regfootball

saabs built in mexico. LOL

The Vibe was inferior in powertrain quality and optioning. GT with a stick only? AWD with as much power as a Yaris?

even the GT was a slug in real driving. i hope a 2.4 is available on the new one.

LMAO. i better email my buddy and see if the wheels fell off his new civic yet!

wow. i didn't realize HOW redundant their worldwide lineup is. for that many models, you'd think they'd sell MORE cars.

when demand for new camries nosedives (because of accord, altima and malibu).....and 200,000 a year start flooding auctions off lease.........

tell me that won't beeoch slap the resale of the fluff car.

i have to sway my hips to counteract the momentum from my beer gut swinging back and forth.

hmm, no wonder so many female coworkers lately have been wanting to have nurturing conversations with me about feelings and relationships, and wondering what I think of their imported hand bags.

how does the new IMPREZA fit in all of this?

now, with the civic recalls, i would say this DROPS them down further they FALL OFF the list.

I mean, really - why the hell do you think Daimler is so glad to be rid of Chrysler? I would venture to say (no pun intended ) that it has been minivan sales that have kept Chrysler from being a total flop this past many years.

subtract jeep and minivans and you are left without much.

cerebus has a big task at hand.

first, I get comfortable. i disrobe, and then pour myself some cognac.

B.V.

You have managed to illustrate how LAME Ford is but the point still remains.

no $h!. everyone knows ford has too many SUV's. the point of the thread is to show ludicrous toyota's multiple SUV fest is.

chrysler has NO LEG TO STAND ON in any attempt to trumpet trustworthiness and quality of their vehicles. GM and Ford are legimately up there among the best these days. Where's Chrylser? NOT IN THE SAME GROUP.

HahahahahahaHAHAHAHAHAHA

I cannot believe you post such silly mindless propaganda about Chryslers and you own an AZTEC!!!!!!!!!!!

Describe your interior...

:wink:

"Rich opulent plastic, with generous air passages located between panel seams. Styling done by a team of custodial engineers to exacting standards!"

LOL

You are TOOOOOOOOOO fuunnnyyyy!!!!!

http://www.autoblog.com/2004/11/05/farewel...barely-knew-ye/

Most Versatile Vehicle on the Planet

Pontiac?s ad campaign touted the Aztek as the ?most versatile vehicle on the planet? and to speak to those that own an Aztek, the slogan fits perfectly. Did you know that the Aztek took home the JD Power and Associates ?APEAL? award in 2001? The APEAL study rates how happy the owners are with their purchase and how thoughtful an automotive design is. The Aztek rated high for powertrain, sound system and interior comfort features. This truck rewarded those that were taken in by its quirky, non-conformist look.

Media killed the Pontiac truck

Automotive style is subjective, we all know that, but the foaming hate that shot out from all directions at the Aztek equaled commercial failure. Many members blame the media for the mediocre sales. AFC member Ande2004 it summed up with this:

My personal take on the demise of the Aztek wasn?t its outward appearance as much as it was the bad press it received when it was launched. The Aztek was born to be different, that was its sole purpose.

To those that responded, style was one of the reasons an Aztek was purchased. ?Yeah I?m different, so what?s it to you??

When you really take a look at the auto landscape post-Aztek, the Elements and xBs littering the landscape, was the Aztek that off the mark? Did the plastic pieces and strange styling of the Element cause it to get its ass handed to it by the media? No, of course not? I guess it has the H of invulnerability brazened on its hood.

Functionality versus price

Above all, most Aztek owners have fallen in love with the truck?s versatility. It has the capability of a larger SUV, but the ride and feel of a car. The interior was very well thought out, including a removable center console that is actually a cooler. Cup holders, cargo trays, power outlets, rear mounted stereo controls ? everything to make and owner happy and at a discount. Aztek owners say that the price was on par if not lower than other SUVs that gave them only a portion of what the Pontiac offers, and none of the personality.

