Bryan writes:
Sajeev, not sure if you’ve noticed, but I’m seeing a new trend in auto advertising. “MPG” is beginning to be used as a noun. As in, “the new CX-5 gets 31 MPGs” (punctuation intended). Only in the last year or so, have MPGs (plural) been spoken instead of “miles per gallon”.
Weird. Anyway, random thought. Love the site. (Read More…)
Spencer writes:
Dear Sajeev,
Are there any examples of concept cars which, while not representative of the vehicles in the manufacturer’s immediate lineup, actually become something of a reality five or ten years down the line? More specifically, can you provide some images of concept cars that actually look like the cars we have on the road today (Isuzu VehiCROSS and similarly rare instances to be omitted, I suppose). Thanks! (Read More…)
It is good to hear that bad puns have survived a decade of uptight up-positioning at Volkswagen, and are alive and well. You had me worried, friends. Under the tagline “As sun as possible”, Volkswagen starts a digital campaign that brings the new Beetle Cabriolet to the Interwebs. (Read More…)
BAIC and Daimler announced last Friday they are taking the Beijing-Benz joint venture a giant step further. Daimler takes a 12 percent stake in BAIC and both parties will work closely together to win market share from Audi and BMW. On the ‘grass roots level’ the close cooperation has long begun! Above, a Beijing Auto E-Series with a Mercedes-Benz grille. How did that happen? (Read More…)
Opel’s new CEO Karl-Thomas Neumann isn’t officially CEO yet, and he already is facing a rebellion of his troops. Opel dealers threaten to discontinue the brand if Opel won’t withdraw a new distribution system. The dealers say the system comes from where Neumann and Opel’s sales chief Matthias Seidl come from: From Volkswagen. (Read More…)
You think gas is finally getting cheaper? Cars that use less gas may be a bit more expensive, but save you money in the long run? Households in the United States spent a record amount on gasoline last year, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said on Monday. More of your income is going out and exhaust pipe than at any time since the 1980s. (Read More…)
Consumers lose interest. Even reporters do.!
A few days ago, we wrote that “EVs run out of juice.” When we did that, we referred to collapsing sales in January only. Now Reuters says: “Are electric cars running out of juice again?” Reuters means it in a bigger way. Like forever.
Farago on guard
TTAC founder Robert Farago receives fame and notoriety at the tip of a gun. Not just a gun, Farago owns 18 of them – at least that’s what he disclosed to the Washington Post. The liberal paper has a big feature on the former car blogger who turned into the eye of the storm that surrounds the gun debate.
(Read More…)
Looking at Renault’s European sales, one sees red. Looking at Renault’s stock chart, one sees the best valuations in the last two years, and a trend that is going up. What does the market know we don’t?
(Read More…)
Now that almost all official data for the Full Year 2012 is available (Middle East is still to come in my books), and just as we are starting to get a feel for what 2013 could look like, I thought I would do a little summary for you of what happened in 2012 in the biggest markets in the world. We have gone through the Chinese market already, now let’s have a look at Europe….
Europe not your thing? That’s ok, you can check out the best-selling models and brands in 172 countries and territories on my blog. Enjoy!
Back to Europe. And it has been a difficult year for European sales, with only the UK among the Big 5 (Germany, UK, France, Italy, Spain) managing to gain ground vs. 2011. But the favourite car and carmaker on the continent are the same as last year…
More bad news from Europe: The new car market in Germany, last year an island of stability in a sea of red, was down 8.6 percent in January. On the back of worse news from other European volume markets, this does not bode well for when ACEA will publish its European data next week. (Read More…)
As we all know, TTAC has an occasional thing for pink cars. So has Fiat. Right where I live. Fiat delights Japan with the 500 Fiore Rosa (i.e. “Pink Flower”) limited edition of its Cinquecento. (Read More…)
“Personal luxury” became one of the few showroom bright spots for Detroit during the darkest days of the Malaise Era. The definition is a bit fuzzy around the edges, but the basic formula always involved a midsize-or-bigger two-door with a generous helping of disco-grade bling, maybe with some heraldic crests and pleather upholstery. Chrysler had the Cordoba, Ford had the Cougar, and GM had the Grand Prix, to name just a few of many examples of the genre. Why, even dowdy AMC got into the act with their Matador Barcelona. So many of these cars were built that you’ll still find examples now and then at self-serve wrecking yards. By 1976, personal luxury was being applied across whole lines, with broad strokes. Today’s find is one of the last of the big A-body LeMans family, built before the LeMans became a cruel Daewoo joke. (Read More…)
Local propaganda almost always serves to screw the little guy. With rare exception, it never fails to do so.
“We need a new stadium!”, cries the billionaire whose team already got one just two decades go. “Please pay for it John Q Public!”
“Hey! What about me?”, screams the local electric company CEO. “We really need to double the monthly service charge for our local residents to manage our costs. But let’s also throw in a double digit rate reduction for those who use a lot of energy. Like the billionaire and his businesses. After all, they create the jobs out here!”
And the story drones on. The trash company that owns a multitude of companies that have virtually nothing to do with trash, wants to hike your bill. Because they need to hit their numbers. Just like everybody else. The insurance company. The gas company. The local government. The state government. Heck, every local monopolist and oligopoly is thrusting their well oiled lobbyist machines right at your shrinking wallet.
Guess who else is doing it now? The auto parts stores.
Today, ad agencies all over the country crunch numbers to prove to their clients that the outrageous amounts of money spent for production and media buys of Sunday’s Super Bowl ads were well spent. Too bad their clients already saw on TTAC which ads were shooting stars, and which were duds. Oh, and Mercedes did not run the car wash ad. They had something more devilish in store.
No doubt each agency will find the most fitting metric to prove that their ad was great. Edmunds has a handy and free metric that shows how well an ad resonates. They call it the “lift.” Edmunds watches your clicks as they are driven to the respective cars on the Edmunds website. It’s a seismograph for the impact an ad has. If the clicks signal a lot of lift, the ad works, as far as Edmunds is concerned. If the needle stays flat, that ad is a dud. Here is the play-by-play. (Read More…)
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