This morning’s New York Times had a jarring headline: “A Proposed Tax on the Cadillac Health Insurance Plans May Also Hit the Chevys.” I swear I thought they meant The Gray Lady was referring to a tax on Cadillac workers’ health care plan. To these admittedly jaundiced eyes (ew), “Hit the Chevys” sounds like something a GMC executive does when sales slide. “Hey, what’s wrong with Joe? Same as it ever was. Hitting the Chevys again? Yup.” Anyway, I can’t remember the last time I heard the phrase “The Cadillac of . . .” (Longtime readers may recall that I made this observation previously when the installation guy referred to my new KitchenAid as “The Lexus of dishwashers.”) When was the last time you heard the Cadillac comparison, and to what did it refer? What, if anything, has replaced it? Meanwhile, if Buick is “The Class of World Class” where does that leave Cadillac? I think the Beatles did a song about that.
I last heard it eleven years ago:
“The Canyonero is the Cadillac of automobiles!”
–Krusty The Clown, 2/98
When was the last time you heard the Cadillac comparison, and to what did it refer? What, if anything, has replaced it? Meanwhile, if Buick is ”The Class of World Class” where does that leave Cadillac? I think the Beatles did a song about that.
I actually heard it yesterday, but I’ll be damned if I could remember what it was in relation to. Cellular phones, I think, and the comparison wasn’t at all valid.
That said, Buick’s tagline is still stupid. I always thought their best hope was a version of “Damn right your dad drank (drove?) it” would have been a winner.
When I was a kid, in the early ’60s, the old man used to subscribe to National Geographic. In those days there was always an add for Cadillac–usually showing chauffeurs standing around chatting, waiting for the owners to leave the party. How times have changed.
http://tiny.cc/uEUqy
@Sajeev.
Nice! The worst part is that there have been real-life tales of “Lexus is the Cadillac of cars”
It’s funny that you mention Kitchen Aid, an American brand that holds its own in the high end appliance market. Kitchen Aid / Hobart mixers are still state of the art.
I think Buick’s ad agency’s rationale is that “world class” is not necessarily the ne plus ultra of appellations.
There are a lot of world class products as well as a difference between world class and state of the art. The Honda Accord and Chevy Malibu are both world class mid size sedans.
Saying that Buick is the class of world class distinguishes it from other admittedly good cars from other manufacturers and GM’s own offerings from Chevy, while positioning Cadillac as closer to the state of the art. I’m sure naming Cadillac’s successful design language as “art and science” was intended to evoke SOTA.
A new slogan for TTAC: “The Cadillac of automotive web sites”
On the Simpsons in 1996 or 97 when Krusty is endorsing the Canyonero SUV in his new-age standup routine.
“I’m telling ya,,,The Canyonero is the CADILLAC OF automobiles! That’s CANYONERO!”
Priceless
“Tata — the Cadillac of India.”
Twotone
How long before Lutz refers to the CTS-V as “the Cadillac of Cadillacs”?
Just two weeks ago. My father-in-law changed his house insurance to a more comprehensive policy and referred to it as “The Cadillac of home insurance”.
I’m sure the expression is used all the time, but mostly because it has become an idiom of the English language and not from the perceived quality of an automotive arm of General Motors.
It strikes me that Kodachrome is the Cadillac of films.
(photographers in the crowd will get it…)
Here in prairie Canada, the phrase is quite common. (I actually work in the insurance business here and I hear the phrase used as above, about comprehensive homeowner’s policies as compared to broad form or named perils, quite often.)
I agree that it’s become idiomatic. I’m not sure how many people have ever even used a Xerox copy machine, but people still often refer to photocopying as “xeroxing”.
Kodachrome was a special beast (and until I shoot the ten rolls left in my freezer, still is), but I wouldn’t call it a Cadillac. More of an MX-5… a blast to use, great at what it does but not necessarily at everything, and yet your experience isn’t complete until you’ve tried it.
In the movie Get Shorty.
Travolta’s character referred to his rented Oldsmobile Silhouette as the “Cadillac” of mini-vans.
Over 20 years ago for me … buying a backpack. The Cadillac of backpacks.
Photojim, I think Daniel meant like the Cadillac, Kodachromes sun has set.
