The basic idea behind Hyundai’s new Assurance scheme: if you can’t afford the payments on your new Hyundai-financed Hyundai within the first year of financial servitude, just drop it off and walk away. No debt. No ding to your credit rating. No charge. The devilish details might not keep the Charmed Ones busy, but they’re worth a closer look. For example, you can only boomerang your Hyundai if you’ve experienced “involuntary unemployment, physical disability, loss of driver’s license due to physical impairment, international employment transfer, self-employed personal bankruptcy, accidental death.” One wonders about the importance of credit ratings to someone who’s just shuffled off this mortal coil, but that’s just quibbling. And, of course, there’s a few Hyundai-shaped hoops you have to jump through even if you are dead. 

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Don’t ya just love marketing guys who trot-out terms like UIO (units in operation, i.e. sold cars) and say things like “We have seen both positive and neutral perceptions grow, and negatives decrease. So we have moved lots of negative perceptions to neutral”? Neither do I. Of course, I’m sure Hyundai Motor America’s VP/Marketing Joel Ewanick is, like most of God’s children, a lovable human being. And if you’re talking to Marketing Daily (MD), what’s a UIO between friends (sounds like something Morris Day would sing about to me)? But I digest. And here’s some interesting factoids from the Ewanick’s Q&A. “We know that 40% of those buying Genesis have traded in vehicles like Lexus, BMW, Mercedes, and Porsche. We know what their income levels are, and we are finding that people are gravitating from luxury or near-luxury cars to Hyundai.” MD reminds us that “since the sedan version of Genesis went on sale in July, the company has sold 5,127 of the cars, including 1,151 of them last month.” That’s far short of Hyundai’s targets, but a pretty good showing in a market so down it has to reach up to tie its shoes. Anyway, about that Super Bowl ad…

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Hyundai just released some pricing info and specs on the surprisingly decent looking Elantra “Touring,” which is essentially just a 5-door hatch version of the professionally mediocre Elantra sedan. What really sticks is the EPA fuel economy, rated at 23 city and either 30 or 31 highway with the manual or automatic, respectively. We’re still talking about a four-cylinder “compact” car here, and despite the weight of size and safety equipment, I am surprised. Hyundai’s own Sonata — with another 40 horses vs. the Elantra — has virtually the same EPA ratings. Sure, we like to trot out the Corvette as an example of a high mileage powerful car, but there are at least a dozen other examples of cars with way more power (and metal) than the Elantra touring and better fuel economy. My 2004 Honda Accord V6, which was a rather portly cruiser, returned 31 mpg on the highway. And yet, the Elantra isn’t unique. Saturn’s Astra, with a 1.8 liter engine, only musters 24/32. The Mazda3 is in the same league. Some of the more efficient cars in this segment can deliver 35 miles per gallon highway – cars like the Corolla, Focus, Civic, and Cobalt XFE. But solely from a fuel economy standpoint, I have a hard time justifying even these better ones, when their bigger counterparts like the Camry, Fusion, Accord, and Malibu offer reasonably close numbers, especially on the highway. It leaves me wondering why, when the Fusion gets 32 mpg highway from its four cylinder, we don’t have a Ford compact car with a gasoline engine that gets 38 mpg highway. But them’s the breaks.

This one is dumber than a box of hair. While my countless hours spent trolling have come up with some really crappy, world class pieces of junk, this is crazy on a new level. The Hyundai Excel was one of the worst cars sold in America in the last 30 years. It’s so bad, in fact, that we used to say it Excelled only at breaking down. So when I saw this one on eBay with 195,000 miles, I was positively shocked. I never thought an Excel could survive for so long. But then the part that really floored me: the seller – a Chevy dealership – is asking $2799 for it. I think the Kelly Blue Book value of $1500 is about $1250 too high, so this dealership is riding off into the sunset of delusional country.

A note to TTAC’s Best and Brightest: if this comparo sounds oddly familiar, that’s because something stinks. But it’s not the husky, malodorous adhesives wafting from the pleather-wrapped Hyundai Veracuz. Nor is it the you-gotta-be-kidding me popularity of a premium-priced Toyota Camry sitting on stilts. The funk comes from mentioning both in the same breath. But I swear on the effeminate grille of a B9 Tribeca that I’ve never read a certain Motor Trend review elucidating this very notion. Fair enough?

