What on earth are Fiat thinking??
http://www.automotivetraveler.com/magazine/viewer.php?path=2011/02/Chrysler_and_Lancia
A little bit of me just died! :'(
Selling Lancia's in the US with Chrysler badging, OK.
Selling Chrysler's with Lancia badging? NOT OK!
Just as I thought that Fiat cannot do any worse with Lancia, they do this. >:(
Lancia is suffering "fate worse than death" in the hands of Fiat.
Alfa is the next in line :'(
Considering the track record of Fiat management it should hardly be a surprise to anyone what Fiat has done, is doing or planning to do in the future.
Decisions such as this would tend to suggest that Fiat have totally lost the plot, BUT, that would be on the premise that they actually knew what the plot was in the first place and there is growing evidence to suggest that they didn't and don't.
Perhaps we should just consider ourselves fortunate that we have seen and been part of the best eras of Alfa Romeo and lament for what might have been.
this is only the start of marchioni killing fiat,alfa,lancia,the unions should never have voted yes,la marca e morta- nothing is sacred anymore,l'italianita sta morendo,when china gets on board its time to jump.ciao e' viva l'italia
The cold hard reality about can manufacturing is that it is a business first, second and third. Can manufacturers only churn out cars that they think will sell.
They only hang onto names because they use them for marketing. Just look at how Alfa Romeo have rehash their icon names for cars that are a long way from being true Alfa Romeo's.
Loyal car fans get the irrits up when their beloved brand(s) are treated in a way that they perceive to be unfair, but the business reality is profit, profit, profit.
FIAT aren't a collective group of car enthusiast, they are a collective group of business people.
FIAT started displaying this in a small-ish way, years ago when Lancia's started using FIAT engine. Then there were the shared chassis between FIAT, Lancia and Alfa Romeo.
The writing of this sort of behavior was on the walls years ago.
well it kinda makes sense... fiat now have 2-3 SUVs.... done...
better than alfa and maser as reported, being desecrated with the task of slapping their badges on one of *those* on something either brand would have wasted $$$ on R&D building one of their own.....
well apart from vw buying alfa i thinking they will be ok with new dealerships starting tio pop up every where
I posted that link in disbelief. Lancia's used to be classic, well engineered if imperfect European cars. Modern Chryslers are by comparison just, well, pretty horrible and changing the grille doesn't change that.
History is an excellent tutor and as Churchill said, the further back you look the more likely you are to be able to predict the future (or words to that effect). Wolseley, Riley, Triumph......
Contrast that with VW and their work with modern Lambo's. Sure they share underpinnings with some Audi's but the product is good, which you need in a competitive market. That's why they're succeeding with the brand.
Last time I looked "common platform" didn't (need to) mean "same car". What lunatic decided that the defining characteristic between a Chrysler and an Lancia could be reduced to the design of the bars on the grille? This is far worse than I imagined (and what I imagined was bad enough).