April 7, 2015 • 39 mins
From Bentleys to Lincolns and more, the guys have explored all sorts of luxurious rides -- but how do we actually define the term "luxury car"? Is it cutting edge technology? A smooth ride? A high price tag?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car stuff from how Stuff works dot com. I welcome
to car Stuff. I'm Scott and I'm Ben. Smooth Ride Bowl,
smooth Ride. I like it. Yeah. Usually, uh, usually I
like to ask our super producer Noel Brown for a
(00:24):
nickname or two. But today I think I'm gonna take
a nickname because you know, remember how I used to
have these uh part time jobs on and off the gigs,
back when the economy was really rough. Well, I'm I'm
doing some other stuff now right, Yeah, I'm a I'm
a waiting room use at consultant. So so it's like,
(00:46):
you know, it's a question and more like not so
much what kind of music we're playing, but how smooth
is the jazz? I request muskrat Love. You always hear
the guy who writes in US muskrat Love, Scott. People
don't want to hear that at the dentist office. They
don't want to hear that at all. But the reason
I'm getting this, uh this fictitious part time gig going
again is not because I'm in dire straits financially, but
(01:08):
because I'm saving up. Scott. I want to get a
luxury car. And that sparked a question that you know
that you and I have been kicking around for a while,
and yes, what exactly is a luxury car? Well, that's
the thing. I don't know if we're going to be
able to define that today. And that's the problem that
I don't think there is a strict definition of luxury car. Now,
(01:30):
remember when we talk about muscle cars, we talk about
you know, other types of vehicles, sports cars, etcetera. There
there are strict definitions that that those vehicles have to
to meet according to some groups, right, yeah, yeah, a
lot of arbitrary groups out there that that say it
has to be this way. This is the strict definition
of a pony car or a muscle car or family
(01:54):
sedan or whatever. Yeah, hot hatch exactly right, warm hatch whatever. Um.
But yeah, there is no strict definition of a luxury vehicle.
And this is a this is kind of the problem
because there's there's an even more blurred line now between
what we call I guess mainstream or ordinary cars. I
(02:15):
don't like to use ordinary or regular terms, but let's
say mainstream cars and luxury cars. And that's that's grown
even more blurry in the recent past, because you know
these luxury features that are available on some of these
mainstream cars. And then there's also the added confusion of
luxury sports cars, right yeah, are are those also should
(02:38):
they also be considered luxury cars? How how often have
you seen a list of of, you know, the most
luxurious cars in the world and there's a Bugatti vera
in on it, or there's an Lamborghini eventa door on it.
They're very expensive, they do have a lot of features.
I understand that, but those are sports cars to me.
I mean, to me, that's a that's a sports car,
And I understand you know that that there's exclusivity that
(02:59):
comes with all the but that's that's part of what
we're gonna be kind of talking about today and just
kind of trying to figure out and there's there's a
lot of I don't know, there's a lot of press
right now about what is a true luxury vehicle and
what what should we be calling a sport luxury vehicle?
What's our luxury sports car is? Is that new Hyundai
(03:20):
is that a true luxury vehicle or is it something
that goes along with a brand like yeah, like the
Mercedes S Class that's what that's a luxury car. But
what about the E class? Is that not qualified? Is that?
And not make the car? Yeah, these are all things
that we're gonna talk about. I mean, I've got a
bunch of questions here, and i don't know if I'm
gonna answer any of these as we talked about it today,
But but my questions were, I mean, just think about
(03:40):
this if you even want something to ponder here at
the beginning of the podcast. Is luxury based on the
experience plus the product? Or is it just the product?
Or is it just the experience and not so much
the product? Can a product be better than the brand itself?
I mean, that's that's another thing. Is there is there
one standout in the brand that that that puts it
(04:00):
into that category? Diamond in the rough? Yeah it is.
How about is the brand name itself part of the luxury? Um?
Is luxury social? That's another thing too. I mean, is
it is it meant to impress others more than just
being luxurious by itself? Um? Is it all product? Maybe?
I mean that's something we kind of already talked about
experience versus product. But what about what about quality, beauty, safety, comfort,
(04:24):
or all those part of the luxury experience, or can
you do with you know, maybe only two of those,
or um, you know, some some variation of that. It's
it's weird. There's no strict definition of this thing, but
as a lot of people like to say, you'll know
it when you see it. Yeah, it reminds me very much.
This conversation reminds me very much of an episode that
(04:45):
happened between the United States legal system and the publishers
and marketers of the James Joyce book Ulysses. And they
were discussing whether or not this book contained obscenity, and
in this, uh, this court case resulted in one of
those well you know it when you see it kind
(05:06):
of things. And I always think about that when we
have these these sort of um blurry his word you used,
I would say, kind of subjective uh, feelings or definitions
about about a certain thing, like Okay, One thing we
know for sure is that luxury does not necessarily equate
to just technology. Just bells and whistles aren't good enough, right,
(05:28):
because there are a bunch there are a bunch of
cars that have a super boatload of amenities, but they're
not luxuries. Oh yeah, you can, you can get a
fully loaded I don't know. I'm gonna just pick a car,
and I don't know if this truly has or happen.
Let's say a Honda Fit. Yeah, and so it's a
relatively low end Honda vehicle. I'm an economy car. It's
got everything. But but you're gonna load it up. You're
(05:50):
gonna put everything that's available into that car that has
I can guarantee you that those features are features that
were found in luxury cars, you know, twenty years ago. Yeah,
that we're only found in luxury cars. Twenty years ago.
There were options, expensive options. So we've talked about that
so many times. The trickle down effect, you know if
you know that the way that you know, the power windows,
(06:10):
power locks, whatever. Yeah, I mean rear to froster, even
things like that. Yeah, I mean just more than two
speakers in the car. Um with some of them have
you know these cars have nine, ten, twelve speakers whatever. Um,
you know that's that's part of their premium package or whatever.
But I bet you won't be long before that becomes
part of the standard audio package in a lot of cars.
(06:32):
And that's just the way it works. Yeah, It always
it always seems to trickle down in in the car
by world. So if you want to know what the
economy cars of, well you say, Scott, five to five
to twelve years from now, we'll have look at the
luxury cars today. Uh, and that is that stuff is
going to later be in like we're one thing that's
(06:54):
happening now would be on board cameras. Right, definitely, that's
a that's a big example. But luxury vehicles it appears
to be um since it's not technology centric. It appears
to be more about the integration or the ease of
using that technology. Yeah, it's not supposed to be work
to drive a luxury car. That's exactly right. Yeah, you're right.
