I was in one of those focus groups. I think I was 7 or 8. Their first mistake was trusting a little kid with no palate, no purchasing power, and an appetite for enough sugar to crystallize an ant colony to give them opinions on the flavor and viability of their product. Their second mistake was giving you this tiny little paper cup with maybe half a swallow of each version in it. As with anything ultra-sweet, New Coke tasted great, in very small doses. Try to suck down 12 ounces of it and even a sugar-fiend kid sings a different tune.
As for Chrysler, the fork was stuck in it when Daimler bought it. Now vehicles of average quality turned into vehicles of decent structural quality and below-average electrical quality. Going to Fiat was just the natural progression of circling the drain.
Yeah, especially if you consider the GLH/GLHS Omnis, which I would happily drive today.
It sounds as though this will just be the name of the parent company (like FCA today or Diamler-Chrysler in the 90s-2000s), not the brand under which the vehicles will be sold. Iâm sure some redundant brands will be discontinued as GM did in 2008, but this isnât the end of the company or its most lucrative brands (Jeep, Ram).
Those PDI drives on the Rabbit diesels were done with foot on the floor the entire time. The motor screaming ( as much as one of them could) but the cars were slower than the minute hand on a wrist watch.
People would buy one for the mileage and after a bit of acclimation would come back wanting to know if power could be increased. Not a prayer.
Whatâs a bit funny about Chrysler is that when Fiat first took over the head man said the first thing he was going to do was get rid of V-8 engines. He said there was no place in the world for large displacement, high horsepower engines.
Guess he realized where a big chunk of market share was. Rams are hugely popular around here and almost all state patrol and many city police cars are Chargers.
He was used to the home market in Europe and maybe the Asian and African markets where big engines arenât found, except in commercial vehicles. Big engines are a niche market for the Chrysler component of FCA. Ford has more 6-cyl choices in the F150 than 8-cyl. That certainly wasnât the case 10 years ago.
Another thing different in the US is the end of the small car. The Spark, Fiesta, and Yaris are going away, but only here. Subcompacts are still a big thing in Asia and Europe.
South America also. And in all those places it has a lot to do with the roads. Iâve been down roads in Europe and South America that two mid-size cars couldnât go down at the same time. If one was heading east and the other westâŠthen one of them would have to back up. Many of our cities werenât really developed until after cars were already established.
Very true! The car allowed growth far beyond the city center. Dad commuted to work in the city on the bus and Mom had the car for errands in the spread-out suburbs.
2 car families then allowed the movement of businesses from the inner city to the suburbs. Commuting evolved into suburb to suburb in a car since public transport was still typically based around the city center. No one wanted the rather long trip to ride into the city and back out to their job in a different suburb.
Cities drove the development of the car. It was seen as a huge pollution reduction (no more horse manure!) for the city. The car, in turn, drove the development of the city-metro areas as we see them today.