After the onset of carmageddon, premium and luxury cars were considered as unsalable. According to mutual agreement, the future of the automobile was small ecoboxes. If there was any future at all.
Fast forward to Germany …
In Germany, anybody who builds luxury cars is overwhelmed. The holy sacrament of the summer vacation has been set aside. Overtime is the operative word.
According to Automobilwoche [sub], BMW is “faced with capacity constraints.” All X models, the 5series and the 7series are “fully booked” said a BMW spokesperson. Waiting periods of “several months” are the rule. BMW Leipzig works three shifts, six days a week.
Daimler is running weekend shifts.
Audi continues to produce the A4, A5, Q5 and A6 during vacation times.
Reason? Despite falling car sales in Europe, customers are sick of frugality. Big and well appointed are back. The main reason: Exports, especially exports to China.
Reality check: These vehicles are still tiny fractions of the entire global market. All this says to me is that the luxury brands have done an excellent job of managing overcapacity, just as the leading mass market companies are begining to do in the wake of the global financial implosion.
If I ever get locked up…THIS IS THE CAR I WANT TO PICK ME UP !
Hopefully they’ll have the rear seat package with the massage motors, DVD entertainment and heated/cooled seats cause I don’t have that in my S550.
The headline doesn’t match the story.
In CHINA, luxury is going gangbusters. The China market does not reflect what’s going on in the rest of the world, especially parts of the world where the new car market is mature and saturated.
The only way to get people into econocans is to starve them into them…The lazy envy-ridden brat ecomorons (only gore-worshipping morons think that CO2 and water “harm” the “enviroment”) want people to starve.
@ AaronH.. You know the odd time, I haft’a agree with you. My Impala uses about 3% more gas than the Grand Am I traded in.
The Impala is 50% more comfortable. The “ecomorons” can have thier econocans. I’ll drive want I want to drive.
How is the SLS doing?
So, the 1% are now comfortable enough that the other 99% won’t go French/Russian Revolution on them enough to drop a few bucks?
BFD.
The reality is that the upper-middle is shrinking too.
Look at the GAO data if you don’t want to observe the obvious. Our trade imbalance is leading to the inevitable – rich, and everybody else.
Is this the America you want?