I like Chrysler. They came up with the Viper, brought back the convertible, started the mini-van revolution ,made the Prowler . They have shown imagination and nerve.
Another factor is what kind of experiences the customer has had with previous Big 3 makes…
My first “car” was an '88 Ford Escort Pony, rather than hash out it’s long, inglorious list of malfunctions and craptacular, nonexistent quality, I’ll sum up the experience with the phrase “Murphy’s Lawmobile”, you name it, it broke, after that kind of experience, which left an understandably bad taste in my mouth, WHY would I ever risk trusting Ford products again?
I had better experience with Chrysler vehicles, specifically, Dodge, I owned three Dodge cars ('92 Shadow, '98 Neon, '02 Neon), and the only thing that has turned me off of Chrysler products is their unwillingness of either the dealer, or Chrysler itself) to cover what was most probably a product defect (rotted out front suspension K-member crossbeam on the '02) to tell me that the rust-perforation warranty ended no less than two months before the problem was discovered, sorry, Chrysler, treat a returning customer like dirt and you can bet I won’t ever return again
So far, my current car, an '07 Saturn Ion has been essentially good, the only minor issues were the fabric on the driver’s seatback having a hole worn in it in 8 months, and the rearview mirror falling off the windshield and dangling from the OnStar power cable, both issues were fixed without fuss, under warranty, while I was at work
at the moment, I have no problem with GM products, aside from the fact that the vehicles in my price range are somewhat boring, then again, I only have about 10,500 miles on the Ion so far…
of the Big Three, the one that I’ve been happiest with so far has been the Ion, Ford and Chrysler cannot rebuild their reputation in my mind enough to make me consider their vehicles, due to my less than stellar experience with them, to me, ford=crap, and Chrysler=jerks, yes the cars may in fact be better, but why should I even consider risking purchasing, lets say, a Focus, when I had such craptacular luck with the Escort?
I imagine this “my last Ford/Chevy/Dodge vehicle was a piece of crap, why should I trust them again” mindset is one of the many factors working against the Big Three, yes their cars ARE better now, a lot better, but just try to convince me to buy another Ford product, go ahead, I dare ya!
I really can’t see anything the car companies have done wrong. They made cars Americans want, big trucks and SUVs. Now, I know that isn’t politically correct, but look around you the next time you drive down the road and see what Americans want.
What is killing the car companies is the same thing that is killing every other business. Most people can’t borrow enough money to buy a new car, and most people don’t have enough money to pay cash for a new car, hence there are very few new car sales.
This brand loyalty stuff is silly. I was always a Chevy guy - I owned two Camaros and an Impala. Then Chevrolet started making crappier cars, and I switched to Ford in a heartbeat.
Why on earth would you let what happened to you a decade ago sway your opinon of the current crop of cars? I owned three Datsun 240-Zs, and all three of them rusted out so badly that they had to be scrapped for safety reasons. Does that mean I wouldn’t consider a Nissan today? Not a chance. What I’d do is check to see if they got their rusting problem under control (they did), and if they did, my old experience doesn’t matter, does it?
There’s nothing wrong with the best vehicles from Ford and GM today. In fact, given that they are at least as good as their import rivals, and you can get huge cash rebates on them, I think people are silly if they let brand loyalty prevent them from at least giving these vehicles a fair shake.
I did that with my current Ford Escape. I bought it new in 2003, and the only thing it’s needed since was a steering pump and a set of brakes. It still looks and runs like new, and I couldn’t be happier with it. For a long time, I avoided GM cars because of their obvious quality problems and their lagging behind in technology. I considered them all mostly junk.
But today, if I were in the market for a new vehicle, Ford and GM would be at the top of my list, because both are clearly making very good, reliable cars now, and with the discounting they are having to do to get customers back, these vehicles are a steal. If you refuse to even consider them, well… it’s your loss.
I agree its silly. But silly or not, I think its a major, if not the major, factor in which cars people decide to buy. I’ve heard people give stories that are similar to MacTech’s to justify their car purchases tens of times.
And to be fair, it cuts both ways. GM and Crysler benefited from the inertia of brand loyalty back when their quality dropped off, people would still buy their cars at higher prices then they were worth because they had fond memories of their previous models.