While the Detroit 2.5 are busy writing plans, maybe they should take a page out of the competition’s playbook. Or maybe not, if they want to keep their jobs. Kim Jong-eun, has been CEO of Hyundai North America since December 2007. “Has been” is the operative word. He’s gone after having been on the job for less than a year. North America accounts for a fifth of Hyundai’s global sales, and Hyundai is the world’s fifth largest auto maker. They want to change both. They are now looking for a local, Reuters reports. The way things stand in Detroit, there should not be a shortage of possible applicants. Or maybe, there is. The job is hazardous. Kim was the third chief executive for Hyundai North America to be fired in two years. The Koreans seem to have a low tolerance for fools failure.

In the last ten years or so, Hyundai decided it’d be fun to build things that resemble cars that people want to buy. In the process, the Korean automaker acquired struggling brother Kia. As you’d expect, the company offers the now-essential model in any current car range: the budget-priced, fuel-efficient compact car. In fact, American buyers hunting in that market segment can choose between Hyundai’s Hyundai Elantra and the Kia Spectra. Is it a distinction without a difference, in the not-so-grand tradition of General Motors? Let’s have a look to each model’s respective brochures…

Just as Costco and WalMart are doing relatively well in difficult times, the Wall Street Journal reports that while Hyundai USA’s sales are down, their market share is increasing.  Industry wide sales in September were reportedly down 27% while Hyundai was “only” down 25%.  Technically that does add up to a miniscule market share increase, but hardly anything to write home about.  Hyundai has also just released the Genesis Coupe in Korea, taking aim at the likes of the Infiniti G37.  Considering how much Sajeev liked the sedan, we are looking forward to the March 2009 US availability of the coupe. (Though Berkowitz not nearly as much).  In their heydey the Thunderbird, Toronado, Eldorado and Mark VII were cars everyone aspired to; lately, not so much. But, with everything old suddenly new again perhaps there will be a revival of the luxurious coupe.  With a starting price under $25,000 the Genesis Coupe might just be onto something. Or not.

OK, so I’m not convinced this full-size sedan shootout deal isn’t important for Hyundai. In other words, America loves an underdog. And while there’d be a lot more love if the underdog in question was American, as the alpha dog in the cross-hairs is German, well, that’s that, really. And this whole tugging on superman’s cape deal couldn’t come at a better time for the Korean brand. While no one would cross-shop a Genesis against a 7-Series, never underestimate the power of making class-bound shoppers feel good about not being able to afford something better. VW NA was born of reverse snobbery– and abandoned that market position for MOR. If the Phaeton had been priced at $35 to $45k… Anyway, Hyundai’s also in tune with the political climate. By “going negative” on BMW, they tap into the prevailing “I hate fucking everyone” gestalt. And you know what? I want to drive one of these Genesis things. FAST.

Hyundai is reporting that it too was burned in September. Sonata sales were the only area of increase, with a jump of some 31.7 percent, to a total of 8,629 for September. (The nasty little asterisk is that the Sonata is so heavily sold to fleet that Hyundai no longer breaks out the actual number of cars that end up in rental and big company parking lots.) The tiny, cheap, and fairly frugal Accent dipped from 3,120 last September to 3,014 this past month. Not entirely surprising– with financing in such short supply– shoppers for a $12k car are frequently not the most desirable loan candidates for panicking banks. The Elantra also fell off a cliff, dropping 48.6 percent from 7,164 last September to 3,681 now. Don’t even mention the SUVs, which might as well have been taken out back and shot. The Santa Fe plummeted from 7,496 to 4,676. The Tuscon also collapsed, dropping from 3,693 last September to a paltry 1,294 this month. If you take the new Genesis out of the equation, which wasn’t on sale last year and replaced no model, Hyundai would actually be down more like 28.5 percent. So much for buying cheap for keeps.