Probably about 25 years ago on WKRP in Cincinnati:
Red wigglers, the Cadillac of worms
(we’re the) Cadillac of worms
(we’re the) Cadillac of worms…
rjones, you beat me to it with your post!
Most memorable instance I saw was a classified ad in the local paper promoting a Hino as “the Cadillac of trucks”; Hino, of course, being Toyota’s commercial truck arm.
Also about two weeks ago … and in a consumer electronics store, no less. It really took me aback. The sales droid was not a fossil either, which prompted me to offer some unsolicited, but friendly, advice re the currency and validity of his analogy.
Longtime readers may recall that I made this observation previously when the installation guy referred to my new KitchenAid as “The Lexus of dishwashers.”
Actually, I’d say a top-of-the-line hosuehold appliance is an apt comparison to most Lexuses…
Are you sure the install guy wasn’t a gearhead?
I don’t so much hear “the Cadillac of” phrase as much as I hear Cadillac as an adjective, e.g. “Insurance customers want Cadillac coverage for Chevy prices”.
When I was a HS kid,I knew a guy who drove a 37 Caddy coupe and then virtually the same car, a 38 La Salle coupe. The tear drop lines of the 37 GM line in toto is my favorite car style. There have been darn few good lookin’cars since then. ”
It is the Cadillac of__________,” was often used in my social circle coming up. Not so much in the last 20 yrs. They were pretty much just a gussied up Chevy, Buick, Pont. of late anyway.
I think I posted that last week in the article about Buick’s latest tagline. I was thinking of the movie Pulp Fiction, when I thought of it.
I’ve been shopping for a sports sedan, and my 13-year-old daughter, who lives on her cell phone and IPod, has been going along with me. The one she liked best? The Caddy CTS.
Hopeful sign for the future?
Just today, on a billboard that called the SRX the “Cadillac of Crossovers”.
1989.
The old Pennsylvanian Checker working for me called his brand new Mitsubishi Colt the ‘Cadillac of small cars’ because that is what he heard around town. Things were tight then, so small was ‘in’ and it was a compliment.
I hear “Cadillac health (insurance) plan” tossed around alot.
The Wire. If you watch the entire clip you’ll even see Snoop correct the salesperson and say “He said Cadillac but meant Lexus.” You’ll have to watch the series though to figure out what is going on. Best show HBO ever did…
Maybe the saying should die completely now that GM have comprehensively killed it’s meaning.
It was subverted from “The Rolls Royce of….” anyway.
The opening scene of The Wire, Season 4, has Snoop in a hardware store buying a nail gun. The sales guy refers to the nail gun as the Cadillac of nail guns.
When she leaves the store, Snoop explains to Chris, her partner in crime, “He call it the Cadillac of nail guns, but I know he mean Lexus…”
They used the nail gun to seal the doors of vacant tenements where they stored dead bodies. GM could use one of these tenements themselves, to store the various models of the various brands they’ve destroyed.
How long until Cadillac ends up in GM’s vacant tenement, is anyone’s guess…
You know, if GM played their cards right Cadillac could be, pardon the expression, the Pabst Blue Ribbon of luxury cars.
Hear me out on this: PBR is becoming very popular among Gen Y-ers due to it’s “old school” image and is kind of a reaction against our parents drinking a lot of microbrews. This is despite the fact that PBR is not particularly good, people just think drinking it is being rebellious and/or ironic. I think that’s the best strategy for GM with Caddy–make it a kind of ironic old school statement, while making Lexus look like mommy’s car.
Also want to add: PBR is very “all-American”, just like Cadillac could be. I’m not sure GM marketing will pick up on this idea, however, if that old suit in their new ads is any indication of their [lack of] “new thinking”.
While Cadillac may not deserve the title, LExus sure does not. I believe journalists and assorted auto illiterates in the Entertainment industry have cultivated this silly “The LExus of this and that” name. For appliances, it may be OK, but for serious stuff, no. And of all LExuses (Lexi), only the LS400-430-460 is convincing to me, and even that is flawed. As for the Camry-clone-rebadged ES, fuggedaboutit. And as for its many SUVs, I could care less, except maybe for the Landcruiser, whatever alphanumeric nonsense Lexus is rebadging it as.
about the last time new Electra 225’s were sold.