(07:14):
Luxury is something that goes above and beyond what you
on the most basic level need. Right, So it seems
that any car really is it's technically a luxury. It's
a luxury to have a car. Oh, that's true. I
don't know. There's there's this weird way you can you
can look at it in a lot of different ways
and some people say, well, no, that's that's that's definitely
(07:34):
a luxury brand. I know that's a luxury brand. So
whatever they create has to be a luxury vehicle. That's
not necessarily true either, but that and it makes waves
to you know what. I'm just thinking one off the
top of my head right now. What was the Remember
the Aston Martin. Now that's kind of a sports car
luxury car mix up as well. Right, they make that
vehicle that's called the Signet, I believe, Yeah, but it's
(07:58):
it's not spelled like the word signet. It's a C
Y G A E T. Yeah. I think it didn't
mean like swan or something like that. I don't remember
exactly what it meant, but anyways, it's it was. It
was basically it was a Toyota I Q or yeah,
dressed up a tiny little car. And I think you
had to own an Aston Martin before you could buy
(08:18):
one of these. That was the rule that went along
with us. It was this strange little vehicle. But is
that a luxury car because it's branded or badged in
Aston Martin. And that's part of the problem I think
is that some of those rebadging that that manufacturers are
doing or carry over of parts. And I know they've
done that since you know, the beginning of automobiles. Of course,
mostly um that. You know, though, if if there's a
(08:40):
parent company and they make certain products that that can
then be adapted into the the luxury market. I suppose
if they if they had you know, plus your seats
or more amenities of some kind, you know, luxury features
to that basic vehicle that they already have, you know,
a platform already in place. Is that truly a luxury
car when they do that or is that just read badging?
(09:00):
I mean, I know in some cases they're really adding
a lot of value to the vehicle by doing that,
but not all cases. It's not all cases, you're right, Yeah,
So that's that's a good point. So we've got we've
talked about like it's not technology, it's the way you
interact with technology. We've talked about um, whether it is
just the name, which I I think it has to
(09:21):
be the name and and the product. I don't think
like it just the name will carry over because we
have seen some experiments with this stuff, even going outside
of the world of automobiles. Right where you get um
I'm trying to think of a good example, but you
you get like a an item, a luxury amenity along
(09:44):
with your purchase of the vehicle, Like your own set
of luggage that's branded for the cart. But but you
know what I mean, like those kind of additions again,
you get this watch that that is supposed to be
part of a package because there's lean you know, this
Ferrari or Lamborghini experience. Um, but those are more again
(10:05):
luxury sports cars. Yeah yeah, And see that's that's part
of the whole problem here. I mean when when you
buy a Ferrari, Okay, you're not buying that because it's
a luxury car. It's a luxury to buy a Ferrari, sure,
but you're buying it because it's a sports car. But
then someone will say that that is a luxury sports
car and that's that's the way it's classified now. Oh yeah,
and we should talk about those, like those luxury classifications,
(10:28):
because there are a couple they change across countries. One is, uh,
one is the compact segment, right like the luxury compact,
compact luxury, compact luxury when when you know, adult sized
luxury is too much. No I'm kidding, it's not child
sized luxury. Uh. This is a this is a US
(10:49):
kind of thing, um, But in Europe it might be
known as like a compact executive car or something um
and then there's an let me let me ask you
a question. Yeah, so you're maybe talking about like when
Lexus puts out like a hatchback or something like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
because that's that's I think one of the examples that
I read in one of the articles was the I
(11:10):
can't remember, it's like the C T two. I think
it's a hybrid and C yeah CT Okay, so so
it's Alexis, but it's a hatchback. It's not necessarily like
you know, they're they're big, stately Lexus vehicles that they
that they sometimes put I know, the big sedan type
cars with the plush ride everything. It might be smooth inside,
but it's not like the great big four door sedans
(11:30):
that are that are cushy and it's like sitting on
a big couch when you're riding down the road. They
don't mean to be disparaging to them. I mean, that's
that's a compliment in the luxury segment, is that it's
a comfortable ride. But I don't know if you get
that experience in the in the CT as you the
same experience as you would in another product of there's
another Lexus. Yeah, that's a great point. Another example would
be like the Audi A three, which shares a lot
(11:54):
of stuff with the Volkswagen Golf UM. But then there's
then they have what would be called like the mid
size uh or just the regular executive cars and this
would be stuff like um, like the Lexus GS. If
we're gonna stick with Lexus, you know, but this the
(12:14):
stuff that we're really looking at that I think we
should focus on what we define what is luxury car.
Both of these sections can get um a little bit blurry,
right as as you said the high end luxury or
the full size, the grand saloons, you know what I mean,
the cars of sheiks and princes. Well what about okay,
you said Lexus and you're talking about them, but uh,
(12:36):
there are also a lot of the Toyota product line
that that match what a Lexus has as well. It's
just a it's a badging issue because it's true Alexus
is the luxury division of Toyota if you want to
look at it, that that's part of the brand, right,
the experience of the social aspect, and and okay, I'll
I look at this list of who owns who, and
you know, luxury, luxury and sports car brands that kind
(12:57):
of thing, right, you know, like the parent company and
then the offshoots, you know, the companies that they also
own that they purchased along the way along the decades
of of automotive history. Right. And for example, BMW owns
Rolls Royce and I don't know if a lot of
people really know that, but you know, both of those,
you know, manufacturers put out quality product, put out ultra
luxury cars. Yeah, their their luxury. They're also BMW is
(13:20):
is more towards the sports car side of it, you know,
towards the driving experience side of it. Rolls Royce is
more towards UM. You know, the the overall plushness, the
the experience of owning a Rolls Royce and and you know,
the dealership experience and all that. UM. Fiat owns, they
owned Ferrari, they owned Maserati, among other things. Ford Motor
Company owns the Lincoln brand. I'm going to talk about
(13:41):
the Lincoln brand. UM General Motors owns Buick and Cadillac.
Those are both Buick entry level luxury. Will call that
there's another one entry level luxury UM A warm hatch
about Honda and Accura, now Accurate is technically the luxury
brand end of of Honda. However, I mean it's okay, sure,
(14:04):
I understand it's a nice car, it's expensive, it's got
a lot of nice features, it's plush. But do you
consider an Accura a luxury vehicle? Absolutely not? Okay? What
about um? Okay, Well, Honda, who's kind of new to
this game, which we'll talk about in the Also they
owned Kia uh Tatsa Motors, you know the the India
yea company from from India. Um, they own Jaguar and
(14:25):
land Rover, so you know that's those are high end vehicles.
I mean there's some plush vehicles in both of those.
Dai lar Ag owns Mercedes Benz of course, then Nissan
owns Infinity, Toyto Motor Company owns Lexus. Like we just
talked about, Volkswagen owns Audie Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, and Porscha,
all which make um, I guess we'll call them luxury
(14:48):
sports cars, right, Um, Well, Bentley makes Bentley makes regular
I would say orthodox luxury cars. Yes, yes, I agree,
Like what kind of along the lines of Rolls Royce? Yeah, yeah,
what was the there's that you're thinking, oh, yeah, the
Molson is is yeah, the like the flagship. But there's
also there there these quotes where people often group uh Rolls, Royson,
(15:13):
Bentley together and they say, you know what, you guys,
you guys make very expensive boxes. You know that's true,
it really is true. But you know what, they're so comfortable,
they're so powerful, and you know they're they're pushing the
horse power of some of these sedans, like you can
get Mercedes now that have V twelve engines that have
six hundred and seventy one horse power six fifty one
(15:34):
or whatever it is. Uh, is that really? Is that
that becoming more of a sports car or is that
still part of the luxury aspect? I mean, is it
saying that you've had power to spare because Rolls, Royceon
and Bentley makes some they have some incredibly powerful engines
and again seven horse power in these things. Let me yeah,
let's just talk just for a second about the Molson,
just to show like the the ultimate, you know, high
(15:56):
and inarguably a luxury car kind of thing, right, And
we're not saying it's the best. It's just one that
is clearly not anywhere near blurred line. So this thing
has a V eight right, it's got um seven fifty
two pound feet to torque and and so you can
pull a stump out with it, you could if you,
(16:16):
which I'm sure a lot of Bentley owners right. Um.
