Tangerine

Acura should make their cars RWD and offer a performance based trim for their TSX like BMW has //M, Audi has R/S4, Merc has AMG and Lexus has F.

They make good cars, they should work on their marketing more though.

And I know I shouldn't say this but Mercedes and Lexus is not on par with each other.

-J-P-L-

True. Mercedes has a lot of catching up to do. Someday though, MB may finally build a car as good as a Lexus. Until then, Mercedes dealers across the world will stay busy repairing them.

Tangerine

LOL good one but I meant the other way around.

FKL

Mercedes-Benz will always be a Mercedes-Benz, from the tank body structure to the safety it provides. Lexus still has catching up to do to have the worldwide recognition that a Mercedes-Benz does. That doesn't mean either is inferior to one another.

-J-P-L-

I know. Nevertheless, I did mean what I said.

Iceman

I agree, and that was their original tagline. Back when Acura was billed as "The luxury and performance division of American Honda Motor Company".

To a certain extent, we can still see that today. Acura is not Tier 1 luxury (whatever that really means), and is instead a nice step up for those who like Honda products but who want more luxury or performance. In that sense, Acura hasn't really lost its way but is just continuing the tradition they started almost 20 years ago.

In reality, though, I think most of us can agree that Acura is adrift. There is no rallying cry that defines their decisions. There is no common goal that unites the product line, the dealers, and the marketing. They produce pretty good cars, but "pretty good" doesn't cut it in today's competitive environment. And their latest attempt to set themselves apart with polarizing styling appears to be having a predictable effect, which is to say making many scratch their heads instead of lining up to buy.

I wish Acura would either go after Tier 1 with a vengeance, or clearly state that they're happy filling the niche of cars that are significantly better than standard Honda/Toyota/Nissan products and not up to Lexus standards, but also significantly less expensive than their Lexus equivalents. If we would start to see a consistent theme of doing that--in press releases, interviews, and the products themselves--I think Acura could cement themselves as the smart choice in the near-luxury performance market.