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I don't think there is anything wrong with their styling. It was horrid around the 4th gen TL/ZDX days where they completely lost the plot, but I think they've righted the ship and became a rather vanilla, if inoffensive pseudo-luxury brand, kind of where Volvos and Lincolns are. Acura was once synonymous with hip and youthful but I think those days are long gone. Now they are a serviceable brand to pick up a "nice" family sedan or SUV without paying BMW/Mercedes/Lexus pricing.
I definitely don't think the current Civic or Accord looks better than the TLX at all, but to each their own. The general public likely will recognize the TLX is the "better" car when they see both on the road, it's just a bit of anti-Acura bias that auto fans have. JMO.
FWIW I think Infiniti has the better styling of the two but is faring significantly worse for brand image/survivability. And styling is definitely not chief of Lexus' challenges.
Bad photo here but i picked this vehicle up as a beater last summer for 3k as i wanted to own a manual trans and I think it's a great looking car and pretty fun and to be in. Interior is holding up fine at 195k miles. Big fan of the tsx and tl of the mid 00s but yes, they do not have the same build quality of Lexus. My is350 is a vault compared to this.
I think they are going in the right path after Ikeda took over and beak got dropped. New tlx should be more interesting with the type s, the rdx is a home run and a new mdxis around the corner.
okay, i didn't read through all four pages of this thread, but i actually disagree with the OP and not because I own an acura, but rather because I really, REALLY like the way the newly-refreshed design of the ILX looks on such a small car. even though they didn't touch the doors, redoing the rest of the panels as well as the rear and front ends made a huge difference on that car and if it made financial sense for me to trade in a car that i own outright as i do my 2016 ILX which was also the first year it was revised, then i would jump on the 2020/2021 model year ILX because the difference the refresh made is quite substantial.
as for the tlx, yeah, it's not great, but the leaked renders of the upcoming car look quite promising and again have that same look from the rear end that the ILX currently has.
i think the rdx is quite a good looking vehicle.
the mdx is a bit bulbous and that vehicle is in need of a complete redesign which should be coming soon.
and their flagship supercar is beautiful, of course.
I think quite a few people have an issue understanding that styling is subjective lol.
That's true, Steve, but there are also designs that have been shown to alienate large a part of the public despite subjectivity. One, of course, was the Pontiac Aztek. Another is what we're discussing in this thread....the Acura parrot-beak front ends (the fact that dealerships had to re-paint some of them body-color for customers to accept delivery proves that). The Lexus spindle-fgrilles have been very controversial with those to both like them and hate them...I myself am not a fan of them. The styling of the current-generation Prius (plus, of course, the rise of other, larger vehicles that offer Prius-type mileage and better versatility) is definitely impacted its sales. There are numerous other examples as well.
From 2005 to 2019, Benz increased their US sales from 224k to a market leading 257k.
BMW rose from 266k to 324k.
Audi rose from 83k to a whopping 224k!
Lexus fell slightly from 302k to 298k.
Infiniti fell from 136k to 117k.
Acura fell from 209k to just 157k.
How's that for objectivity!
That is consumers saying what they think of the product.
05-12-20, 12:57 PM
Subjectivity.
