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The Persuader
My personal blog, started in 2006. No paid or guest posts, no link sales.
Posts tagged ‘South America’
02.07.2021
Here are July 2021âs imagesâaides-mĂ©moires, photos of interest, and miscellaneous items. I append to this gallery through the month.
Sources
Star Trek: 1999 reposted from Alex on NewTumbl. Didn’t Star Trek and Space: 1999 share a producer?
Publicity shot for French actress Manon Azem, from Section de recherches.
Charlie Chaplin got there first with this meme. Reposted from Twitter.
I realize the history page in Lucire KSA for July 2021 suggests that you need a four-letter surname to work for Lucire.
The 1981 Morris Ital two-doorâsold only as a low-spec 1·3 for export. Reposted from the Car Factoids on Twitter.
Ford Capri 1300 double-page spread, reposted from the Car Factoids on Twitter.
Alexa Breit photographed by Felix Graf, reposted from Instagram.
South America relief map, reposted from Twitter.
From the Alarm fĂŒr Cobra 11: die Autobahnpolizei episode ‘Abflug’, to air July 29, 2021. RTL publicity photo.
Lucireâs Festival de Cannes coverage can be found here. Photo courtesy L’OrĂ©al Paris.
Last of the Ford Vedette wagons, as the Simca Jangada in Brazil, for the 1967 model year. The facelift later that year saw to the wagon’s demise.
Ford Consul advertisement in Germany, announcing the 17M’s successor. Interesting that the fastback, so often referred to as a coupĂ©, is captioned as a two-door saloon, even though Ford did launch a “standard” two-door. More on the Consul in Autocade here. Image from the Car Factoids on Twitter.
Tags: 1910s, 1960s, 1966, 1967, 1970s, 1972, 1980s, 1981, 2010s, 2020, 2021, actor, actress, advertisement, advertising, Alarm fĂŒr Cobra 11: die Autobahnpolizei, BL, Brazil, Cannes, car, cartography, celebrity, Charlie Chaplin, China, Chrysler, COVID-19, culture, electric cars, Facebook, film, Ford, France, Geely, Germany, history, humour, Lucire, Lucire KSA, media, Mercedes-Benz, modelling, newspaper, parody, popular culture, privacy, publishing, retro, RTL, South America, Sweden, TV, Twitter, UK, USA, Volvo Posted in cars, China, culture, design, France, gallery, humour, internet, marketing, New Zealand, publishing, Sweden, technology, TV, UK, USA | No Comments »
02.04.2016

Above: The current Fiat 500. A year shy of its 10th anniversary, is it still cool in 2016?
The Detroit News reports that Fiat has been having trouble Stateside, with dealers now permitted to sell the cars alongside Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge and Ram instead of at stand-alone showrooms.
Itâs been worrying seeing Fiatâs plans unfold since it decided to take control of Chrysler, a firm that was once the darling of the US car industry, with its industry-leading R&D times, to one that was starved of investment in the 2000s.
Those initial plans, sold as a long-term strategy, turned out to be a short-term Band-Aid. With hindsight, maybe it wasnât too much of a surprise, since Fiat was still grappling with understanding just what it was taking on.
Fiat needed to do something given that things at home werenât looking too good, with a model range that wasnât very cohesive, and with its entries into the Chinese market having faltered a few times. To the casual observer, Fiat saved Chrysler, but thereâs some truth in saying that having the company that controls the Jeep brand was a lifeline to Fiat itself.
What weâve seen since those days was the failure of the strategy of twinning Chrysler and Lancia. While this was a marriage of convenience, I could see this having some long-term gains with Lancia focusing on smaller cars and Chrysler on larger ones, but the result in 2016 is that Lancia has been reduced to an Italy-only marque, the equivalent of what Autobianchi was a few decades ago. Once the Ypsilon is deleted, then Lancia is consigned to the history books.
The winner has been Alfa Romeo. It has only just returned to the junior executive segment with the new Giulia, after an absence of several years, and its 4C is a cracking sports car. Things are looking up, and rumours that Alfa and Dodge would be paired up in the same way Lancia and Chrysler were mercifully havenât come true. The Giulia platform could be used for future models. Jeep has benefited from Fiat platforms, and Ram has gained some Fiat vans.
But the parent brand, Fiat, has looked very uncertain for a while.
For a start, thereâs little uniformity globally. Fiat has the opportunity to offer the Viaggio and Ottimo in more places than China, slotting above the Ăgea, for example. While having unique models for South America makes some sense, because of Fiatâs strength there, thereâs an opportunity to globalize, with the Toro pick-up truck looking very appealing.
Without having more of its self-developed products, the Fiat range in Europe doesnât inspire too much confidence. While most manufacturers have one or two joint-venture models, Fiatâs range is almost exclusively made up of vehicles that have shared tech. The famous 500 and Panda are on a Fiat platform which has Chrysler input (before the takeover), and is shared with Ford for its B420 Ka. The Punto, 500X and 500L are on another platform shared with GM. The DoblĂČ is also offered to GM. The Qubo is the product of a joint venture with Peugeot. The Freemont is a rebadged Dodge Journey from MĂ©xico, which Fiat gained after the takeover. The 124 Spider is based on the Mazda MX-5, and built in Japan by that firm. The Fullback pick-up is a Mitsubishi Triton twin and made in Thailand by that Japanese firm.