I have been driving SATURNS (GN) since 1992. All of them have been excellent cars, with very low repair costs, and no defects. The biggest repair I’ve had (2000 L-100), was $160.00 to fix the airconditioning. The other big benefit of Saturns-they are not popular with thieves-so insurance costs are much lower than for Toyotas. My latest car (Saturn Aura, is great-leather seats, all options, and a price much less than a comparable Japanese or German car.
Oh, you’re quite right. That’s why auto companies try so hard to capture the youth market - the statistics show that the vast majority of people will stick with the car brand they had when young, unless something happens to greatly displease them. So the domestics definitely have a hill to climb to get those customers back.
Absolutely. I have friends who are ‘Chevy guys’. We have a neighbor down the street who has a license plate “FORD BOY”. Another truck in that family is “FRD BOY”. I think it’s safe to say that this family will never buy anything other than a Ford vehicle.
I have little sympathy about the big three as some of you know. If you drove the craptacular cars in the 70’s and 80’s you would understand. I remember some of the first Honda Civics, yeah they were really tiny but they were really reliable. Over time they were not joked about as toys anymore.
Even though Ford and GM have some great quality vehicles, people still remember the bad times. It takes time for people to forget the shit that Detroit put out for a very long time.
I will probably never own a GM car again because of a 82 Monte Carlo. Wow, It really did spend more time in the shop and probably cost me more in repair bills then it was actually worth.
Those memories last. The big three need to kiss serious ass.
GM and Chrysler get a “stealth” bailout.
Cerberus is the company that owns Chrysler.
if they want to turn public opinion around they should start putting their cars into the hands of people who will abuse the hell out of them and then use the feed back as advertising, I work in driver training, my experience with American cars is horrifying. give me a new ford, let me teach in it then get back to me, few things abuse a car more than spending 6 hours a day or more on the road with 8 or more different inexperienced drivers behind the wheel. I put 40k miles on a car one year just teaching.
if they are going to tell me their cars are better now its not gonna work for me. I need feedback from a neutral party.
No.They sit on life-support administered by the loving parent-government and await someone to suck it up and pull the plug.
I used to wonder what impact fleet cars had on the big3: they were usually dreadfully boring cars that most people would only encounter as beaten and battered cars driven by unloving people with no ownership in them. (And what was with the peeling paint on the GM Luminas!?!)
For me (33 years old), I’d still not buy anything from any of them, thanks to memories of time spent at arrogant, incompetent dealer service rooms with my parents.
I wonder what a new NASCAR with big3 cars straight off the showroom floor would do? Imagine seeing the actual car available to buy being raced every weekend. I think that’d boost perceptions for some (youth especially). Never happen, though.
That’s too simple by half.
I don’t see (unlike some poeple aorund here) anything wrong in trucks and SUV’s. I don’t care one way or the other. But the Big Three, and GM in particular, has had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the modern world. Ironically, without CAFE requirements, they would probably have gone out of business already, since their available mileage would have been ridiculously out of date. GM wants to live in the past. Their executives are inbred (figuratively) in that they all ome up from GM’s entrenched management. The company needs to hire outsiders, a lot of them.
That’s faint praise. So it wasn’t a lemon when it was delivered. Yea.
What about reliability and maintenance costs over the life of the car? Does it fall apart after N years, where N is a small number? My Toyota Corolla isn’t a “cool car”, but it has been running very reliably for almost 10 years. It hasn’t reached the point where many parts start to wear out or fall off. Plus, when I bought it, it was substantially cheaper than many competing models.
I’ve never owned a GM car. Some of my friends have, and they regretted it. I used to own a Ford Taurus, which was a decent car, but seemed to suffer from premature aging.
JD Power also does reliability rankings, based on the past three years of reliability data, plus recall data.
The Ford Fusion scored a perfect 10/10. Cite.
Consumer Reports collects reliability data direct from customers - these are actual reports of unscheduled maintenance and repairs. The Ford Fusion has scored higher than Camry and Accord. Cite.
I still wonder about this. With the exception of my grandfather’s Cutlass Ciera in which I had my first driving lessons, the only American cars I’ve driven have been rentals and a couple of test drives of cars that were quickly ruled out. Now I know that rentals and lot cars are not kitted out the way that I’d personally choose, but my experiences have been bad almost straight across the board. American cars, compared to my mom’s Honda Accord and Volkswagon Golf and the three cars I’ve owned, all small, a Toyota, a Nissan and now a Hyundai, were just cruddy:
- Ford Taurus: drove like a tank, got crappy gas mileage.
