I wholeheartedly agree! Their cars always were overpriced in relation to
their true competition. The French company's unrealistic ideas on their
proper market segment in the USA, and their unrelenting embrace of
questionable marketing policies, eventually caused their demise. Of
course, the US recession in the early 90's didn't help either, and
sounded the death knell.
What I don't understand is why Peugeot feels it would be so damned
costly and risky to re-enter the US market. I do truly believe they are
now making good quality cars, very much on par with most of the
competition. The reliability would likely be there....all they really
have to do is adopt a prudent attitude (which they never had before out
of Paris...because they rarely listened to PMofA) concerning how to
properly market their cars, which doesn't have to cost a fortune if your
message is spot on. Besides that, they need a good, sound dealer
network. I think stand-alone dealers would be best, so the cars aren't
relegated to the corner of the showroom while dodgy salespeople pull
potential customers by the arm over to their VW or Jap offerings,
because they truly know very little about the vehicles themselves. I
always knew much more about the cars than any salespeople I ever
encountered at Peugeot dealerships, because they were always teamed with
other marques, at least up in Michigan where I'm from (now reside in
NC). Dammit.....I really think the market is now ripe for some true
diversity. I think people will very soon begin to tire of sport-utes,
vans will hopefully begin to wane, as will pickups (but of course, all
of these will remain very large, important market segments here). It's
just that I think Peugeot has some fine offerings, that would turn
people's heads, and quite possibly make them really 'desire' to own
them, since they tend to have a certain style and flair mostly lacking
here in the US by other car companies. Basically, do what has to be done
CORRECTLY, and they could easily be successful in the USA again. When
that plant is up and running in Brazil, seems to me that it would be
very cost effective to begin shipping to a re-energized US dealer
network. Get to work boys!.......Paris, are you listening??!
Regards,
Brian O.
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