No cheap, trendy city car like the Aygo can't be helping.
I miss the Note.
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They must have made something on the endless number of Jukes I see - one car I won't be seen dead in.
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>> No cheap, trendy city car like the Aygo can't be helping.
>>
>> I miss the Note.
>>
So do a lot of Singers :-)
I’ll get my coat
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Nissan - Japan - are the authors of their own demise in their own backyard. The Ghosen debacle, screwed up the Renault alliance and not used their small car expertise, Japanese management mired in the old ways,
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>> Nissan - Japan - are the authors of their own demise in their own backyard.
>> The Ghosen debacle, screwed up the Renault alliance and not used their small car expertise,
>> Japanese management mired in the old ways,
>>
Shame.
I have driven: A 120Y (1972 Cherry), 1984 Cherry, Sunny, Primera and Note. (The 1984 Cherry was Dad's and the Primera was a company car.)
What stood out on all of them was their solid reliability and they were so easy to drive. I found the Note less tiring to drive than several much more expensive cars.
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I had a 2nd generation 2 litre auto Primers, damn good car.
I also had a 240Z, bit of a rust bucket but it went well.
I also tuned every Datsun model - easy to work on and very reliable.
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It was annoying that they didn't continue to sell "normal" cars over here.
A colleague had a GTI (not sure the exact model) Almera that was a real wolf in sheep's clothing and managed to keep it long after the return date because he liked it so much.
It's replacement, the Pulsar (I think) could have sold here. Hyundai still sell normal hatchbacks as do Toyota, but they were lackluster re promoting it and I don't think they did any sporty models.
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When your model's broke, there's 2 ways to go (and everything in between). You can try to maintain scale by deleting loss making products and growing the business elsewhere, through innovation and/or increasing market share (in which your competitors will not cooperate). Or you can downscale the business, close the marginal stuff and try to shrink the cost-base.
Ford seems to be doing that. They have removed the Fiesta, Britain's best selling car forever, and are about to do the same with the Focus. No Mondeo now. Just a lot of undifferentiated SUVs and crossovers. The only 'ordinary' and more or less affordable car is...the one I've forgotten the name of. Puma? I think it's supposed to substitute for the Fiesta and the Focus. They only seem to make them in battleship grey for some reason.
What Ford is doing always strikes me as trying to get the costs to go down faster than the sales, which is an odd strategy unless you can pay out shareholders along the way. And you are giving business to your competitors. But not everybody can grow indefinitely. Do they all crash and burn in the end?
I think I heard on the wireless that Stellantis is in the soup. I'm never very happy with governments (us) supporting failing businesses with cash but it seems to me they'll need a bit of slack if they are to play their part in net-closer-to-zero. Leaving the seemingly unachievable targets in place and the fines will likely result in failure.
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In the late 1980's the UK home micro industry died because the market was saturated and the Japanese brought out game consoles that were much better. A similar thing happened in the 1990s with Commodore and Atari when IBM and the PC clones arrived.
Could we be seeing the same now, with the arrival of the Chinese to the market?
Potentially a disaster of our own making, by shipping production to China (BMW / VW / Rover selling tools for old Rovers etc.) giving them the knowledge and experience to build quality cars and regulations on cars that make them more and more expensive so that even a small "B" class Fiesta costs over £20k to buy and thus pricing many out of the market and "killing the golden goose".
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>> Could we be seeing the same now, with the arrival of the Chinese to the
>> market?
>>
>> Potentially a disaster of our own making, by shipping production to China (BMW / VW
>> / Rover selling tools for old Rovers etc.) giving them the knowledge and experience to
>> build quality cars and regulations on cars that make them more and more expensive so
>> that even a small "B" class Fiesta costs over £20k to buy and thus pricing
>> many out of the market and "killing the golden goose".
We are certainly seeing the same now and the trend has been evident for at least three years.
We (collectively) have voted with our wallets to buy cheaper. It is also clear the quality coming from China has increased rapidly - their cars are now the equal of those made in the west.
Similar experience to the Japanese in the 1960s, Skoda in the 1990s, Koreans in the 2000s. Start with cheap and rather crude. Rapidly develop to fairly cheap and competitive. Final act is expensive and excellent. Toyota, Honda, Skoda, Kia, Hyundai etc are all examples.
Car manufacturing in the UK (and probably much of Europe) will go the same way as TVs, smartphones, motorbikes, kitchen appliances etc etc - unless propped up by import quotas or tariffs.