It takes some twelve weeks to build it though, and
there's there's a lot of customization here and that I
think Scott is a big mark of a luxury car.
How long did you say it takes to build on?
Twelve weeks? Twelve weeks, twelve weeks. Well, because they have
(16:37):
they have a build rate of about seven to eight
hundred per year, and it's sold out for two years
when it came out, so you know, debuts and then
sold out. Yeah. Yeah, So it's an exclusive vehicle because
they limit the amount that they put out because they
can't put out that many because they're all hand built
and crafted, finally crafted. And I would say, yeah, exclusive,
(17:00):
he's a big part of it. Well, that's the That's
the other thing is that you know, if there's a
factory that's just cranking these out one after the other,
is that is that luxury? I mean, I've got a
lot of questions. I don't really have a lot of
answers today. I mean, I know that's the problem, but
there isn't a strict definition. And that's that's just why
we're talking about this because these blurred lines as we
keep we keep saying blurred lines, but it really is confusing.
(17:22):
It's yeah, well, if everybody can have it, then it's
not a luxury. Okay, that's just how the market works.
One thing I did want to get to and I've
still have more to cover here, but and we won't
spend too much time in this, but I saw something
this is a while back, maybe a year ago. I
saw something in an auto blog and the title was
Lincoln not true luxury yet, says Ford Design chief. Oh
(17:45):
Jay May's Ja May. So. So here's the guy from Ford,
the head you know, the head design boss guy at Ford,
who isn't you know, is seeing over the Lincoln brand
as well. He's saying that, um, the Lincoln brander. He
said that the Lincoln brand is not yet true luxury. Now.
I know that the Lincoln brand has been around a
long time. I mean I want to say that one
(18:06):
was back in like the early nineteen teens. I think
is that right? I think that's right. Anyways, I'll have
to check my facts on that, but um, he says that,
and here's part of the comment. This is why he
says it. He says, every brand needs to have d
n A and a unique selling point and things in
that vehicle that make you think that that's a particular brand,
like that's that's exclusive to that particular brand. But he's
(18:30):
saying that they're still using a lot of the the
Ford products to create the the quote new Lincoln, because
you know they had this kind of rebirth, right, yeah, yeah,
they perfect rebirth. Yeah. So they've been around since again, yeah,
nineteen seventeen Lincoln Motor Companies founded. Okay, so they've been
around a long long time. And they had a fantastic past.
(18:52):
I mean a lot of luxury vehicles created throughout you know,
the decades, and a lot of luxury vehicles patterned after
their success. Sure, and then they went through some tarts,
some tough times and kind of almost went away really
and then they were reborn again, I guess a few
years ago. Remember all these ads that was like the
new Lincoln and the new brand new products that they're
(19:13):
gonna come out with, and they did. But when you
when you look at um you know, to take for example,
the m k Z right now, I think the the
guts of that, the you know, the the mechanicals. Yeah, yeah, exactly,
it's a it's basically um Afford fusion underneath. And it
does have a lot of Lincoln parts that you know,
(19:33):
make it unique Lincoln, but it's not entirely a Lincoln product.
And that's what Jay Mays is saying. He's saying that
there's kind of this maybe even a ten year cycle
that that that Lincoln brand is going to have to
go through before it can be considered a true luxury vehicle.
And some people call that optimistic, true luxury brand. Yeah yeah.
And and when you say optimistic, they're saying it's not
(19:56):
ten years. How long did they say? It might take uh,
thirty years before it can really be back in the
luxury class because right now it's missing exclusivity. Okay, okay,
I get it, I get it. But man, you look
at that. That MKC is such a great looking vehicle.
I really do like that. I mean, it's a flagship.
It's definitely different, and they've got you know the Okay,
(20:19):
here here we go again, the m k C, which
is again, another exciting vehicle from from I don't know
if I want to say exciting, maybe not exciting. It's
a it's an SUV from Lincoln, the m k C
and a lot of people we have listeners that right,
and they love theirs they have. They speak highly of it,
but it's afford escape based vehicle and it's not truly
a Lincoln Lincoln loan vehicle. And I understand why Ford
(20:43):
does this. I get it. There's trying to trying to,
you know, strengthen the brand, and they're investing in the brand.
They're not They're not giving up by any means, right,
They're going to continue working. You know. They're having a
little bit of production issues or they had some production issues,
but they're they're getting things back on track. But again,
Jay May's is not terribly optimistic of when he's saying
ten years maybe, and other critics are saying thirty years
(21:04):
before the Lincoln brand comes back as kind of a
quote unquote official luxury brand. Ah, yes, my friend, But wait,
there's one very important thing that we should mention. This
is Western discussion at this point, and there's a very
interesting thing that's happening in some other parts of the
world in China and India, especially as uh, the as
(21:28):
the average income increases, right as as people are finding
themselves with more disposable income and more market access to things,
manufacturers noticed something weird when it came to China. A
lot of brands that are seen as maybe old or
not as popular or square on the way out here
(21:50):
in the States and in Europe are going like gangbusters
overseas in China. Yeah, that's right, because they love the
buick the right why, I mean, someone please, somebody explained
that to me. Also, one of my friends showed me
a this isn't just you know, with cars Scott's. One
of my friends told me that perhaps Blue Ribbon, which
(22:12):
is one of the cheapest beers around here, uh, is
consider a higher end thing. And really it's a high
end drink. Higher end. Yeah, I guess just the brand
name carries some degree of casher and so this uh
and I drinking it to be ironic or anything like that,
I don't know if they are, man, I don't know.
(22:34):
I'll have to ask. But but you know, this is
this is important to say because in the Lincoln conversation,
especially UH, the Lincoln is at the time of that
article is preparing to go on sale in China. Strange,
strange days, very strange. Yeah, it's interesting how to have
that all works out though, I mean, you know, there's
a there's a market for everything, I guess. And it
(22:55):
does prove you know, this one of the questions you
asked before about this, this social will aspect, like, um,
we see it again and sometimes in clothing in the
United Kingdom. Um, I think it was Burberry or something
became popular with the the the non aristocratic element and
(23:19):
because of that, people stopped doing and people stopped wearing
this stuff. And yeah, furthermore, I just got one more.
I know, I'm just I'm going over more with these comparisons.