The bathroom facilities at a particular US air base in the Middle East are refered to as “Cadillacs”. They are called as such because they’re relatively nice for a deployed location; tile floors, well lit, air conditioned, etc. However, there is no doubt most people find them pretty nasty. Mold grows everywhere and grafitti is a reoccuring problem. People use and abuse them and cleaning done by rotating teams of TCNs who do a half assed job. As a deployed member of the military we can’t expect luxury, so we accept the Cadillacs or what they are – a compromise between comfort and disgust.
No, no, NO!
If the KitchenAid is the Lexus of dishwashers, the Bosch must be the BMW–the ultimate washing machine.
In fact, in German, BMW’s logo is “Freude am Fahren”, a far more modest and, take it from me, a very satisfied 740iL 98 owner for 4 years now, absolutely true claim, translates as “Happiness at Driving”
Last Friday.
The “Cadillac” Health Insurance program is what Congress has specifically reserved to itself and Federal workers, while the rest will get the DMV with bedpans.
Only as parody, as in “the cadillac of frozen breakfast burritos”
The last time I heard this in earnest it was automatically corrected by the person stating it. I was interviewing for a job in 2002 at a company that manufactures golf cars and a mid-30’s (at the time) gearhead engineer said:
“We make the Cadillac, well, um, the *Mercedes* of Golf Cars.” (said with denoted emphasis)
So, when will we see:
Buick – The new class of Lexus
BDB: The PBR’ers are just as image conscious as the microbrew types and are merely in rebellion. The true rebels drink Miller High Life. It’s cheaper, all-American, and there’s no image attached to it whatsoever.
It has been so long since I heard the expression that I can’t remember the last time. Which should tell us all something.
There will always be room for the “Cadillac” of anything as long as at least one 1959 Coupe de Ville is left in the world. http://www.mystarcollectorcar.com/
A few years back a buddy of mine bought a used Fleetwood, fitted it up with a snowboard rack, and replaced the “C” on the Cadillac badge with an “R”. He then declared Radillac to be the Cadillac of snowboarding cars. That lasted one Burlington, VT winter, after which he realized it was more like the Cadillac of ill conceived beaters and sent it off to its reward.
The implied luxury of Cadillac is about as relevant as Xerox is to photocopying today. Too much adjective and not enough substance to differentiate it from the competition.
Today’s auto market is a tough place to stand out.
Daniel J. Stern :
September 21st, 2009 at 6:05 pm
It strikes me that Kodachrome is the Cadillac of films.
(photographers in the crowd will get it…)
Daniel: Linking Cadillac to Kodachrome is a good one. Seems Kodak has “retired” Kodachrome as a dinosour of the photographic industry. Is this what will happento Cadillac?
http://www.kodak.com/eknec/PageQuerier.jhtml?pq-path=2709&gpcid=0900688a80b4e692&ignoreLocale=true&pq-locale=en_US&_requestid=16171
Unfortunately, “This is the Cadillac of__________” is firmly entrenched in my local vernacular so I hear it all the time. I am actually trying to break myself of this.
Jim Sutherland nailed it: it’s not about what Cadillac has become. It’s about what Cadillac once was.
KitchenAid? Meh. Decent, but your installer doesn’t set that high a standard. I think you mean Sub-Zero – now those are gorgeous American made appliances.
Bosch as BMW? Bosch is rarely made in Germany these days. But now that you mention it, BMWs are made in Zhonghua, China … so yeah, you are right.
What’s ironic is that when I purchase appliances these day I usually go Samsung, and make sure that they’re made in Korea to ensure quality. You draw the parallels to the auto industry.
How is a Cadillac similar to an insurance policy?
They will both let you down when you really need them and they are both sold by guys with a drinking problem and a bad suit.
