LexFather

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24714435

By Jay Leno
updated 3:55 p.m. ET, Fri., May. 23, 2008
The type of vehicles America makes best are, unfortunately, not the type of vehicles that people really want anymore. Nobody builds better trucks than the Americans do. Not even the Japanese build as good a truck as the Ford F-150 or the Chevy Silverado.

It’s the same with performance cars. The Corvette Z06 has 505 horsepower, comes with a big warranty, and can hit 200 miles per hour. It weighs almost exactly the same as a half-million-dollar Porsche Carrera GT and gets higher mileage — 26 miles per gallon.

Where we seem to lose it is in the low-bucks econocar. I used to be able to identify any American car from 25 yards. Now they all have this jellybean look. It’s a mystery to me, because the one thing we used to do better than anybody else was build cheap, extremely high-quality cars. We did it for decades, all the way back to the beginning of the industry.

There was no better car for the money than the Model T. It was a basic car, but it used the finest materials available. There are still almost a million of them out there.

When you get into a high-priced, well-made American car today and the key is in the ignition, you hear a melodic bong, bong. But when you get in a cheap American car, like a rental, and the key is left in, it goes plink, plink, plink. It’s just horrible. Every time you use the turn signal, it’s like breaking a chicken leg.

In order to make the more expensive car more appealing, U.S. companies feel as though they have to dumb down the cheaper car.

I believe that, all things being equal, Americans will buy American. It just has to be as good as the competition; it doesn’t have to be better. The classic example is Harley-Davidson. Throughout the ’70s, the motorcycle maker had huge quality-control problems. Then Harley-Davidson said, “Look, let’s take our time. Let’s build fewer bikes. Let’s build them properly, so they don’t leak oil and they’ll run forever.” Harley-Davidson won back the market share it had lost, and it continues to dominate today.

Even though the bikes might not be technically superior, they’re bulletproof and they’re American. People will buy American if given the chance.

The automakers are starting to think like Harley and understand that when you get into an automobile, everything should be appealing to you. If you see stitching that’s out of line on the dashboard, you’re going to get madder and madder every time you see it. That’s one place where the American car companies dropped the ball.

Thankfully, in the past couple of years, they have gotten better. If you look at the new line of G.M. cars, they are almost as good as what the Europeans are doing, especially when you compare interiors. Cadillac has a line of small four-door sedans that are, if not quite the rival of Audi or Mercedes, pretty darn close for quite a bit less money.

The problem with what's happened over the past few decades is that you have a whole generation of kids who have no brand loyalty. They've grown up on Honda, Hyundai, Kia and Toyota. To lure them to the American brand, you’ve got to give them something exciting, something bold, something different.

America does technology well, and I think this is how the companies will bring those buyers back. I think cars like the Chevy Volt, which is entirely battery-powered, or hydrogen cars from Chrysler, Ford and G.M. will take off.

Looking into my crystal ball, I predict that Toyota will probably become the dominant force, and the other companies will have to become leaner to survive. They’ll start reining in some of the more unprofitable models.

The overhead at most of the U.S. firms is crazy, and they’ll have to figure out a way to fix that. They’ll ultimately survive, but I think that they’ll need to change how they do business. And in the future, you’ll see smaller companies doing more boutique manufacturing, as BMW has with the Mini.

One last thing: No matter what happens, do not expect all American cars to go Eurosize. American buttocks are not getting any smaller.

rsantiago

If GM, Ford and Chrysler would stop penny pitching their cars and start listening to the engineers rather than bean counters, there is still a ray of hope of the Big Three.

Faraaz23

I agree. Out of the 3, I see GM by far making the most progress. Chrysler, we'll see. In Cerebrus's defense, they bought a nightmare so it may take some time. Ford, I'm still on the fence. Their Euro cars are simply quite too expensive to bring over. Not many will pay $40,000+ for a Mondeo here when you can buy the a Volvo S80 for a similar price (It shares the same chassis, and the Ford has a Volvo 2.5L I-5).

Faraaz23

You also have to give them something of quality and value. This comes from a family who used to drive all domestics and were driven away by its much inferior quality. In fact, my two siblings and I all had GM cars as our first cars. Fast forward through time, everyone in my family drives Japanese cars (4 Lexus and 1 Infiniti). In fact, that same Lexus my father bought way back in 1992 still runs very well. Like many others, the brand loyalty has to be EARNED.

mmarshall

The big problem with American cars began in the 1970's with downsizing. When Detroit built B-I-G cars from the late 50s to the early 70's, they generally did it better than anybody else in the world, save for maybe Mercedes-Benz. Then along came expensive gas, CAFE rules and emission controls....and the big, soft-riding Detroit plushmobile was never the same.

So, while some factors were beyond our control, I basically blame EPA for the demise of the big American car....and the manufacturers themselves for the huge quality drop in the 70s and 80s. The demise of the big, full-framed American car drove some people into truck-based SUVs to compensate, but now even those are threatened as well.

GM, up to the last couple of years, has been widely criticized for its plain, cheap interiors and poor fit-finish, and justly so. But in the 1960's, GM did body quality, interior detail and fit/finish better than any other American manufacturer, though its acrylic lacquer paint tended to fade prematurely.

tex2670

American automakers have no one to blame but them selves. In the early 80's, when the US imposed tariffs on imports (including trucks), did the US makers take their new found profits from the protectionist import taxes to re-invest in R&D to make a car the could compete with the Japanese? No--it was business as usual, and they fell further behind, hoping that flag waving would guilt the American consumer into buying their car. I'll never forget Lee Iacocca pitching Chrysler cars made in Mexico and Canada, and those that were rebadged Mitsubishi's, telling the public "Made in America."

mmarshall

True, but that wasn't what I was talking about. Iacocca was indeed a double-talker (I remember his rantings well), but by THEN the damage I described in my post had occurred.....for the reasons I explained.

fiveohfour

iTrader: (1)

Very intelligent man, that Jay Leno. I'd like to hear more of his heartfelt opinions more often.

PhilipMSPT

iTrader: (5)

Well, all of Toyota's and Honda's cars have realized this; most of their vehicles have gotten bigger and heavier. Even Hyundai. Nissan did not follow this mantra with the new Maxima, so we have to see how well that will turn out.

In general, for the U.S. market, this is true. However, a more compact car is called for in Asian and European markets, and compact American cars such as the Ford Focus or Chevy Aveo are crap. Honda is clever with turning their European Honda products into Acura nameplates in the U.S. Lexus is doing well in Europe because of their hybrid and diesel technologies.

American nameplates are having a tough time because they cannot sell their bread-and-butter products outside of the U.S (hey, Hummers don't sell in Europe, just like Harley Davidson...), and they have way too much competition in their own turf.

My own advice to American automakers: quality can be had with cost-efficiency with the right engineering. It's not about cheap materials, but how you use it. The average consumer knows what cheap is, but if you can put it together nicely as a whole package (take a look at Hyundai, for example), the consumer can be forgiving...

CK6Speed

iTrader: (1)

I think this is exactly the point Mike was making. All those cars got larger, so expect the American cars to get larger as well due to their fat buts, and not smaller (Euro size).

lubester

i liked that little passage, it gives some hope