Originally posted by red99sesport:
Originally posted by sigma:
Originally posted by 96RedSE5Sp:
They (CR not Forbes) were dead on about the Contour. If it wasn't for their glowing review, I would not have gotten one.

And all that carping about an anti-American bias conspiracy at CR is nonsense. Why would they try to pull this off? Were they biased in the '80s? Even American car companies admit their cars of 20 years ago were crap when compared to Japanese cars?



It is illogical to argue that because someone was correct in regards to something 20 years ago they must be equally correct today. Particularly when the argument being made today is that it's precisely that well-earned poor reputation from 20 years ago that affects the perception of the very consumers that are surveyed by CR. Perception changes far slower than reality.



Yeah, that's nice, but reality doesn't sell cars. If you have done things to make sections of the American Public percieve that your cars are inferior to Japanese cars, and they won't even look at the Ford model, then you certainly won't get them to buy one, regardless of the fact that it isn't a bad car.



Then that's not Ford's problem. If they simply won't ever buy a Ford again then there's nothing Ford can do at this point to change that. No use crying over spilled milk. What's done is done.

What they can do is go after those that aren't quite so close-minded and believe that change does happen. And many American-made models have the highest percentage of conquest sales on the market, meaning that if they can actually get people into their showrooms to look at their cars, they have a higher percentage of converting an import into a domestic buyer than vice versa. So, if/when Americans actually look at American cars, they actually like them better than the Foreign makes. The problem is getting them to look at them.

Oh, and I thought of 2 more articles-we'll-never-see-very-mainstream in addition to the 2 I mentioned earlier

1> The oh-so-perfect Toyota recalled a higher percentage of their fleet last year than any manufacturer except Ford (Ford's F-Series recall hurt them because such a large percentage of their fleet is F-series)

2> Toyota is under criminal investigation in Japan for deliberately hiding severe safety defects in order to avoid costly recalls that would hurt its' reputation. Yay Toyota!

American car companies don't make the most reliable car companies in the world. And you won't see me make any statement to the contrary. But they'd be doing a hell of a lot better with a little "fair and balanced" news reporting of their own. As soon as the automotive media stops collectively sucking on Toyota's teat and actually actively reports on some of their problems with the same level of perceived severity, the American automotive industry will rebound in a huge way.

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