Actually, Chrysler has spent the better part of the last 12 (or so) years attempting to put truly distinctive looking cars on the road. It has had absolutely no effect on their ability to increase sales relative to Ford (or anyone else).
The lesson I would draw from that is that while there are probably niche markets for distinctive body shapes, it is simply not the attraction for other people that people in that niche perceive that it should be.
In the order listed: Fugly, You mean the Elephant, Meh.
Now that they’re from the same corporation, Jaguars look a lot like Fords. A couple years ago, I was behind a car at a stop light and thught “Hmmm… I like what they did with the back end on the new Taurus.” Then I saw that it was actually a Jag. Still thought it looked like a nice rendition of the Taurus.
Cars are starting to look homogenized because the car **makers ** are being homogenized. Jag is part of Ford, Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Mercedes are all one big happy family. Rolls Royce is part of VW. Pretty much everything else that isn’t Japanese or Korean is part of GM.
With brands merging together like this, we get a lot more “badge engineering” where they take a basic car and doll it up in different ways. For example, the “luxury” brand gets the leather interior and by simply changing the front “clip” it gets fancier headlights and grill. The mid-range brand gets “leather-appointed” interior and a different front clip. Same engine, frame and drivetrain and probably 90% the same sheet metal, so the investment in difficult engineering is recycled.
Not true: Chrysler 300 sales as hot as its looks:
The 300 sold more cars in two months than the previous did in five months.
And since it’s just been named car of the year by just about everyone, based in large part on its outstanding styling, you can bet that sales are going to get even stronger. A perfect example of how fantastic styling can sell a car.
Another example of a distinctive car that is selling like hotcakes because of its terrific styling is the Ford Mustang. Everyone’s drooling over it, and they’re flying off of the lots.
Yeah, but “fantastic” != “unique”, since it’s obviously a ripoff of British styles.
For your generic sedan/wagon I think the answer is “self-supporting body”. I just invented that phrase, because I don’t know the technical phrase in English. And my dictionary wasn’t much help either.
It used to be that cars were made with a frame, and then you hung the body on top of that. In these modern times, the body needs to stay in place by itself. This is the reason so many cars tend to have a high rear end (which is not good for aerodynamics) and a narrow front.
Another reason is that so many cars in fact start with the same base.
Ford Focus is basically the same car as
Mazda 3 which is the same car as the
Volvo s40 which in turn is the base for the
Jaguar X-type
… all being part of Ford Motor Co.
Sorry, a single best seller (that looks to me like a German-built Avalon) does not make my statement “not true.” We have over a decade of “cab forward” sedans, PT Cruisers, Vipers, retro Ram pickups, Neons, and other attempts at unique design and Chrysler still has a “-Daimler” tacked on the end of it and the company is not in any position to trade places with Ford on the sales rung of the U.S. market ladder.
I actually like a lot of those cars and I am driving a Dodge. However, simply making “distinctive” cars has failed to bring Chrysler Corporation off the bottom of the U.S. auto sales race.
That’s because “unique” does not translate into “good”. Witness the Pontiac Aztek. The Aztek, by the way, is an example of what can go wrong when you swing for the fences with unique design. Despite having some pretty innovative engineering and packaging, the Aztek was a sales dud for one reason: it’s butt-ugly.
The cab-forward cars never set the world on fire. They were just too bland. And Chrysler carried the concept too far into their lines, blurring the distinction between different models. It’s hard to sell a sports car to young people that looks almost identical to the sedan your grandfather drives. And it’s hard to sell gramps on the sedan when it looks just like those cars the kids are racing around in.
But some of the new vehicles coming out of all the big three manufacturers are sporting truly unique and outstanding design. In fact, I think we happen to be in the golden age for car design right now. The new 300, the new Mustang, the Pontiac Solstice, The Ford GT, the 350-Z and Mazda RX-8 are all headed for cult car status. The Murano is a truly unique vehicle, with 240HP, continuously-variable transmission, adaptive all wheel drive… This is a space age vehicle - unique in design in all aspects, and it’s pretty darn nice.
Compare this generation to the pablum spewing out of the 1980’s, when the Mustang was the Mustang II and the average sedan from Ford looked identical to the sedan from GM or Chrysler. ‘K’ cars were not exactly the epitome of unique design.
And the new Vette may be the best looking Vette since the 1960’s.
The word we use is “unibody,” from the body and frame being together as a unit.
Instead of “base,” we would say “platform.”
Gotpasswords makes a good point. The cars look alike because the companies are alike. I’m intrigued that there are those who can’t tell one 50’s car from another. Maybe your age really does make a difference. That, and the time you were born and brought up in. I agree that Chrysler has made efforts at creating unique looking cars. In fact, in the last few years, whenever my wife and I notice a pretty or interesting looking car, we notice that it is often made by Chrysler. (And it looks as if we’re not going to agree on the PT Cruiser, which I love and which she hates, but which is truly different.) What I don’t understand is why the companies don’t market these differences. My own feeling is that culturally, we have lost touch with the value that says that there’s something good about being different and standing out from the crowd. So that type of sales pitch is lost on the current generation of car buyers. And I still contend that if I wanted a Mercedes, and I wanted a Mercedes that made a statement (which I think a lot of Mercedes owners want to do) I sure wouldn’t buy the one that looks just like a Honda Civic. What are these people thinking? Anyway, thanks for the input. xo C.