But on the show Brain stuff, we looked at UM
looked at studies of names. Is very interesting social pattern
(23:41):
that takes place with names that could also take place
with brands, and it's it seems that we can trace
the rise and fall of a name's popularity a first name. Right, Uh,
if we like, if we see what people in a
given year are naming their daughters or their sons, uh, basic,
and then look at their um, their income or their
(24:02):
wealth level, and then we'll see that people who are
lower on the economic scale in later years start naming
their kids those kind of names, which makes the people
at the top of whatever this measurement is stop naming
their kids those names. That's fascinating. I'm gonna have to
look that up. So maybe that's what's happening. Like maybe
there's a thing like that happens in Evan, a flow
(24:25):
that naturally happens, and this is just the way it's
working out right now. And maybe luxury and just so
we're clear on this before we move on, I want
to I want to tell you that I'm a believer
in the Lincoln brand. I really am, and I feel
like it's a luxury brand right now. I really do
because those cars, I mean, especially the mk Z, I
really really like the redesign of that vehicle. If I
could afford one, I would get one right now. I'm
(24:46):
kind of in the market and I would. I would
love to, but it's just a little bit out of
reach for me right now. But it's a big swing.
I I don't see the ten year thing. I mean,
I understand that that's you know, the Ford boss guy
saying that's what it takes. But and in thirty years.
Come on, I mean, I really think the global market
is going to have an effect that uh makes it
less than thirty years for sure. I hope, so, I hope. So.
(25:07):
But okay, one last kind of one last document I
guess that I wanted to talk about here, and it
comes from an article that's this again at this point
four years old, so it's it's a little bit dated
in the products that they mentioned, but the ideas that
are mentioned in this article, uh, some of these are
really evergreen ideas. And I don't know if we're gonna
have time to go through all this. We're kind of
running out of time here, but I'll quickly try to
(25:28):
summarize some of this stuff and and just go through quickly.
Stop me if you if you like. But the idea
was that USA today back in two thousand eleven, the
end of two thousand eleven, so it's not that old.
I guess maybe three or four years old. Um, they
got together with four luxury car executives or luxury car
brand executives and sat them down at a round table
(25:50):
and had a discussion about what makes a luxury vehicle.
And this is this is perfect because this gets the
you know, the the inside impression of what it takes
to be luxury from the top execs of these companies.
So UM a few people that they talked they talked to.
They talked to Don Butler, who is the marketing manager
for a General Motors Catolic brand. They talked to Brian Smith,
(26:11):
who was the vice president in charge of marketing for
Toyota's Lexis brand. They talked to um Ludwig Villish, who
is the I hope I'm staying there right, is the
president of BMW of North America, and Steve Shannon, who
is vice president of marketing for Hyundai Motor America. And
the reason Hyundai was invited to tables because of their
at the time brand new model, which was the Equis
(26:34):
And I think I'm hoping him saying that, right, that's
a weird name. It's e q u u S I think.
And uh they also have the Genesis Sedan, which is
another luxury vehicle, but I think they're mostly talking about
the because he goes to the dealership too. Yeah, exactly.
So they wanted to UM explore the new definition of luxury,
(26:55):
like what it takes to be uh M, a luxury brand.
And again a couple of things that they mentioned. The
products are a little out data because they're talking about
stuff that's gonna come out in two thousand twelve. But
the evergreen ideas, you know, the things that they said
that I thought made most sense were, um, you know,
just some things that I highlighted here and we'll go
through them the So just for instance, the Cadillac brand
(27:15):
rep said, the definition of luxury changed. Luxury was size, space, comfort,
and presence, but now luxury is defined more by the
feel of the vehicle, he says. And the Toyota rep said,
the difference isn't just in price. Luxury has to do
with the overall experience the car, the dealer, the reputation
of the brand, and the satisfaction of owning that certain
(27:39):
So you know, it's like it has to do with
your own personal satisfaction when you get into the vehicle,
you you really enjoy driving that product, Uh, you know.
The BMW rep said, Um, it's all about emotion. That's
what distinguishes the luxury car from the mainstream R And
that makes sense from BMW because they're into the driving experience,
the driver's car. Um Honda, this is an interesting take
on the whole thing. They say, time saved and hassles
(28:02):
reduced are the essence of luxury appeal. So they're saying that,
you know, whatever is easiest for the customer is is
a true luxury and it kind of again, that kind
of makes sense that they would they would say that. Now,
the other, the other angle this whole article took was
that and it's not really a problem, but they call
it a problem. The problem is that um luxury items
(28:27):
are starting to creep into mainstream vehicles. So you might
have a twenty economy car that offers luxury options that
were only available thirty years ago as an expensive option.
So the exclusivity is watering down exactly right. Yeah, So
it's uh, you know, it's it's all being um, oh well,
I guess water down is maybe the best way to
put it in yet. So it's, uh, it's it's like
(28:47):
you're you're maybe not getting quite the exclusivity that you
did before, but you're able to afford the features that
were at one time luxury that you saw his luxury.
But now luxury vehicles have taken another step higher. I
mean there's luxury cars out there ben that have night vision. Now,
did you know that they've got electro chromatic you know
sunroofs that you know you touch a button into two
(29:08):
dim them or you know somewhere in between whether they're
opaque or transparent. Um, just amazing stuff. Massaging front end
back seats, which sounds like a bad idea. Yeah, it
kind of does, I guess, but um, you know, the
the idea is that the the brand name can be
tarnished by water down models. Is the case with with
Cadillac because um, remember they had the Cimarron back in
(29:32):
the Cadillac really suffered because of that and other brands
didn't have to come back from stuff like that, but um,
Hyundai has never had to deal with that because it's
brand new to the game there. But that's another problem.
Means that it's not a well established brand, and if
you're looking at the luxury vehicle, you might not necessarily
think that, you know, you'd want to get a Hyundai, right, Well,
(29:53):
it's a great vehicle. If you're in that market, you
kind of want to be part of that long story,
you know, the rules Royce store, which is which is uh,
just an amazing kind of journey that people feel like
they're a part of when they own a Rolls Royce. Yeah,
there's there's another side to this though, too. You can
get you can get caught in the crossfire here. There's
(30:13):
a great note um from Butler that you mentioned earlier,
you know, the with Cadillac. Uh, I just want to
read this. He said, our heritage is a hundred and
nine years. People think fondly of the Cadillac. The problem is,
quite often it's the same way they think about their grandfather.
They love their grandfather, but they don't want to spend
(30:34):
a lot of time with them, which is just poignant.
I understand what he's saying. Yeah, so that's a hundred
thirteen years now. You know, I went through I actually
you know what we're talking about. I went through and
kind of laid out how many years all these manufacturers. Yeah,
so as I found the dates from all these new Cadillac,
as you mentioned, was found at nineteen o two. That's
a hundred and thirteen years now. BMW has been around
(30:55):
for ninety nine years at this point, Lexus years and
then Hyundai if you want to consider the the nine
l Z, which was their first full size sedan, which
later became became the Equis model UM. If you want
to consider that as like their entry level luxury offering.