I don’t have anything else to say. Lieberman thinks the Hyundai Sonata (decent car, really) handles better than the MINI Cooper and MINI Cooper S. I think Lieberman has been hitting the wine early in anticipation of the Jewish holidays. There are, however, some cars with great enthusiast reputations that some of us are just not on board with. Lieberman doesn’t like the MINI. I don’t get the fuss over the 1-Series, Nissan 350Z, or even the Nissan GT-R. P.J. McCombs just doesn’t love the Lexus IS-F. Jay Shoemaker doesn’t dig the Maserati GT. And so on. It just goes to show, there’s nothing truly objective about cars. Even the truth. Especially the truth.

Hyundai’s Genesis RWD luxury sedan was initially aimed at new luxury buyers, with a $33k starting price that sought to lure upgrades from the Maximas and Avalons of the world. But Hyundai VP for NA sales David Zuchowski reveals to Automotive News (sub) that this strategy has failed. “We thought the vehicle would be a nice interceptor vehicle for someone looking to move up to the first luxury vehicle. What we found out is somebody looking for the first luxury vehicle needs the (established) brand,” says Zuchowski. “Conversely, we are attracting more people from BMW, Mercedes, who are probably tired of paying premiums for the brands.” This year Hyundai hopes to sell 8k of the new luxury model, ramping up to 20k units over the next several years. “Genesis is not going to be a huge volume, but will have a huge halo effect, it will elevate the entire brand,” says Zuchowski. “For years, we’ve said we don’t have a product problem, we have a perception problem. The gap between what people think of our brand and what our products really are is as large as any in the industry.” This perception-gap complaint somehow comes across a lot more credibly from Hyundai then it does from the usual suspects from Detroit. After all, Hyundai has gone from being a Rodney Dangerfield punchline to a BMW and Mercedes sales thief in a few short years. Hyundai was considering launching a Lexus-style luxury brand with the Genesis, and though it hasn’t ruled the possibility out down the road, such a plan is unlikely given the Genesis’ apparently-strong halo effect.

Hyundai appears to be drawing up its own version of a constitution. The first on the list was “Quality shall be paramount” (moderately successful) and the second on the list is now “We shall work together with suppliers”. Hyundai’s corporate mothership has announced that it has signed a “fair trade agreement” with its 2368 suppliers. “The deal has paved the way for Hyundai-Kia Automotive Group to establish a fair trade order with partner companies and promote mutual growth through co-existence and cooperation,” said a company spokesperson. They also added that this is the first time a single company has agreed on a fair trade pact such a large number of firms. Before we break out the record books, which the “fair trade” aspect might possibly be fresh, the notion of positive, longstanding closely-knit relationships between industrial firms in Asia are a big part of the region’s manufacturing history. While I commend Hyundai for some serious long-term planning, how much of this was ethically motivated and how much was damage control? Sure Hyundai is promising transparency now. After their chairman stole $100 million for a secret bribery slush fund, and then received a pardon from the South Korean president, a former Hyundai executive.

Yes, we all hate the alphanumeric nomenclature, snaking over the auto industry like poison ivy. And with only so many letters and numbers, we always expect some repeats (Lexus LS/Lincoln LS, Chrysler 300C/Mercedes C300, BMW X5/Mazda MX-5). Has Hyundai gone a character too far? The car we North Americans know as the Veracruz is being introduced to Europe as the ix55. Not only is this a bizarre thing to say down at the pub (Oh, I drove my ix55), but it’s awfully close to, well, a lot of other cars. Hyundai’s new scheme for European car names is to begin with the letter “i,” because if it worked for Apple, it’ll work for them. Or Mitsubishi’s “i car.” The X we can assume refers to this vehicle being an AWD crossover, and of course the 55 is because it has a 5.5 liter V8. Erm, no. Instead, it sounds to me like a mish-mash of BMW (xDrive 50) and the 55 immediately conjurs memory of a trillion Mercedes AMG cars with 55 at the end, from C55 to E55 to S55 to CL55 to CLK55 to ML55 to G55). Besides, what was wrong with Veracruz?

One of the cornerstones of TTAC's existence is reminding the auto industry that "those who don't learn from the mistakes of the past are destined to repeat them."  As a corollary we can say that learning from history's successes forms part of the recipe for a flat-out victory in today's highly segmented, price sensitive market.  We have seen almost two decades since the boring sheetmetal of the Lexus LS400 hit our shores, forever changing the way we think about luxury cars. Fast forwarding along that school of thought brings us to the new, V8-powered, Hyundai Genesis 4.6.