What does the line “It’s More Car Than Electric!” mean? Beats us, but apparently it’s supposed to make you want to buy a Chevrolet Volt. Maybe “The electric car you can just put gas in on those days when you’re not giving a crap about the environment” was too long. Perhaps “It’s actually a series hybrid” didn’t pop with consumers. And maybe “Avoid the scary Range Anxiety® you get with ‘real’ electric cars” was too aggressive. All we know is, GM has registered “It’s More Car Than Electric,” and it’s time to get used to it. Meanwhile, how did we not find the ad parody above sooner?

In its retooling announcement for the Orion assembly plant, GM notes that

Orion will be the home to Chevrolet’s new small car and Buick’s future compact sedan – the all-new Verano.

What’s interesting is that GM doesn’t call the “new small car” the Aveo, even though it’s shown near-production versions of the new model bearing the Aveo name at several auto shows. Sooner or later, GM will have to start sticking with consistent, memorable nameplates in order to build up the kind of loyalty enjoyed by models like Accord, Camry, Civic and Corolla. Which would suggest that an improved Aveo should be called the Aveo, and that the new Opel Astra-based Buick Verano should be called something less instantly forgettable. We’ve speculated about what a three-door Buick Astra hatch might be called, but this Verano plan calls for an intervention. Help GM keep Buick from sliding into 90s-era ambivalence by improving on the narcoplesy-inducing nameplate Verano. It doesn’t have to be a heritage nameplate, but it should be something that makes the brands foray into compact cars seem like less of an afterthought. And that will be just as good four generations from now.

First of all, the Nissan Juke really is a fun car to drive. The engine’s an absolute cracker, and the chassis is shockingly composed. Too bad it’s impossible to mention the car without a full-blown war breaking out over its controversial styling. As I noted in my review, Nissan is unabashed about targeting a specific demographic with the Juke, and a number of practical concerns were overlooked in order to please what Nissan calls the “urban experience seeker.” In this video, Nissan’s Alfonso Albaisa shows that the Juke’s design is also a product of this intense focus on 30 year-old guys. Plus, counter-intuitively, a desire to forge a more cohesive design language across Nissans product portfolio. Had Albaisa and his team designed the Juke with more universal values in mind (but with the same widened Versa chassis and 1.6 liter direct-injected turbocharged engine), it’s tempting to believe they could have made a truly iconic automobile. And this is coming from someone who more or less fits the Jukes target demographic.

Once upon a time, there was a Volkswagen executive who couldn’t figure out how to get American consumers emotionally invested in his brand. Then one day it hit him: why not re-skin the Golf as a Beetle? It could be less practical and efficient than its donor car, but baby boomers would buy it in Costco volumes anyway, for the sheer gauzy nostalgia of it.  After flogging that Beetle for 12 years, through two successive updates to the car it was based on, it was time to update the old classic. But how?

Luckily history had an answer. Following the example of Beetle tuner/modders at the end of the original Beetle’s lifespan, VW apparently chopped the roof, exaggerated the fenders and called it good. Perhaps with the goal of making for a more “original” feel, the windscreen appears to have been moved back as well. Unfortunately tough, the change simply emphasizes the front-engine proportions, making the end result more reminiscent of a Morris Minor than the ur-Käfer. But, as the Volkswagen executive had learned by now, Americans don’t notice that stuff. The only remaining problem: how to avoid calling it “The new New Beetle.”

The Countryman is a game-changer for us. We are going from extra-small to small

With sales of its aging city car circling the toilet, Roger Penske’s Smart USA has reached a deal with Nissan to sell a Smart-branded version of a Nissan-developed four-door B-segment car, likely the Versa. Though Penske’s organization apparently pushed for and announced the deal, and the model will be exclusive to the US, the Detroit News calls the move “part of the growing cooperation between the Renault-Nissan Alliance and Daimler AG.” Penske says

We were not amused (to coin a phrase) at Ford’s decision to tax fans of the hatchback by adding $500 to the price of its five-door Fiesta and forthcoming Focus. And rather than following Ford’s example, GM has priced its CTS-V Sportwagon some $475 cheaper than its $63,465 CTS-V sedan, by starting prices for the unique muscle wagon at $62,990 (including destination). Needless to say, we love the wüchtig, 556 HP CTS-V, so the prospect of a distinctively be-hatched version for less money is like catnip here at TTAC HQ. On the other hand, our beef with Ford has to do with its refusal to offer the practicality of a hatch at the base price point, and that argument doesn’t really hold water in the tire-smoking world of supercharged V8 rocketships. Moreover, $475 doesn’t exactly make much of a difference when you’re talking about a car that costs the equivalent of four base Fiestas. Still, we like to think of this as a win for the wagons… if only in principle.