Fiat, in other words, is holding down more relationships than Casanova.
As a casual observer, thereâs an opportunity for a massive streamlining of platforms, and offer more in-house models. That may well be happening, and letâs hope its current strategy is more long-term than its last.
Secondly, as mentioned earlier, Fiat hasnât had a great reputation of being able to carry out long-term salesâ strategies in many of its markets. Take New Zealand, for example, where Fiat was offering its (Grande) Punto and Bravo models, before it decided to pull everything and offer only the 500.
The Punto has returned after a hiatus, this time as a budget model, along with the Tipo 139 Panda, but those who bought Puntos in the 2000s might think twice about returning to a company that abandoned them and offered no direct replacement for their car when it came to trading up.
That lack of continuity could have some buyers worried, and Fiat needs to regain their trust in a big way.
Being the Five Hundred Car Company, which Fiat certainly was in the US, cannot help, if buyers expect Fiat to offer more. Weâve seen it fail here, and Fiatâs had to back-track. Even in Hong Kong, where Fiat had also been reduced to flogging only the 500, it has had to add the Freemont.
Fiat will argue that as it had been absent from North America for so long, it could re-enter the market-place with a single, fashionable model: after all, Mini and Smart have done.
The trouble is that Fiat isnât known as a niche brand: there was enough in the US media to indicate that this was an Italian giant, and the perception of such a large company didnât gel with it offering a niche range anywhere. It lacked the cachet of a brand that was created to be fashionable and funky from the outset. You just canât do it when thatâs the name of the owner (think: can you sell âcoolâ cars with GM as the brandâthat had been tried in New Zealand and failed dismally; or, going back a generation, Leyland? Volkswagen surely is the sole exception with its Beetle), and FCA, which the parent company is called, isnât a consumer-facing brand. Itâs just a company name with no brand equity.
In the same vein, average punters might not know of BMWâs connection with Mini, or Daimler AGâs connection with Smart. They stand alone with plenty of brand equity, helped by identifiable products, and, in Miniâs case, even helped by its image outside North America.
I also question whether the 500X and 500L are cute cars in the same vein as the original 500. Getting Ben Stillerâs Derek Zoolander character to advertise the 500X seemed good in theoryâtill it dawned on the public that the new Zoolander film was a bit naff, cashing in on last-decade nostalgia. Iâm not a fan of retro design, either, and I would have hoped that Fiat would have renewed its 500 by now, since weâre on to newer versions of the Beetle, Mini, and Smart. Itâs no surprise that Fiat sales are down 14·6 per cent so far this year.
If Toyota could not sustain Scion with all its muscle, then Fiat retail really should be integrated into dealerships selling Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram Stateside. And Iâd argue that Scion couldnât remain because the brand had lost its coolness among the college kids who bought the XB in the first place. Buyers in this consumerist game, and at the fashion end it is more a game than in any other, are notoriously fickle.
I donât know how itâs going to play out. Fiatâs a brand Iâve grown up with, and Iâve been visiting their dealerships since I was two years old. Back in the 1970s the showroom in Homantin, Kowloon had everything from 127s to 130s. Fiat was doing a brisk trade on 124s. I came close to buying various Fiat Group cars over the years, including a Tipo and a Lancia Delta, and more recently I had considered Alfa Romeo Mitos and Giuliettas. I briefly toyed with importing a Tipo 844 Lancia Delta from the UK badged as a Chrysler, but decided having a $75 1:43-scale one was enough.
To see Lancia decimated and now on life support as Fiat concentrated on making Chrysler and Dodge work, to see the home brand filled with other peopleâs products in the interim, and to receive news that US buyers werenât flocking to its showrooms in the same numbers any more, all make me concerned. Go to Italy and the taxi ranks no longer are dominated by Fiat Group cars: the cabbies have gone French and German. It’s all very well Maserati and Ferrari doing well but the former’s volumes won’t have a huge impact, while the latter has been separated and now has a different parent. The only continent where I think Fiat is making a decent bash of things is South America. I donât want to paint a doom-and-gloom picture, not least because I have fondness for all the brands that now fall under the Fiat umbrella. But the weaknesses, at least to an outsider looking in, outnumber the strengths. My gut says Fiat will work through it all, but will it do it in a fast enough fashion, or is there more pain to come?
Tags: 2016, Alfa Romeo, branding, Brazil, business, business strategy, car, car industry, cars, Chrysler, Dodge, exporting, Fiat, film, history, Italy, Jeep, Lancia, marketing strategy, North America, promotion, Scion, South America, Toyota, USA Posted in branding, business, cars, China, globalization, marketing, USA | 2 Comments »
30.12.2012
The last few times Autocade reached a milestone, I blogged about it, and since this one is a bit of a Duesy, it deserves to be recorded.
The car cyclopĂŠdia has reached 2,000 models, with the Opel Kadett D getting us there.