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With the exception of the MG and Volvo, Chinese automotive companies have no market presence here. There is probably market reluctance to buy an unknown entity like BYD or Seal. (the buying public have no idea that Volvo is Chinese and they are careful to maintain that ignorance). Chinese stuff has a "cheap and nasty" reputation
Its taken the Koreans 40 odd years to build up a reasonable presence from nothing, so its going to take them a while to gain traction
Unless
We get revivals of some old names. Stand by for a new Rover?
Last edited by: Zero on Mon 2 Dec 24 at 12:37
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>> We get revivals of some old names. Stand by for a new Rover?
>>
That'd be Roewe?
www.saicmotor.com/english/latest_news/roewe/index.shtml
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roewe
Last edited by: zippy on Mon 2 Dec 24 at 12:50
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and
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rover_(marque)
Seems it's owned by Jaguar Land Rover.
Last edited by: zippy on Mon 2 Dec 24 at 13:27
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Some of the Chinese cars are OK (MG4), but some are not - just read some of the reviews. (Funky Cat or whatever they call it now, Omoda 5, Skywell BE11, etc.). The lack of support is also an issue apparently in getting spares, although Tesla have shown that the traditional dealer network is not necessarily essential for that.
Few of the Chinese cars have an 'identity' and so will struggle with residuals, even if they are cheap to purchase.
Whilst globalism may benefit the bosses, the impending Chinese car invasion(?) is showing the downside of exporting all your manufacturing overseas. And with advances in AI, will our precious service industries be the next to be undermined by cheap/subsidised competition? I hate to admit that Trump might be right on anything, but maybe he is with tariffs on Chinese car imports, where the CCP subsidises manufacturers in the way that they have, in order to protect jobs.
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>>Tesla have shown that the traditional dealer network is not necessarily essential for that.
You'd think that, but they don't carry essentials like brake pads, so it seems...
www.autoevolution.com/news/tesla-client-that-got-model-3-performance-without-brake-pad-tells-us-her-story-179349.html
It's a crime in this country to sell an unroadworthy vehicle and not having brake pads fitted would, I am sure, count.
"The car would be “within specs:” Tesla’s technicians said the noise was normal for performance brakes." is even more worrying.
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>>Car manufacturing in the UK (and probably much of Europe) will go the same way as TVs, smartphones, motorbikes, kitchen appliances etc etc - unless propped up by import quotas or tariffs.
Should we be worried? There must be a limit to how many people can be employed as baristas, or barristers, hairdressers and estate agents. Or for that matter car salespersons and muckyanics.
It seems a perverse idea to think a national economy can survive without making anything.
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>>
>> It seems a perverse idea to think a national economy can survive without making anything.
>>
Investments and services, but they will go to the lowest bidder / be conducted from anywhere in the world - like call centres.
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>> Investments and services, but they will go to the lowest bidder / be conducted from
>> anywhere in the world - like call centres.
I think one take away from the last 20 or so years is that offshoring call centres doing anything more complex than Amazon returns is fraught with risk.
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>>
>> call centres doing anything more complex than Amazon returns is fraught with risk.
>>
It annoys me that Equiniti use foreign call centres considering the potential values of portfolios with which they deal (not mine unfortunately). In poor countries even a modest holding could be a life changing amount and be a temptation.
Fraud, theft and poor quality service isn't just from foreign call centres. My previous employer had staff caught with recording devices in the UK and a service company refurbing an office put key loggers on computers - clearly an organised crime group attempting to gain access.
I heard of one girl in her very early 20s who turned up to work at one of their call centres in a brand new expensive Porsche and had lots of "bling", latest iPhone etc. She was interviewed and it turned out she did OnlyFans to boost her income and it had taken off in a way she hadn't expected. She still wanted her call centre job to fall back on.
I don't think we're all suited for OnlyFans :-D
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>>
>> It seems a perverse idea to think a national economy can survive without making anything.
>>
But of course it can. Our economy is already dependant on services - over 80% and the US, the most successful economy in the world is fundamentally a service economy. China is anxious to reduce its dependency on manufacturing.
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I fear lower cost-base nations with AI will take away a lot of our service industries...
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>> I fear lower cost-base nations with AI will take away a lot of our service
>> industries...
With Russia having started cyber WW3, AI services will be firewalled by country.
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Things are not too rosy at VW either, with factories being closed and workers unhappy.
Last edited by: Robin O'Reliant on Mon 2 Dec 24 at 21:08
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www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNK8Fwyy_Io
A small Kei car from Nissan Japan. £13k. 100 mile range (electric).
This sort of thing would do well in cities here and some of the tiny roads in continental Europe.
Last edited by: zippy on Mon 16 Dec 24 at 15:02
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Those small wheels would get lost in our potholes! I think I would rather a car that is a bit more substantial.
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Nissan in Big Trouble - zippy
