GERMANY: German drivers rank German car brands bottom of customer satisfaction league - paper
01 Dec 2003
Source: just-auto.com editorial team



German drivers rank Mercedes-Benz and Volkswagen among the three worst brands in customer satisfaction, Automotive News Europe reported.

The 38,454 members of the ADAC, Germany's largest automotive club, who responded to the latest half-yearly survey put Volkswagen as No. 31 and Mercedes as No. 32 among 33 brands on overall customer satisfaction. Only Land Rover was worse. But if satisfaction with service is eliminated from satisfaction with their vehicle, German drivers ranked Mercedes-Benz last among all brands.

German brands generally did poorly in the customer satisfaction rankings: Ford was No. 21. Audi was No. 26, followed by Opel at No. 27 and Smart at No. 29. The exceptions were No. 8 Porsche and BMW at No. 11.

Notably, Japanese brands captured the top seven rankings, led by Toyota, Subaru and Honda.

Even the low-priced Korean brands finished higher as a group than
European-based brands: No. 10 Hyundai was followed by Kia at No. 16 and Daewoo at No. 19, Automotive News Europe said.

Brands, ranked by overall customer satisfaction in ADAC survey:

1. Toyota
2. Subaru
3. Honda
4. Mazda
5. Nissan
6. Mitsubishi
7. Suzuki
8. Porsche
9. Saab
10. Hyundai

Originally posted by jet864
Wow, looks like some Europeans hate their domestics as much as some people over here hate ours. I still would have a hard time believing that a Kia would fare better thana brand new MB. I thought Daewoo Hyundai and Kia all had bad quality rankings by JD power? Maybe Germans buy Japanese regardless, kind of like how Americans wil buy ANYTHING from Germany.

James

Originally posted by IsraelRX
Than Porsche and to some extent BMW contridict your logic.
Compare the findings to Consumer Reports (where all German cars fail misreably) and it make sense.

Originally posted by jet864
Rather Germans voted Suzuki, Mazda, and Mitsubishi in the top six, and Hyundai rounding off the top ten. That seems ridiculous to me because I didn't think these manufacturers had anything to offer besides gas mileage.

Originally posted by bitkahuna
The survey was about customer satisfaction, not fastest car or anything. Maybe it's nice dealers, value for money, and LOW MAINTENANCE that are a bigger factor here.

German cars are EXPENSIVE because they require GERMAN LABOR and that society makes the cost of employees extremely high with all the benefits they have to offer (including about 6 weeks paid vacation for everyone).

Originally posted by jet864
I'm not sure what you mean by GERMAN LABOR, but it seems to me that if they're in Germany, labor shouldn't be too hard to come by.

Originally posted by bitkahuna
I'm sure there's plenty of people in Germany willing to work in auto plants given their high unemployment level, but the problem is that the government red tape and social programs make it very very expensive to employ anyone, and darned near impossible to let go of anyone.

Originally posted by jet864
Also I realize that these Japanese cars I listed aren't the most prestigious or the fastest but how we see German cars they see them as domestics.

Originally posted by Bean
Mazda not prestigous? They have some pretty cool cars... the RX-7 RS turbo and the RX-8 and Mazdaspeed RX-8 are quite cool

Mitsubishi has several cool cars... dunno if the Galant VR4 is made anymore but they had a V6 model over there that had the 3kgt motor in it; they obviously have the EVO series of cars, etc... i dont see how this is not prestigous?

i'll say it again; i just dont see owning a german car as prestigous; its just another car; and not a very good one at that... M3, M5, AMG car, etc... those are prestigous; but the other cars are just normal (overpriced) cars