When asked if any Aztek owners would bite for the 2006 Pontiac Torrent, the unofficial Aztek replacement, some said because of the great experience they had with their current Pontiac, they would, but concede that they would lose the uniqueness of the Aztek.

thing is, owners heap high praise on their interiors. There are 3 other coworkers I work with who also have one and they all love the interior, its quietness, space, features, versatility and level of finish.

so, you can be one of the bandwagoners that can't think above groupthink but truth is aztek owners have the last laugh because they are happy with their purchase.

previous gen caravan owners may have been happy with their interiors. I don't see how that will be the case this time around, considering the competition.

the article does a really good job of summing it all up.

And everyone on this board knows it. Problem is, the other 99% of the US does not.

One important item was left out. Part of the reason and a big part of the import bias is the notion of better interiors and more tech advanced powertrains.

that still exists and honestly I argue that interiors, aside from the reliability myth, drives most car purchases to average consumers. "how nice of a cabin cruiser do i get for xxx a month"?

So to me, this perception problem will remain as it is until detroit really takes the gloves off in the press and in the advertising and in the marketing....AND.....dumps big time resources into interiors. and, moves AHEAD of the imports in the perception of how tech their powertrains are.

Americans are dumb and don't always get it right away and a lot of the time simply don't want to change their thinking anyways.

What i would do........anyone who trades an accord or camry in on a new aura or malibu or whetever, 5000 dollar trade bonus. put your money where your mouth is. if you own a camry or accord of any year and any standing, we will give you 100 dollars cash on the spot to TEST DRIVE the malibu. If you buy the malibu and give up your camry or accord, we will give you an additional 5000 dollar rebate.

radical, yes, but THAT WOULD GET PEOPLE IN THE SHOWROOM. then, send the accords and camrys to the crusher.

Get the competition off the road and into the car you are selling.

REVISED FOR 08 MODELS (without seeing malibu or 08 mazda6 yet)

haven't been able to establish an order, just groups

TIER 1

Accord

Milan / Fusion

Galant / Ralliart

Altima

Malibu

Aura

Mazda6

TIER 2

Grand Prix

Impala

Passat 2.0

G6

Camry

TIER 3

Avenger

LaCrosse

Sebring

Legacy

Sonata

Optima

Which one do you like better? I think I prefer the Altima.

honda has shown a lot more innovation over time than toyota.

Your sales guess is actually pretty good. Vibe sales for 2005 were 64K and in 2006 it was 45,000 units. This is NOT a big percentage of Pontiac sales but barely gets into double digits (14 and 11%).

I suspect that a few people buy the Vibe because its a Toyota and end up staying for the better service most Pontiac dealers provide. Still the biggest benefit to GM is getting Toyota to use its factory and pay its retirees and other workers benefits.

a- i had a 99 prizm. ok car...but it felt flimsy and well assembled at the same time. i didn't think it would feel buttoned down real long time. i got rid of it after 3 years and 20k miles. the blandness and flimsiness of it wore thin and left me wanting more...it really did not even satisfy in an appliance sort of sense.

secondly.........so, vibe sales in 2005 when it was a fairly new model were 64,000 units....most if not all retail i bet. by the way, show me the 2003 and 2004 numbers.

how many retail (non fleet units) does pontiac as a brand sell a year now?

09 vibe would no doubt rebound and sell at that number because it is a new design.

64,000 units + this years retail sales (- current vibe) = volume goal......64,000 % volume goal would be more like 20-25% of pontiac retail sales. maybe higher. lets say 1 in 3 or 1 in 4 pontiacs were vibes. pretty strong case to keep the model if you ask me. just like it would be suicide to cut the G6.

new vibe + torrent selling at a big clip makes it a hell of a lot easier for pontiac to exist as a brand and be able to provide that rear drive you want, as opposed to folding under lack of volume.

vibe=matrix w/ new front clip. not a lot of effort for a good amount of sales.

face it, crossovers are hot, and this is a way for GM to get market share on that segment.

