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Sedans Luxury Lounge
21405 messages, Last post on Nov 27, 2009 at 12:27 PM
You are in the Sedans Forum. Your Hosts are pat & karens
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Replying to: lexusguy (Oct 20, 2008 1:12 pm)
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Replying to: tagman (Oct 20, 2008 5:58 pm) Somebody is going to go C11. I'm just not sure yet which one will be first. My guess is that Ford will scrape by, GM will go C11, and Cerberus will cut and run from Chrysler as fast as they can. Only their ego has kept them in this money torching uber-failure this long, but they won't kill themselves to stay in a business they never really wanted to be in. GM may swallow what's left (if they can actually find somebody to give them the credit to do so) or Chrysler may be split up and sold off to various parties. On a side note, I think the Germans are going to benefit from all of these changes, but they will need to introduce their newer, more fuel-efficient products sooner than they had anticipated. We'll see. M-B isn't in great shape right now, but Porsche/VWAG and BMW are doing reasonably well considering the climate. Honda will no doubt continue to make a killing in small cars, it's what they are best at. Trying to push Acura up to peer level with Lexus, let alone the Germans, is another story. They aren't doing a cut-price LS460, ala Genesis. They are doing an LS460 priced LS460. Who is going to buy a $70K Acura? All of those Phaeton owners? |
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Replying to: jimbres (Oct 20, 2008 6:24 pm) Indeed, it makes both Camry and Accord look incredibly dull by comparison. The interior is a bit less luxurious than the new Maxima's, but it's more driver focused, and more importantly it's a big improvement over the dirt cheap interior in the old 6.   Notice the reasonable number of buttons and reasonable layout. Honda used to do things that way. Now they do things like this: 
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Replying to: lexusguy (Oct 20, 2008 8:52 pm) I saw it advertised on tonight's MNF game. I was very impressed, and even mentioned what a good-looking car it has become. Notice the reasonable number of buttons and reasonable layout. Honda used to do things that way. Now they do things like this: Better known as the "shotgun interior"... LOL.  Actually, I've taken a close look at that layout, which is from the Accord, and it is indeed quite menacing at first glance, but a second and third look reveals that there is actually some logic to the madness. Climate controls, audio controls, and navigation controls are fairly well segregated into their own sections, and most functions have a clear analog control. Now, I'm not suggesting that it's a preferable approach, because it's not... but, it's really not as bad as it looks. TM |
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Replying to: tagman (Oct 20, 2008 9:18 pm) The problem is it looks really, really bad. Why is there a menu, info, AND a setup button? Control knobs are supposed to reduce the number of dash buttons, not increase them. Even BMW knows that.
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Replying to: lexusguy (Oct 21, 2008 12:13 am) Honda provides those direct-access buttons. Gee... Damned if you do and damned if you don't TM!
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Replying to: tagman (Oct 21, 2008 3:32 am) Regards, OW |
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Replying to: tagman (Oct 20, 2008 5:58 pm) Sorry Tag but I will have to wholeheartedly disagree with you 100 percent with this one particular statement of yours above. German auto makers are in very serious trouble. MB and BMW, Audi and Porsche are in the worst segments possible during slower global economic times. Their engineering is first rate. Their marketing strategies are first rate. Even their customer satisfaction statistics have improved substantially during the years. All 4 marques have done every single thing they could do except one thing. WRONG MARKET SEGMENT! Suzuki auto sales are booming. Is it because of their engineerng?  Is it because of their marketing strategies?  Is it because of high customer satisfaction  Nope it's because they are in the right market segment! That's the only reason. Honda is doing better than Toyota solely because it does not have V8 trucks and SUVs. Toyota is the leader not only in terms of sales but also in terms of technologies that really count for the future (hybrids, plug ins). Honda luck resembles the luck of Suzuki in terms of having offerings that are biased towards fuel efficient vehicles. What about the other German calledVW? They have the best prospects among the Germans primarily because their product line caters more to the frugal types. The economy dictates market demand. Auto enthusiasm is independent of the economy and that is why many of us here discuss Italian exotics without ever intending to buy one of those overpriced lemons. When the economy booms again then luxury German marques will luck out. But waiting for that boom may involve the patience of Job. .
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Replying to: dewey (Oct 21, 2008 7:22 am) It also gives them choices to subsidise leases to gain volume or offer other incentives to increase sales. I agree that this segment will come under pressure due to recent economic changes, but in most industries the high end consumer has been less affected than the lower end when it comes to income and spending patterns. There are areas of the country where expensive homes are still selling well but low end homes don't move, the car industry may go the same way for a while. At the end of the day I don't think any of these companies would switch places with lower end brands. I do agree with you that the reason that we are here discussing these expensive cars is that econmic factors don't always dictate our interests. Most of us are fortunate to be able to drive some nice cars and even dream of the fancy Italian lemons that you've highlighted.
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