The State of The Car

[f6fhellcat13]

We did a bunch of hinges for BMWs at my old workplace. A very good young engineer was working on them.

It is a shame the programs he was working on all turned out to be extremely hideous cars.

I don't even bat an eye when a new BMW comes out anymore. They're losing the quality and quantity race to Mercedes, and increasingly, Audi.

Are they losing out on snob appeal, too? Audi had a run in the last decade and early part of this one. I still see a shitton of them, but E90s (which are still modern in my brain) are being poorly modified more and more, which must be a sign to the Roundelheads that their beloved brand is plunging downmarket. I see a lot of the other premium SUVs these days; K̶u̶b̶a̶n̶g̶s̶ Levantes, Stelvios, Macans etc... Merc is completely lost at sea; they fill the niche vacated by Oldsmobile, with the G capitalizing on the horrible-people market that it shares with the X6(M). At least in the two corners of America (and Montreal) that I frequent, I think Tesla is the brand du jour in the upper middle-class and aspirational middle middle-class stakes. Also, in New England, the previous buyers of pitiful base model BMWs and Benzes seem to have realized that they can have a Subaru with more toys and a less-venal dealer network, though I still find Subies to be pretty agricultural.

*Darth Vader saying "Sister!"*
EDIT: This works better if Kitdy's picture is on the same page...