Americans aren’t just not familiar with plug in hybrids, they don’t know about them: At least according to Yahoo News. They paint a picture of an American consumer populace that is unfamiliar with plug in’s. From the article: “PHEVs remain a tough thing to market here in the U.S. People don’t understand what a plug-in hybrid is,” Ed Kim, a veteran industry expert and vice president at AutoPacific, told ABC News. “It’s incumbent on automakers to explain what the benefits are to consumers and overcome this insurmountable marketing challenge,” he said.” Plug in hybrids account for just 0.9% of the market the first quarter of this year. Its up to automakers to get people familiar. One analyst says that due to plug in’s being a middle compromise, that could explain why they aren’t working because according to him (from the article):”PHEVs inhabit a barren middle in consumers’ consciousness. It’s a halfway solution and consumers typically haven’t liked middle of the road solutions.” With 41 new plug in models planned to be introduced between now and next year, automakers better get their act together, or waste money and time on products consumers don’t want.
Ford is getting pricing on Bronco options from consumer inputs: Per Autoblog, Ford has been sending customers who have placed a reservation on a Bronco “an advance ordering survey to help us understand consumer demand for certain features on the new Bronco.” It will remain to be seen whether or not they actually take the customer responses and apply them. But from what we can gather, the Bronco will have some customization, but get pricey fast, just like the Wrangler. Brief TL;DR snippets from the article:
Swapping the seven-speed manual for the 10-speed automatic with the 2.3-liter EcoBoost four-cylinder costs $1,600. Stepping up to the 2.7-liter EcoBoost, which is paired with the automatic, costs $3,500 on the Base, Big Bend, Black Diamond, and Badlands trims.
The Outer Banks trim (between Black Diamond and Badlands) looks to start with the automatic, so it charges $1,600 to get the 2.7-liter.
The off road focused Sasquatch package costs $5k on the Base, Big Bend & Outer Banks Trim. Its $2500 on the Badlands trim. From the article: “One poster who chose the Black Diamond trim was presented with a $4,500 price for the Sasquatch kit.”
Head over to the article to see more pricing. But you can pretty much gather that it wont be uncommon to see $50-$60k+ Bronco’s. Speaking of expensive….
The 2021 Dodge Durango Hellcat starts at $81,000: $80,995 to be exact. Gotta use that psychological pricing with the 99’s at the end to make it seem cheaper. Via The Drive, they also report that Dodge released pricing for the rest of the Durago line up as well. The base SXT starts at $31,765 and the R/T at $45,305. That means there’s a whopping $50k price difference between the base SXT and the Hellcat for 417 more horses and $35,690 between the lowly Hemi powered R/T and the Hellcat for 350 more horses. Insane.
Luxury buyers aren’t interested in Cadillac or Lincoln: In an article that should surprise no one, MSN Money reports that luxury car buyers have no interest in America’s only 2 luxury marques. From the article: “Kelley Blue Book’s Brand Watch Report for the second quarter of 2020 included results for what it calls brand “consideration.” Buyers considered buying BMW’s ahead of other luxury brands, with 24% of shoppers preferring it in the survey. It was followed by Audi (owned by Volkswagen) at 21%, Lexus (the luxury brand of Toyota) at 18%, Tesla at 16%, Mercedes at 15% and Acura (Honda) at 12%, the same as Cadillac. Lincoln posted a figure of only 7%.” That’s low. Really low.
They paint a picture of 2 brands that are still bought by older buyers with small model lines and none of the 12 considerations that luxury buyers look for when shopping (If you’re wondering what those 12 considerations are, they are durability, safety, driver comfort, driving performance, technology, interior layout, reputation, affordability, exterior styling, fuel efficiency, prestige/sophistication and ruggedness). Meanwhile their competitors have younger buyers, bigger model lines and tech that people want in their models. One of the main problems with both Lincoln and Cadillac is the fact that they are part of bigger corporations and its reflected in everything they do. While other luxury brands are indie, or function as if they are autonomous even though they are part of bigger corporations. But that’s a discussion for another time...