It also passed 2œ million page views during DecemberâI noticed it was about to cross 2 million back in March 2012. Not huge numbers if you break it down per day, but for something that was meant to be a hobby site, it’s not too bad. I also notice that it gets cited in Wikipedia from time to time.
The history has been noted here before, especially when I first started it in 2008. It was meant to be an editable wiki, but, sadly, in 2011, the bots became too uncontrollable, and I made the decision to lock down the registration process. A small handful of peopleâI count four, including myselfâhave contributed to the site with content and programming, among them Keith Adams of AROnline and Peter Jobes. A fourth contributor, whose name I have forgotten, provided some early info on Indian cars.
It’s still a bit light on American cars, mostly due to the issues of converting from cubic inches. Some of my references aren’t that accurate on this for the same reason, and I want to make sure that everything’s correct before it’s published. Most US sites just record cubic capacity in litres when metric measures are given, and we need to be more accurate. But we will get there.
Of course, over the years, we have recorded some oddball cars. So, as I did for its fourth birthday, here is a selection. My thanks to Keith and Pete, and to all our readers.
And since I blog less these daysâFacebook (including the fan page), Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr and the rest seem to take more of my attentionâI imagine this is my last entry for 2012. Have a wonderful 2013, everyone!
Rambler by Renault: after Renault bought IKAâs operations in Argentina in the mid-1970s, it inherited a design based on the Rambler American.
Renault Torino. 1975â81 (prod. 100,000 approx. all versions). 4-door sedan, 2-door coupĂ©. F/R, 2962, 3770 cmÂł (6 cyl. OHC). Continuation of Rambler American (1964â9)-based IKA Torino, rebadged Renault after it took over IKA in 1975. Facelift in 1978. Very subtle changes thereafter, with Renault logo eventually displacing the Torino prancing horse. Two versions at the end of its run, the Grand Routier sedan and ZX coupĂ©. A planned, more modern successor never saw the light of day.
Ford by Chrysler: Simca took over Fordâs operations in France in the 1950s, and the model it inherited, the Vedette, stayed in production long enough in Brazil for Chrysler to put its own badges on it when it bought Simca out.
Chrysler Esplanada. 1967â9 (prod. unknown). 4-door sedan. F/R, 2505 cmÂł (V8 OHV). As with Regente, rebadged when Chrysler took over Simca Brasil. Power reduced to 130 PS; comments for Regente apply here, with the principal outward difference being Esplanadaâs higher trim level. Slightly more powerful engine.
Chrysler by Volkswagen: this one is perhaps better known. Chrysler found itself in such a mess by the end of the 1970s that it sold its Brazilian operations to Volkswagen, which eventually rebadged the local edition of the Hillman Avenger.
Volkswagen 1500/Volkswagen 1500M. 1982â91 (prod. 262,668 all versions). 4-door sedan, 5-door wagon. F/R, 1498, 1798 cmÂł (4 cyl. OHV). Facelifted version of Dodge 1500, itself an Argentine version of the Hillman Avenger. Had a good history as a Dodge in the 1970s, and sold on that goodwill as well as robustness; but largely seen as an economy model for VW in the 1980s. Five-speed gearbox from 1988, with air conditioning on more models.
Volkswagen by Ford: as part of the Autolatina JV in Brazil, Volkswagen and Ford rebadged each otherâs models. A similar experiment was happening in Australia between Ford and Nissan, and Toyota and Holden, around this time.
Ford Versailles (B2). 1991â6 (prod. unknown). 2- and 4-door sedan, 3- and 5-door wagon. F/F, 1781, 1984 cmÂł (4 cyl. OHC). Volkswagen Santana (B2) with redone front and rear ends, and addition of two-door sedan and three-door wagon. Part of the Autolatina tie-up in South America between Ford and VW, replacing Corcel-based Del Rey. No different to Volkswagens in that market, with same engines. Wagons called Royale, but five-door only added in 1995. Fairly refined by early 1980sâ standards but ageing by time of launch, though better than Del Rey.
While weâre looking at South America, the Aero-Willys probably deserves a mention. Autocade doesnât have the Ford-badged versions there yet, but it will in due course. Thanks also to acquisitions, Ford wound up with Willys in Brazil, and built a Brooks Stevens-penned design till it was replaced by its own Maverick in the 1970s. Here is that car, with an old platform, but more modern (compared to the 1950sâ version) styling.
Aero Willys 2600 (213). 1963â8 (prod. unknown). 4-door sedan. F/R, 2638 cmÂł (6 cyl. OHV). Rebodied Aero, considered one of the first all-Brazilian cars, originally shown at the Paris Salon the year before. US platform as before, and modern styling by Brooks Stevens, but this shape was unique to Brazil. Engine now with 110 hp. Rear end altered in 1965, and spun off upmarket Itamaraty model in 1966.
Tags: 2012, Argentina, AROnline, Autocade, Brazil, cars, Chrysler, Ford, history, Jack Yan, joint ventures, JY&A Media, Keith Adams, M&A, Mediawiki, Peter Jobes, Renault, South America, Volkswagen, Wikipedia Posted in cars, interests, internet, media, publishing | 1 Comment »
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