They've been around since I think the company is founded
(31:18):
in very different So we're gonna give them sixteen years
in the luxury market. Okay, I think that's being favorable.
That is very sixteen years versus d and thirteen years.
You're you're more likely to consider or to associate Cadillac
or BMW being a luxury brand versus Hyundai, Yea or
or you know any of those, I mean, Infinity, all
(31:40):
those brands that just kind of popped up are Acura well,
because name recognition is such a big part of it
and brand familiarity. You know, the question is like why
am I spending this much money for Hunda? You know
what I mean? But you know what, let me tell
you this this and this plays right into the Hyundai thing.
And this is maybe the last bit that I want
(32:00):
to cover from this article. And I thought, this is
really showing, this is really really telling, I guess, um,
the role of the dealer, And this is how the
exacts talk about how the dealership experience plays into this
whole thing. And we know the story of the rolls Rice.
As you just mentioned, you know that you can go
in and and really design the whole thing from from
from the you know, bumper to bumper. Anything you want
(32:21):
is is it's it's all just a matter of how
much money you want to spend on the thing, anything
you want. So this is really the dealership experience for
the rest of us. I guess you know, how comfortable
are they going to make it and and what part
does that play in it? Well, okay, so here's how
they looked at it, Lexis. I'll break it down by
by brand Lexus. Um they the rep said, or the
(32:41):
executive said, luxury is at least fift of the dealer
dealership and the experience. The luxury side is people that
want to come in and feel like their needs are
being met at the dealership, and we work hard at that.
So they're trying really hard to make people feel welcome
to the dealership and that you know, we're going to
take care of you no matter what it takes whatever,
exactly right. So Honda's experience is even even more extreme.
(33:04):
Um they say, time spend of the dealership actually gets
in the way of a luxury experience, so Honda lets
them avoid it. Because EQUA shoppers needn't even visit the dealership.
The car will be brought to their homes or offices
for test drives and then picked up and dropped off
for service. So that's one thing that's that's one thing
that you can't get more of time. So they're they're
sign conscious. Yeah, very time conscious. All right, and you'll
(33:28):
get to these last two. Cadillac says, we offer the
vehicle pick up and drop off as well. But there
are people that want the relationship with the dealership as well.
They want to they want to know that it's not
just a transaction, you know, it's not just all about money.
The person. They want to know that the person there
actually cares about me, the person respects me. The person
also looks out for me as well, so that's important.
We'll actively say like stuff like, hey, Scott, you know,
(33:51):
since the weather's coming in, we're gonna go ahead. And
I know that you just dropped this off for a
quick oil change, but we wouldn't a haad detailed the
car too. Yeah, yeah, stuff like that, I mean, Cadillac
would it would be likely to happen there? Um, all right.
The last one is BMW and this is the kind
of the opposite end of the spectrum. Um, he says,
I would rather, I would rather say, being the purveyor
(34:12):
of the ultimate driving machine, that the product is more
than fifty. So he's saying dealership is important, maybe a
little less than fifty. It's mostly the product in this case,
because we we sell a driver's vehicle and that's what
it's all about, which is in line with what their
their mission is. They say that it does. I mean,
but it is. It's a luxury brand. I mean it
(34:32):
really is. And and and I think somewhere in here
they said, you know, someone who is going to buy
a BMW is is perfectly fine getting a you know, BMW,
the the M three, versus getting like the seven series,
which is a great, big four door sedan. And they're
not asking for a bigger car. They know it's a
luxury car, but it's a luxury sports car and they're
happy driving it. They're not They're not wanting the M
(34:53):
three to grow to gigantic size for that plush right,
they want it for what it is. Yeah, they don't
need a bunch of cushy bench seat lazy boy reclining
type interiors. Yeah, but you know there's other BMW buyers
that do want that, and they go into the higher
you know, the higher number series vehicles. I get that.
I I get the experiences different for all of these manufacturers.
(35:15):
And that's across the board. You know, the ones that
weren't invited at this round table as well. Um, they
would all have different answers. And again, this is a
little bit frustrating. And if there's no strict definition luxury,
you can't point to it and say that's lexury, that's
luxury because of this feature or because of that feature.
It's more of a field thing, and it's and it's
based on your own impression and management of these companies.
(35:37):
Let us be honest, Scott, management of these companies. Uh,
each group is defining luxury car in the way that
makes their products seem the most luxurious. Yeah, I mean,
I hope we've got our listeners thinking a little bit
about what is luxury to you and what's the what's
you know, the Maybe you can help to clear up
(35:58):
the lines. I guess between lugsury car, luxury sports car
or entry level luxury car, versus luxury car or um
ultra luxury or whatever's the only real luxury car. I guess,
and I know, this is just some people trying to
reclassify vehicles so that they have their own little tagline
or their own sales approach or whatever. But but what
(36:18):
really does set apart luxury brands or luxury products for you? What?
What what makes it a true luxury and what matters
the most to you about that? Right? Yeah? And it
could be the dealership, it could be the product. It
could be uh, you know, the way it makes you
feel when you drive it. It could be the social aspect.
You know that the people admire you when you pull
up into that car. You think that you think that
(36:40):
they do uh monocle in your top hat. Yeah, maybe
you're Maybe you're just you know what, and there's nothing
wrong with this. Maybe you're just really proud when you
hand the keys over to the valet and they see
what kind of you're driving. I mean, I can understand
the feeling behind that. But what is it about it
that makes it feel like a luxury car to you?
And what makes you proud about owning that product? Yeah? Personally,
I see them when whenever I see somebody with a
(37:02):
car like that, you know, I think of it as
an investment because it lasts so long the resell value
can be great. And also, yeah, there is some cachet,
but those companies are typically very good to their customers. Okay,
can be and I well okay on this, but but
think about it like that that old Rolls Royce that
we keep seeing at these shows around town here. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
(37:23):
that thing has dropped significantly in value. It's the mid eighties,
it's race right, and it's probably yeah, it's like early nineties.
I don't know how much that can cost, but um,
it's definitely not worth it definitely dropped. Okay, well we
have okay, we have to talk about this for you
real quick. Okay, alright. So, uh so one of the
shows we went to, we started seeing the same Rules
Royce show up. And I had always thought man would
(37:46):
be amazing good one, but they're so expensive and it's
a great car, and it's a great car, it's in
great shape. And so Scott, you came back one day
and said, well, you know, I actually I looked at
the prices of this and uh when you told me
the price, I was shocked. Yeah, it's it's like an
economy car price. Now, yeah, a little bit more, which
is you know what? So maybe I am wrong there
about the resell value on these. I just assume their
(38:08):
cars you can keep forever to the point where they
become well, they devalue so much initially. I mean, you know,
they've got such an initial high price that they ask
at the dealership, and then as soon as you drive
off the lot, you know the old story that you know,
it's it loses the value or whatever it is, and
then every year after it starts to come down unless
it becomes a collector's item or it's so rare that
(38:30):
you know, you're you're left with one of only ten
on the road or something, and so it starts to
gain in value. Yeah, or unless you know, four or
five decades pass, right, and if you can keep it
going that log, yeah, you know what, it probably will
come back and yeah, it's be going to hang on
to it that long. I don't know, So let us know.
