produce a good car, you think it is worthy of an upmarket price, yet wonder why buyers of the Taurus(500) and the TaurusX (or whatever) turn a cold shoulder to $30k+ prices for what you want for them. Why is a re badged Freestyle worth 5 large more than a Taurus sedan? It isn't, yet there it is and your sales numbers support that.

Detroit will pump out ever more models based upon ever more generic, thoughtless designs because the counters of bean told them so. 40 years of declining market share should tell them something, but as long as the people in charge get golden parachutes for crap cars, the inmates will run the asylum.

USA will turn cultural and sales icons like the original Taurus...at one point the best selling and most profitable car on Earth...into pointless exercises in absurdity. The new Taurus is easily 5k out of touch with its market...that market now learned and mindful of resale values....they buy Hondas and Toyotas. The Ford Focus which was a hugely popular vehicle in the US was left to wither and die on the vine due to lack of updates and overall shoddy quality of build.

The big three have a business built of hating people that buy their cars. Honda don't. Toyota kinda. South Korea coming on cam and delivering nice rides for not a lot of money...absurd resale value, but that will be fixed in time.

USA have not moved away from the basic pretense of the 60's and 70's...worse still is that they are embracing the crap of the 80's.

Build a better car than a 2008 Honda and make it easier and cheaper to fix and service..your salvation.

Until then Vegas for all high and sundry, pity that.

 

1000%. I'm sure most people would prefer to purchase home grown efforts if only there was something to buy.

.....and btw Mr. DKW, I said SEDAN, NOT coupe, NOT 2 door hardtop...
... I wanted to use a model that was relevant, not a luxo-sled with 4 foot long doors, drums all around and a 425 'Rocket'.
LOL..

 

Oddly, people seem to have a problem with buying a small US car. Back in the early 60s, GM built the uni-bodied F-85, Tempest, and Skylark. None of them sold. In 1964 all of these got much larger and the sales took off.

Many of today's GM cars are rated quite highly and even better than much of the imports to which they are compared. Not to mention, as I just found out with my wife's Miata, a whole lot cheaper to repair! I drove a Pontiac Grand Prix rental from Main to Maryland (with a few stops along the way) and it was a very nice car. Handled very well, best FWD I've ever driven. Interior was very comfortable, and all was in easy reach of the driver.

My in-laws have a Honda hybrid, and the interior is awful. The brakes suck, and the car makes all sorts of moans and groans while it jerks and lurches when accelerating/decelerating. If it was a GM car, the press would pick it apart! But, it's a Honda, and as such, can do no wrong.

My Wife's Miata, a '96, has door panels of cardboard with a plastic armrest stuck on, reminiscent of something I would expect on a 1960's GM car, not a modern $25K "sports car." the dash has more hard plastic than a Lego collection, and the console is by Tupperware! Yet, again, the press loved the thing. But, as I have read, the Solstice has a poor interior. Go figure.

My parents just bought a new Buick Lucerne, and other than being named after a gallon of milk, it's a nice car. Rides a bit soft for my 39 year old taste, but the leather is quite nice, as is the fit and finish. I can't comment on its durability as they just bought it, but their last Buick was traded in with 100K miles with nary a problem.

My current company car does have a serious transmission problem (it's a Chevy Impala) after only 70K miles, but I suspect that this might have a bit more to do with the previous driver, and his lack of scheduled maintenance. Other than this, the car performs as it is meant to, and gets 30MPG highway, besting the Miata's 27MPG.

Shiny Side Up!
Bill

 

Let's hope the Malibu Hybrid is worthy. Can't disagree with your assessment of the public's deference towards the 64 BOP compacts (My Cousin Vinny immediately pops to mind...). GM was on the right track, but who's to say if they hadn't wavered the second generation wouldn't have been equally successful. Same applies to Ford when they stopped the award winning Mondeo platform after 6 years. GM and Chrysler offerings couldn't touch it dynamically, but quality control issues and a tight rear seat killed it early, easy fixes one would think. A great shame they deserted it, as it was a viable cut rate 325i alternative.

Merry Christmas, Isabelle

 

Buick isn't going anywhere anytime soon. Buick is a highly priced and sought after luxury brand in China. Even more so than BMW or Mercedes. China alone will keep the brand going for a while. If anything GM will simply pair down to fewer models. Buick is down to three.

As for Pontiac, GM is actually re-focusing that brand for performance. GM actually gets high marks from JD Power for many of it's brands.

 

When I was in China last year for the first time one of the things that I thought would be interesting was all of the China-specific cars that we don't see in the US (yet).

As I stepped out of the airport in Beijing there was very little traffic other than thr shuttles, a lone car was driving up. It looked different, I thought "let's see what this thing is..."

...A Buick.