chevy has HHR and saturn has vue so this is the only option left for this.

ok, 'for the usa'. add that on to my last post.

we got it 3 years ago. at the time we needed something inexpensive. it was about 5-7 grand cheaper than any LWB minivans across the board. it has about 75% of the utility of a minivan and a nice interior for the price we paid. and we've been completely satisfied with it. my transmission hasn't gone out. my ICP or whatever, hasn't gone out. I've got 75,000 trouble free lost cost reliable GM miles out of it in the 3 years. we weren't in a position like a lot of minivan buyers are. We wanted something for much less than minivan buyers spend so there is no correlation. FOr me it was either buy a compact car or the aztek. I ended up getting a completely satisfactory vehicle for a good price and it hasn't broke down. In 75,000 / 3 years miles i think i have only spent about 350 bucks to fix anything not wear and tear and not covered by warranty. That is TRUST, my friend, and I have faith in GM.....not DAI......If i had bought say, a short WB chrysler van, i suppose i'd have to worry about my front shocks being shot by now or my tranny going out right now. I never even considered a SWB chrysler van at the time because one of my buddies was having a bitch of a time with his about the same time we were shopping. I am not sure if i know of ANYONE who has ever made it to 75k in a chrysler product and has been trouble free. Part of the reason I am always leery of one. I know of plenty of folks who push 200k in GM cars over time. I honestly don't know of anyone who isn't ready to scrap their chrysler not too long after 100k most of the time. the dude that installed the blinds in my house, couldn't start his chryco van at my house and had to be jumped, why he was still driving it, i don't know. barely even got it started with a jump and i am surprised he didn't need a tow home.

van buyers split into those who buy on price and those who like to buy as nice as they can get. chrysler sold to the cheapskate poor folk van buyers and honda and toyota sold to the yups with $$$$$$.

now, chrysler is trying to price up the new vans at the level of the yup vans and the interiors simply do not justify the asking price to be with the big boys. is the gist of the thread.

It would be pretty easy to satisfy a van buyer right now, just direct them to a one year old loaded freestar for about 15 grand and they would save 20g and the plastic would be about the same as the chrysler and they could use the 20g to pay off other debts.

Maybe chrysler interiors lack these days because the money they would have spent on interiors has to go to warranty fixes and recalls....hmmmmm..........i wonder

because when all the jpanese car makers holed up in the bunker with the top japanese govt officials and japanese bankers, they decided toyo would be hybrid and honda would get diesels.

I don't think people buy minivans on LOOKS. I think they buy them as the whole PACKAGE. Which includes PRICE!

the freestar / monterey was the best buy going in vans for a couple years and that did not help them...price is not always the 100% issue.

Nope.

Tell that to the Pontiac Aztec. It wasn't the INTERIOR that made or broke the Aztec. The OUTSIDE is the first impression.

If INTERIORS sold cars, I'm willing to bet the original Volkswagen Beetle would have gone under in a few months.

The Caravans are (and have been) an overall appealing package to the average mom. They look decent, nothing flashy. They drive nice, like a car, and are very useful. Decent gas mileage. Lots of seating. That's why boatloads of Chrysler Caravans have sold over the years. Good overall packages SELL, and the Chrysler minivan offerings have sold in abundance. It doesn't matter if a few people have radically biased assessments or not, the PUBLIC will buy what the PUBLIC likes.

And they have.

wow, you are smoking something.

the previous caravans had decent interiors, not class leading, but nice comfortable, warm feeling, well laid out ones. the chrysler vans sold in the volume they did, mainly on price, for reasons folks like me and carbiz stated above.

THE NEW ONES ARE A REGRESSION IN INTERIORS. The powertrain is improved, but not such to offset the bad impact of mom checking out the inside of the rubbermaid hall of fame for the first time.

we bought our aztek, a lot because it had a good interior for the price. its dated today, but that doesn't hide the fact that new dai van interior is about 2-3 nothces below what they should have put in it to contend in the market for the next 4-5 years.....