If you want to learn some more about luxury cars,
you can check out every podcast we've ever done car
(38:52):
stuff show dot com. In fact, our very first episode
was on luxury Cars of the Future, right it was,
which is kind of dated now is wailed, but but
go easy honest with that one, and you can find
us on Facebook and Twitter as well. Right to us. Yeah, please,
we have a lot of questions. We didn't have a
bunch of answers, but we want to hear what you think,
(39:14):
so check out those Remember those questions we asked at
the top, and right to us with your responses. We
are our stuff at how stuff works dot com. For
more on this and thousands of other topics is how
stuff works dot com. Let us know what you think,
send an email to podcast at how stuff works dot com.
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car stuff from how Stuff works dot com. I welcome
to car Stuff. I'm Scott and I'm Ben. Smooth Ride Bowl,
smooth Ride. I like it. Yeah. Usually, uh, usually I
like to ask our super producer Noel Brown for a
(00:24):
nickname or two. But today I think I'm gonna take
a nickname because you know, remember how I used to
have these uh part time jobs on and off the gigs,
back when the economy was really rough. Well, I'm I'm
doing some other stuff now right, Yeah, I'm a I'm
a waiting room use at consultant. So so it's like,
(00:46):
you know, it's a question and more like not so
much what kind of music we're playing, but how smooth
is the jazz? I request muskrat Love. You always hear
the guy who writes in US muskrat Love, Scott. People
don't want to hear that at the dentist office. They
don't want to hear that at all. But the reason
I'm getting this, uh this fictitious part time gig going
again is not because I'm in dire straits financially, but
(01:08):
because I'm saving up. Scott. I want to get a
luxury car. And that sparked a question that you know
that you and I have been kicking around for a while,
and yes, what exactly is a luxury car? Well, that's
the thing. I don't know if we're going to be
able to define that today. And that's the problem that
I don't think there is a strict definition of luxury car. Now,
(01:30):
remember when we talk about muscle cars, we talk about
you know, other types of vehicles, sports cars, etcetera. There
there are strict definitions that that those vehicles have to
to meet according to some groups, right, yeah, yeah, a
lot of arbitrary groups out there that that say it
has to be this way. This is the strict definition
of a pony car or a muscle car or family
(01:54):
sedan or whatever. Yeah, hot hatch exactly right, warm hatch whatever. Um.
But yeah, there is no strict definition of a luxury vehicle.
And this is a this is kind of the problem
because there's there's an even more blurred line now between
what we call I guess mainstream or ordinary cars. I
(02:15):
don't like to use ordinary or regular terms, but let's
say mainstream cars and luxury cars. And that's that's grown
even more blurry in the recent past, because you know
these luxury features that are available on some of these
mainstream cars. And then there's also the added confusion of
luxury sports cars, right yeah, are are those also should
(02:38):
they also be considered luxury cars? How how often have
you seen a list of of, you know, the most
luxurious cars in the world and there's a Bugatti vera
in on it, or there's an Lamborghini eventa door on it.
They're very expensive, they do have a lot of features.
I understand that, but those are sports cars to me.
I mean, to me, that's a that's a sports car,
And I understand you know that that there's exclusivity that
(02:59):
comes with all the but that's that's part of what
we're gonna be kind of talking about today and just
kind of trying to figure out and there's there's a
lot of I don't know, there's a lot of press
right now about what is a true luxury vehicle and
what what should we be calling a sport luxury vehicle?
What's our luxury sports car is? Is that new Hyundai
(03:20):
is that a true luxury vehicle or is it something
that goes along with a brand like yeah, like the
Mercedes S Class that's what that's a luxury car. But
what about the E class? Is that not qualified? Is that?
And not make the car? Yeah, these are all things
that we're gonna talk about. I mean, I've got a
bunch of questions here, and i don't know if I'm
gonna answer any of these as we talked about it today,
But but my questions were, I mean, just think about
(03:40):
this if you even want something to ponder here at
the beginning of the podcast. Is luxury based on the
experience plus the product? Or is it just the product?
Or is it just the experience and not so much
the product? Can a product be better than the brand itself?
I mean, that's that's another thing. Is there is there
one standout in the brand that that that puts it
(04:00):
into that category? Diamond in the rough? Yeah it is.
How about is the brand name itself part of the luxury? Um?
Is luxury social? That's another thing too. I mean, is
it is it meant to impress others more than just
being luxurious by itself? Um? Is it all product? Maybe?
I mean that's something we kind of already talked about
experience versus product. But what about what about quality, beauty, safety, comfort,
(04:24):
or all those part of the luxury experience, or can
you do with you know, maybe only two of those,
or um, you know, some some variation of that. It's
it's weird. There's no strict definition of this thing, but
as a lot of people like to say, you'll know
it when you see it. Yeah, it reminds me very much.
This conversation reminds me very much of an episode that
(04:45):
happened between the United States legal system and the publishers
and marketers of the James Joyce book Ulysses. And they
were discussing whether or not this book contained obscenity, and
in this, uh, this court case resulted in one of
those well you know it when you see it kind
(05:06):
of things. And I always think about that when we
have these these sort of um blurry his word you used,
I would say, kind of subjective uh, feelings or definitions
about about a certain thing, like Okay, One thing we
know for sure is that luxury does not necessarily equate
to just technology. Just bells and whistles aren't good enough, right,
(05:28):
because there are a bunch there are a bunch of
cars that have a super boatload of amenities, but they're
not luxuries. Oh yeah, you can, you can get a
fully loaded I don't know. I'm gonna just pick a car,
and I don't know if this truly has or happen.
Let's say a Honda Fit. Yeah, and so it's a
relatively low end Honda vehicle. I'm an economy car. It's
got everything. But but you're gonna load it up. You're
(05:50):
gonna put everything that's available into that car that has
I can guarantee you that those features are features that
were found in luxury cars, you know, twenty years ago. Yeah,
that we're only found in luxury cars. Twenty years ago.
There were options, expensive options. So we've talked about that
so many times. The trickle down effect, you know if
you know that the way that you know, the power windows,
(06:10):
power locks, whatever. Yeah, I mean rear to froster, even
things like that. Yeah, I mean just more than two
speakers in the car. Um with some of them have
you know these cars have nine, ten, twelve speakers whatever. Um,
you know that's that's part of their premium package or whatever.
But I bet you won't be long before that becomes
part of the standard audio package in a lot of cars.
(06:32):
And that's just the way it works. Yeah, It always
it always seems to trickle down in in the car
by world. So if you want to know what the
economy cars of, well you say, Scott, five to five
to twelve years from now, we'll have look at the
luxury cars today. Uh, and that is that stuff is
going to later be in like we're one thing that's
(06:54):
happening now would be on board cameras. Right, definitely, that's
a that's a big example. But luxury vehicles it appears
to be um since it's not technology centric. It appears
to be more about the integration or the ease of
using that technology. Yeah, it's not supposed to be work
to drive a luxury car. That's exactly right. Yeah, you're right.