It’s not that the ad itself fails to mention the car it’s actually promoting, namely the Subaru Legacy. After all, if Subaru wants to entertain enthusiasts without actually indulging in the kind of gauzy praise they lampoon so effectively here, that’s fine by us. No, the only problem with the whole “2011 Mediocrity” campaign is that Subaru’s own Tribeca was clearly styled by the very designers they mock in this spot. And in this day and age, bland, uninspired crossovers are at least as lampoonable a cliche as the bland, uninspired sedans that Subaru slams (and which earned Toyota the cash for a 16.5% stake in Subaru’s parent company). Still, this is a ballsy move for a brand that is already growing like gangbusters in the US, and it shows just how far off the mark Volkswagen’s current attempt at US market growth is likely to be.

BUMP.com: Who BUMPed Me? from BUMP on Vimeo.

Cars may be battling with communication technology for the hearts and minds of the youth, but at least we’ve got a handle on the downsides of our internal-combustion (or, increasingly, not) friends. Cost, pollution, risk and overall coolness deficits can, given a responsive industry, be battled. On the other hand, we’re only just learning about the endless creepiness that comes from limitless connectivity (stop me when I start sounding like someone who just enjoyed a week away from the internet). Take, for example, the latest attempt to fuse social media with cars: Bump.
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The ad shown above seems to cement a sad reality for automotive enthusiasts: the objects of our passion are no longer considered the cutting edge of material culture. And this reality is reflected is reflected in more than just ads for mobile phones, the object that appears to have replaced cars as the touchstone of youthful cool. For a broad array of reasons, young people (the traditional arbiters of cool) are less obsessed with cars and car ownership than they once were. Even automakers themselves are rushing the automobile to the scrapheap of history by seeking to load ever more phone-like capabilities to cars, a trend that both fuels phone mania and disinterest in driving as an intrinsically rewarding experience. But, it seems, that cars can still be cool after all…
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No, not the silly humpbacked 911. That’s just Porsche’s latest wallet-lightening technology. Porsche’s nod to heritage is in the fact that it’s building only 356 of these 911 “Speedsters.” Because, you see, the first Porsche Speedsters were based on the Porsche 356. Oh yes, and by limiting an “exclusive” to a few hundred units means Porsche can charge $204,000 for a 408 HP 911. Which, after all, is actually the more significant nod to Porsche heritage: the 911-based Speedsters, which arose in the cocaine and yuppie-fueled 80s, have long been a high point in Porsche’s proud tradition of charging silly money for ever-so garish “special editions.” Doesn’t heritage just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside?

As with most EVs, we knew about the CODA EV for a long time before a price was ever trotted out (the car was first mooted as the Miles XS500, and was scheduled for a 2009 launch before reality struck). And even before we knew the price, we reckoned that a Chinese-built sedan with Chinese battery cells thrown into it in Southern California would face its fair share of challenges. Now that the CODA EV has been priced at $44,900 (full specs here), we’re certain of it. Of course, Federal tax breaks bring the CODA down to $37,400, and a further California incentive could bring it as low as $32,400, or about $400 less than a Nissan Leaf… before tax breaks. Why would anyone pay $12,000 more for a Chinese fly-by-night when they could have a Nissan? CODA CEO Kevin Czinger tells Automotive News [sub] that

Price is not a decisive factor in the sale of electric cars. I think the 40 percent additional range, and 40 percent additional battery energy with all-season thermal management, is the decisive factor

The first 9/10ths of this strange Nissan Juke spot is the typical youth-oriented car commercial: much sound and hipness, signifying nothing. Which is probably why the unexpected ending makes such an impression. Say what you want about Nissan’s decisions regarding the Juke’s styling and marketing, nobody can accuse the brand of living in the past.

Having told the world that Onstar will allow users to update their Facebook profiles and listen to Facebook news feeds from their cars, bosses at the GM subsidiary reveal that they haven’t actually determined if these features are safe yet. Onstar Marketing boss Sam Mancuso explains the situation to AdAge

Today people are texting while they are driving. It’s not legal and it’s a very bad idea; 47% of people who are texting say that they have done so in their vehicle while driving. To do a normal text message takes 4.6 seconds, and at the speed of 55 miles an hour, someone can travel the length of a football field. We know that people want to use technology, but we are working on using it in ways that they don’t have to be distracted. Our goal is to minimize that distraction to virtually zero.

The litmus test we use is “Keep your eyes on the road, your hands on the wheel and your mind on the drive.” If we find that the texting service or Facebook audio update capability causes people to be distracted we’re not going to do it. We’ll vet those things out internally…We’d be very proud to talk to you, others in the media or family and friends and say we tested it, developed it and it’s not safe.

Does anyone actually believe that this will be the outcome, now that GM and Onstar have begun hyping these features?
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Via Hemmings News comes this delightful find from Chevymall.com: an officially licensed poster comparing women to cupholders. So, did Susan Docherty sign off on that when she was GM’s marketing boss, or is this just more evidence that GM really is a “testosterone saturated, white, American male culture”? Either way, it cements the impression that Chevrolet’s values and image stopped making progress around the same time its market share did… which, incidentally, was about the same time the poodle skirt went out of fashion.

It’s just too bad that, between the ’59 Impala, the poodle skirt, GM’s US market dominance and casual sexism, only the casual sexism seems to have survived.