“Pink Cadillac” by Bruce Springsteen (1984)
***
I love you for your pink Cadillac
Crushed velvet seats
Riding in the back
Oozing down the street
Waving to the girls
Feeling out of sight
Spending all my money
On a Saturday night
Honey I just wonder what you do there in back
Of your pink Cadillac
***
Now some folks say it’s too big
And uses too much gas
Some folks say it’s too old
And that it goes too fast
But my love is bigger than a Honda
It’s bigger than a Subaru
Hey man there’s only one thing
And one car that will do
Anyway we don’t have to drive it
Honey we can park it out in back
And have a party in your pink Cadillac
We echo Robert’s feeling since Caddy lost their way way back in the sixties.
http://carsinpedia.com/car_day_archive_details.php?id=382
I am a machinist, and one of the gages we use in the shop is commonly called a “Cadillac gage”, because it’s the most accurate piece of equipment we’ve got. Sadly, it’s made by a Japanese company, Mitutoyo.
I just heard it 2 minutes ago! It was a Cadillac commercial for the ‘Cadillac of Crossovers’ the new CTCRVSXRAV4VXS …or something like that.
I agree there is a place for a retro car brand. Not retro cheap like the HHR, but retro luxe. Lincoln did this a while back semi-successfully with an art-deco look in their SUV’s but the 50’s have yet to be mined.
What would it look like?
Bench seats. Lots of cushiony good leather, everywhere. Retro stereo controls. Column shifter? Real burled wood, not fake wood. Maybe the faintest whiff and insinuation of tailfins. A ride like a Lexus ES or the Buicks of old. Metal switchgear that feels like an analog switch that will last for 50 years (even if it’s connected to a typical electric system underneath.)
But put in a single engine -a modern small six cyliner of 2.8-3.0L, comprehensive safety equipment and nav gadgetry, six or even seven speed automatic and a 21st century build quality.
Skip engine and transmission choices- those add cost and complexity and even keep the number of colors down to five or six to run easily on a lower inventory.
That, I think would sell. You would sell to men in their 30’s and 40’s who are looking to move up to a better family car. Price above a Malibu and below a Cadillac…somewhere like Buick or Mercury or Chrysler.
The temptation would be to put in a huge displacement engine and make a muscle car, but that market is saturated. The market is in making a quality Accord/Malibu size car for under 32k with a great interior, and in order to do that you need to keep the engine small and DIFFERENTIATE.
Being in Europe i’ve probably only heard it in american movies. Last time in Get Shorty i think. “The Cadillac of minivans”, referring to the Oldsmobile Silhouette.
Around here its Rolls Royce or Mercedes. And as for KitchenAid… There’s a not-so-flattering editorial on one of their appliances right here on TTAC; https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/editorial-stein-x-leikangers-metaphorical-journey-into-kitchenaid-hell/ Sorry if someone already linked it and i missed it.
Abe Vigoda once said to me about the car he had when he was 16, “That there, young lad was the Cadillac of Deusenbergs!”
Just today, on a billboard that called the SRX the “Cadillac of Crossovers”.
… but technically correct would be the “Crossover of Cadillacs”.
When we were negotiating to buy our house just over 3 years ago, the sellers were willing to leave all appliances except for the brand new front-load washer and dryer. We asked to work those in too. The woman was heard to exclaim, ” Not my PORSCHE washer and dryer!” To add insult to injury, both the woman and her husband were Ford employees.
Here in the Philthydelphia area, it’s Lexus of … by a major win. Hell I even say that occasionally and I happily own a CTS..
A little off-topic but since you mentioned taxes on “Cadillac” Health Insurance plans – The last I heard the proposed tax on these plans had an exemption – for union plans that covered workers like those who make, well, Cadillacs. So like in Animal Farm I guess some workers and health plans are more equal than others.
My grandfather still calls things the “Cadillac” of this and that. Odd, considering he’ll drive Lincolns until the day he dies. Cadillacs are what my grandmother drives, and in his mind for good reason.
The phrase was used by a WAMU (DC NPR station) reporter during the local segment of Morning Edition this very AM. Surprise, surprise, it was in connection with a health insurance plan.
Here is an obscure one:
Sometime in the mid-1990s, Reverend Norb, a prominent columnist for MAXIMUMROCKNROLL got fired for using the phrase “the Cadillac of vaginas” in a column. The editors thought it was too sexist.
It ended up creating a pretty big controversy in the punk scene for a few months.
-Ken
“Koblog :
September 21st, 2009 at 8:45 pm
The “Cadillac” Health Insurance program is what Congress has specifically reserved to itself and Federal workers, while the rest will get the DMV with bedpans.”
There, fixed it for you. Federal Civil Service retiree.