(07:14):
Luxury is something that goes above and beyond what you
on the most basic level need. Right, So it seems
that any car really is it's technically a luxury. It's
a luxury to have a car. Oh, that's true. I
don't know. There's there's this weird way you can you
can look at it in a lot of different ways
and some people say, well, no, that's that's that's definitely
(07:34):
a luxury brand. I know that's a luxury brand. So
whatever they create has to be a luxury vehicle. That's
not necessarily true either, but that and it makes waves
to you know what. I'm just thinking one off the
top of my head right now. What was the Remember
the Aston Martin. Now that's kind of a sports car
luxury car mix up as well. Right, they make that
vehicle that's called the Signet, I believe, Yeah, but it's
(07:58):
it's not spelled like the word signet. It's a C
Y G A E T. Yeah. I think it didn't
mean like swan or something like that. I don't remember
exactly what it meant, but anyways, it's it was. It
was basically it was a Toyota I Q or yeah,
dressed up a tiny little car. And I think you
had to own an Aston Martin before you could buy
(08:18):
one of these. That was the rule that went along
with us. It was this strange little vehicle. But is
that a luxury car because it's branded or badged in
Aston Martin. And that's part of the problem I think
is that some of those rebadging that that manufacturers are
doing or carry over of parts. And I know they've
done that since you know, the beginning of automobiles. Of course,
mostly um that. You know, though, if if there's a
(08:40):
parent company and they make certain products that that can
then be adapted into the the luxury market. I suppose
if they if they had you know, plus your seats
or more amenities of some kind, you know, luxury features
to that basic vehicle that they already have, you know,
a platform already in place. Is that truly a luxury
car when they do that or is that just read badging?
(09:00):
I mean, I know in some cases they're really adding
a lot of value to the vehicle by doing that,
but not all cases. It's not all cases, you're right, Yeah,
So that's that's a good point. So we've got we've
talked about like it's not technology, it's the way you
interact with technology. We've talked about um, whether it is
just the name, which I I think it has to
(09:21):
be the name and and the product. I don't think
like it just the name will carry over because we
have seen some experiments with this stuff, even going outside
of the world of automobiles. Right where you get um
I'm trying to think of a good example, but you
you get like a an item, a luxury amenity along
(09:44):
with your purchase of the vehicle, Like your own set
of luggage that's branded for the cart. But but you
know what I mean, like those kind of additions again,
you get this watch that that is supposed to be
part of a package because there's lean you know, this
Ferrari or Lamborghini experience. Um, but those are more again
(10:05):
luxury sports cars. Yeah yeah, And see that's that's part
of the whole problem here. I mean when when you
buy a Ferrari, Okay, you're not buying that because it's
a luxury car. It's a luxury to buy a Ferrari, sure,
but you're buying it because it's a sports car. But
then someone will say that that is a luxury sports
car and that's that's the way it's classified now. Oh yeah,
and we should talk about those, like those luxury classifications,
(10:28):
because there are a couple they change across countries. One is, uh,
one is the compact segment, right like the luxury compact,
compact luxury, compact luxury when when you know, adult sized
luxury is too much. No I'm kidding, it's not child
sized luxury. Uh. This is a this is a US
(10:49):
kind of thing, um, But in Europe it might be
known as like a compact executive car or something um
and then there's an let me let me ask you
a question. Yeah, so you're maybe talking about like when
Lexus puts out like a hatchback or something like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
because that's that's I think one of the examples that
I read in one of the articles was the I
(11:10):
can't remember, it's like the C T two. I think
it's a hybrid and C yeah CT Okay, so so
it's Alexis, but it's a hatchback. It's not necessarily like
you know, they're they're big, stately Lexus vehicles that they
that they sometimes put I know, the big sedan type
cars with the plush ride everything. It might be smooth inside,
but it's not like the great big four door sedans
(11:30):
that are that are cushy and it's like sitting on
a big couch when you're riding down the road. They
don't mean to be disparaging to them. I mean, that's
that's a compliment in the luxury segment, is that it's
a comfortable ride. But I don't know if you get
that experience in the in the CT as you the
same experience as you would in another product of there's
another Lexus. Yeah, that's a great point. Another example would
be like the Audi A three, which shares a lot
(11:54):
of stuff with the Volkswagen Golf UM. But then there's
then they have what would be called like the mid
size uh or just the regular executive cars and this
would be stuff like um, like the Lexus GS. If
we're gonna stick with Lexus, you know, but this the
(12:14):
stuff that we're really looking at that I think we
should focus on what we define what is luxury car.
Both of these sections can get um a little bit blurry,
right as as you said the high end luxury or
the full size, the grand saloons, you know what I mean,
the cars of sheiks and princes. Well what about okay,
you said Lexus and you're talking about them, but uh,
(12:36):
there are also a lot of the Toyota product line
that that match what a Lexus has as well. It's
just a it's a badging issue because it's true Alexus
is the luxury division of Toyota if you want to
look at it, that that's part of the brand, right,
the experience of the social aspect, and and okay, I'll
I look at this list of who owns who, and
you know, luxury, luxury and sports car brands that kind
(12:57):
of thing, right, you know, like the parent company and
then the offshoots, you know, the companies that they also
own that they purchased along the way along the decades
of of automotive history. Right. And for example, BMW owns
Rolls Royce and I don't know if a lot of
people really know that, but you know, both of those,
you know, manufacturers put out quality product, put out ultra
luxury cars. Yeah, their their luxury. They're also BMW is
(13:20):
is more towards the sports car side of it, you know,
towards the driving experience side of it. Rolls Royce is
more towards UM. You know, the the overall plushness, the
the experience of owning a Rolls Royce and and you know,
the dealership experience and all that. UM. Fiat owns, they
owned Ferrari, they owned Maserati, among other things. Ford Motor
Company owns the Lincoln brand. I'm going to talk about
(13:41):
the Lincoln brand. UM General Motors owns Buick and Cadillac.
Those are both Buick entry level luxury. Will call that
there's another one entry level luxury UM A warm hatch
about Honda and Accura, now Accurate is technically the luxury
brand end of of Honda. However, I mean it's okay, sure,
(14:04):
I understand it's a nice car, it's expensive, it's got
a lot of nice features, it's plush. But do you
consider an Accura a luxury vehicle? Absolutely not? Okay? What
about um? Okay, Well, Honda, who's kind of new to
this game, which we'll talk about in the Also they
owned Kia uh Tatsa Motors, you know the the India
yea company from from India. Um, they own Jaguar and
(14:25):
land Rover, so you know that's those are high end vehicles.
I mean there's some plush vehicles in both of those.