As pointed out the Vibe is not a big seller nor a profit center. If a dealer is living off of Vibes he is hurting.

Pontiac needs to do a car more in the image of a Mini or some kind of shooting brake off a G6 platform. There are many things they can sell that would do better than what is a under powered crossover.

Pontiac could have done a car somewhat like the Nomad but in a more modern Pontiac style. Even based on a FWD with would make a much bigger impact than putting more money into the Vibe.

The redo of the Vibe is like renaming the Ford 500 a Taurus little gain for the cash spent. That money could go to a morte worth while venture on a future product.

The Shame is Pontiac is selling the cars Satun should have and Saturn is getting the cars Pontiac should have.

its 6 years old and they killed two models so duh sales are down. over its 6 year run, the vibe has sold a lot......i am not able to find numbers but it would not surprise me if they have moved 40-50k a year of these things since inception. that would be a big percentage of pontiacs volume in this span.

like GM needs something lame like the Mini.

it costs hardly anything to rebadge the vibe and in the process GM learns a few different things about how others build their cars. the vibe brings in more people than just graying haired guys who used to bo burnouts in the highschool parking lots in the late 60's and early 70's in their musclecar. vibe helps widen the pontiac demogrpahic. sure, it might be better suited as a saturn, but i don't see toyota agreeing to that, plus we already have the vue. toyota would never agree to it being a chevy. GM seems to not want to spend money to create a 'shooting brake' as you call it.

fact is, since 2000, the vibe has been one of GM's most consistently popular and praised cars. sounds lame sure, but the vibe ushered in the crossover era. it deserves to continue in some form.

Chrysler can put what they want on the window sticker, but the transaction prices will be $5-8k lower. They won't dare go up against the prices of the Toyota and Honda. Again, as I said, they have lots of under the table money and direct mail to their 'loyal' minivan base. They've marketed their vans far better than GM or Ford ever bothered to try.

We can debate horspower numbers and other such stuff until our fingers are numb, but with the more recent Chrysler minivans, the ride and power were lacking. If they want to maintain their market share, for their sake, I hope the '08 is a vast improvement. Even the outdated and tired '07 Uplander rides better than the '07 Chrysler offerings.

And this is why I say the chrysler vans may be doomed. EVEN IF they fixed the ride and handling, then the bad interior negates any and all progress made in that area, if they are trying to get big price out of them. i.e. this is the part Chrysler just does not get! Interiors are what sells cars!!!!!!!

Mom has the checkbook. Mom controls the genie. Daddy is told by mommy she needs to have the van with the nice interior. Women are sensitive to cheap plastic and interiors more so than men. Women who have just given birth get really emotional about seemingly non-mattering things like this. If daddy wants mommy to ever let genie out of the bottle, than mommy is gonna want daddy to get the van with the nice interior. In addition to the one that drives nicer.

It will be REALLY interesting to see if the new van interiors will be repellant to women compared to the ody and toyota. My guess is big yes.

It better drive like a frickin BMW or something "to be best in the industry" because it has to make up for Fisher-Price plastics, inferior 2nd/3rd row comfort, the lack of third row room, substandard leather, the clumsy and shoddily-assembled center console, the flimsy glovebox, the nasty rubber armrests, the stubborn A/C vents, the poor entry/egress...

i think the magazines have been cautious in pointing out how nasty the interior is on these vans yet, because they have about 6 months of big advertising push checks coming in the coffers while DCX does the new model rollout. After 6 months or so, when DAI is done funding ads for this and has moved on, we'll see the real truthful reviews come out.

re: GM vans...i was in a terrazza loaner recently and its interior wasn't too bad, but it feels like piloting a bus and does not feel like you sit in it. I think that's the turn off about the GM vans.....they feel more like driving a bus rather than something you sit IN.

i really like the magnum after i had one as a rental but in no way would i buy one; the interior is that terrible and depressing.