- Ford Festiva: like driving a clown car without the clowns, a rolling easter egg and not big enough to breathe in.
- Chevy Cavalier: actually one of the better experiences, but that was 1991, they made bad changes to this car over the decade before its demise.
- Chevy Lumina: so-so gas mileage, had no style at all.
- Pontiac Grand Am: same as the Lumina, also far too square which made driving weird.
- Pontiac Grand Prix: just too big at key dimensions (the hood seemed to be six feet long) and got crappy gas mileage.
- Dodge Intrepid: same as the Grand Prix, meant to be sleek but missed the mark, and got gas mileage in the teens.
- Buick something or other: Zzzzzzzzz so boring I don’t remember details.
- Chevy Monte Carlo: just too big overall, bad gas mileage.
- Chevy Malibu: felt too square, I backed into a pole because even between three mirrors and looking back over my shoulder through the rear windshield, I still couldn’t see where the corner of the car was.
- Chevy Cobalt: Small, uncomfortable, ridiculously bad gas mileage for its size.
- Pontiac G6: Less passenger room than my Hyundai Elantra. Cockpit layout ridiculously inaccessible to my small mom with short arms. Truly wretched driving experience and again, poor mileage.
- Ford Focus: Again, less passenger room than the Elantra, boring plastic interior (this wasn’t a rental, but a friend’s “fully loaded” car) just nothing about it felt special.
- Chrysler 300: (as a passenger in a private vehicle) huge, absolutely, needlessly cumbersome and huge. Should be renamed the Sherman 300.
The only American vehicle I’ve ever driven and liked has been a Saturn VUE but the gas mileage was nothing to write home about (and the hybrid VUE gets 2 mpg more than the standard for $3,000 more base price, I don’t know what the point is) and the price for the features and mileage couldn’t really compare to the competition like the Honda CRV.
And American cars don’t seem to last. I’m not seeing, here in the snowy, salty northeast, many 10+ year old Fords or Chevys on the road. It used to be that there were quite a few old style Ford Escorts or little boxy Chevy Cavaliers around, but no longer, even on the $895 “drive it home today” street corner used car lots. But I do still see 10+ year old Toyotas and Nissans, especially, and was driving a '96 Nissan until a year ago. I see old pickups and I see old minivans, but passenger cars? Nope.
So I know that these things color my perception of American cars. A year ago, when I was shopping to replace my Nissan, there wasn’t a single American made car on my radar. I wish there could have been, but there wasn’t one that began to fulfill my needs.
It is not about the cars anymore. They have proven themselves for a long time. It is about a survivable business model. The question is whether one exists. Can anything save a manufacturing company that has to pay health care costs? They would have to come up with a brand new product that everybody wants. A really well priced,good looking electric car might do it.
Cars are cars. You can get a crappy Toyota too. Our dealership system is a big problem. They have been arrogantly abusing their customers for decades.
GM is now considering Chapter 11 bankruptcy:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090214/ts_nm/us_gm_plan
GM’s talks with the UAW have also broken down with only days to go before their progress report to Washington is due:
http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/14/news/companies/uaw_gm_talks.reut/index.htm?cnn=yes
Sounds like a great time to buy a GM vehicle!
I was absolutely thrilled with the '71 Nova, and bought the '74 version off the show room floor. Big mistake, since it was not the same car. Haven’t bought a new car since. Need to win the lottery to do it.
GM, Ford, and Chrysler are in big trouble, and they managed to do it to themselves.
I don’t think you can overlook the contribution of American car dealerships to the equation. We all have horror stories of taking a car in and it sits in the lot for 3 days then they gave it back untouched.They have treated customers with a cavalier and snotty attitude for decades. There are so many horror stories. Then the lemon laws. If you spent a lot of money for a car and it was a bad car, it was your problem. They would fight you in court to avoid fixing it or replacing it. They were customer unfriendly.
Auto salesman have always invented ways to lie and cheat customers. They would change contracts ,add costs like unasked for warranties and change interest rates when the paperwork was finished. To think when you go to the dealer to buy a car and you will be in an adversarial procedure gives the buyer pause. Buying a car has always been an unpleasant experience and it did not have to be.