Dai lar Ag owns Mercedes Benz of course, then Nissan
owns Infinity, Toyto Motor Company owns Lexus. Like we just
talked about, Volkswagen owns Audie Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, and Porscha,
all which make um, I guess we'll call them luxury
(14:48):
sports cars, right, Um, Well, Bentley makes Bentley makes regular
I would say orthodox luxury cars. Yes, yes, I agree,
Like what kind of along the lines of Rolls Royce? Yeah, yeah,
what was the there's that you're thinking, oh, yeah, the
Molson is is yeah, the like the flagship. But there's
also there there these quotes where people often group uh Rolls, Royson,
(15:13):
Bentley together and they say, you know what, you guys,
you guys make very expensive boxes. You know that's true,
it really is true. But you know what, they're so comfortable,
they're so powerful, and you know they're they're pushing the
horse power of some of these sedans, like you can
get Mercedes now that have V twelve engines that have
six hundred and seventy one horse power six fifty one
(15:34):
or whatever it is. Uh, is that really? Is that
that becoming more of a sports car or is that
still part of the luxury aspect? I mean, is it
saying that you've had power to spare because Rolls, Royceon
and Bentley makes some they have some incredibly powerful engines
and again seven horse power in these things. Let me yeah,
let's just talk just for a second about the Molson,
just to show like the the ultimate, you know, high
(15:56):
and inarguably a luxury car kind of thing, right, And
we're not saying it's the best. It's just one that
is clearly not anywhere near blurred line. So this thing
has a V eight right, it's got um seven fifty
two pound feet to torque and and so you can
pull a stump out with it, you could if you,
(16:16):
which I'm sure a lot of Bentley owners right. Um.
It takes some twelve weeks to build it though, and
there's there's a lot of customization here and that I
think Scott is a big mark of a luxury car.
How long did you say it takes to build on?
Twelve weeks? Twelve weeks, twelve weeks. Well, because they have
(16:37):
they have a build rate of about seven to eight
hundred per year, and it's sold out for two years
when it came out, so you know, debuts and then
sold out. Yeah. Yeah, So it's an exclusive vehicle because
they limit the amount that they put out because they
can't put out that many because they're all hand built
and crafted, finally crafted. And I would say, yeah, exclusive,
(17:00):
he's a big part of it. Well, that's the That's
the other thing is that you know, if there's a
factory that's just cranking these out one after the other,
is that is that luxury? I mean, I've got a
lot of questions. I don't really have a lot of
answers today. I mean, I know that's the problem, but
there isn't a strict definition. And that's that's just why
we're talking about this because these blurred lines as we
keep we keep saying blurred lines, but it really is confusing.
(17:22):
It's yeah, well, if everybody can have it, then it's
not a luxury. Okay, that's just how the market works.
One thing I did want to get to and I've
still have more to cover here, but and we won't
spend too much time in this, but I saw something
this is a while back, maybe a year ago. I
saw something in an auto blog and the title was
Lincoln not true luxury yet, says Ford Design chief. Oh
(17:45):
Jay May's Ja May. So. So here's the guy from Ford,
the head you know, the head design boss guy at Ford,
who isn't you know, is seeing over the Lincoln brand
as well. He's saying that, um, the Lincoln brander. He
said that the Lincoln brand is not yet true luxury. Now.
I know that the Lincoln brand has been around a
long time. I mean I want to say that one
(18:06):
was back in like the early nineteen teens. I think
is that right? I think that's right. Anyways, I'll have
to check my facts on that, but um, he says that,
and here's part of the comment. This is why he
says it. He says, every brand needs to have d
n A and a unique selling point and things in
that vehicle that make you think that that's a particular brand,
like that's that's exclusive to that particular brand. But he's
(18:30):
saying that they're still using a lot of the the
Ford products to create the the quote new Lincoln, because
you know they had this kind of rebirth, right, yeah, yeah,
they perfect rebirth. Yeah. So they've been around since again, yeah,
nineteen seventeen Lincoln Motor Companies founded. Okay, so they've been
around a long long time. And they had a fantastic past.
(18:52):
I mean a lot of luxury vehicles created throughout you know,
the decades, and a lot of luxury vehicles patterned after
their success. Sure, and then they went through some tarts,
some tough times and kind of almost went away really
and then they were reborn again, I guess a few
years ago. Remember all these ads that was like the
new Lincoln and the new brand new products that they're
(19:13):
gonna come out with, and they did. But when you
when you look at um you know, to take for example,
the m k Z right now, I think the the
guts of that, the you know, the the mechanicals. Yeah, yeah, exactly,
it's a it's basically um Afford fusion underneath. And it
does have a lot of Lincoln parts that you know,
(19:33):
make it unique Lincoln, but it's not entirely a Lincoln product.
And that's what Jay Mays is saying. He's saying that
there's kind of this maybe even a ten year cycle
that that that Lincoln brand is going to have to
go through before it can be considered a true luxury vehicle.
And some people call that optimistic, true luxury brand. Yeah yeah.
And and when you say optimistic, they're saying it's not
(19:56):
ten years. How long did they say? It might take uh,
thirty years before it can really be back in the
luxury class because right now it's missing exclusivity. Okay, okay,
I get it, I get it. But man, you look
at that. That MKC is such a great looking vehicle.
I really do like that. I mean, it's a flagship.
It's definitely different, and they've got you know the Okay,
(20:19):
here here we go again, the m k C, which
is again, another exciting vehicle from from I don't know
if I want to say exciting, maybe not exciting. It's
a it's an SUV from Lincoln, the m k C
and a lot of people we have listeners that right,
and they love theirs they have. They speak highly of it,
but it's afford escape based vehicle and it's not truly
a Lincoln Lincoln loan vehicle. And I understand why Ford
(20:43):
does this. I get it. There's trying to trying to,
you know, strengthen the brand, and they're investing in the brand.
They're not They're not giving up by any means, right,
They're going to continue working. You know. They're having a
little bit of production issues or they had some production issues,
but they're they're getting things back on track. But again,
Jay May's is not terribly optimistic of when he's saying
ten years maybe, and other critics are saying thirty years
(21:04):
before the Lincoln brand comes back as kind of a
quote unquote official luxury brand. Ah, yes, my friend, But wait,
there's one very important thing that we should mention. This
is Western discussion at this point, and there's a very
interesting thing that's happening in some other parts of the
world in China and India, especially as uh, the as
(21:28):
the average income increases, right as as people are finding
themselves with more disposable income and more market access to things,
manufacturers noticed something weird when it came to China. A
lot of brands that are seen as maybe old or
not as popular or square on the way out here
(21:50):
in the States and in Europe are going like gangbusters
overseas in China. Yeah, that's right, because they love the
buick the right why, I mean, someone please, somebody explained
that to me. Also, one of my friends showed me
a this isn't just you know, with cars Scott's. One
of my friends told me that perhaps Blue Ribbon, which
(22:12):
is one of the cheapest beers around here, uh, is
consider a higher end thing. And really it's a high
end drink. Higher end. Yeah, I guess just the brand
name carries some degree of casher and so this uh
and I drinking it to be ironic or anything like that,
I don't know if they are, man, I don't know.
(22:34):
I'll have to ask. But but you know, this is
this is important to say because in the Lincoln conversation,
especially UH, the Lincoln is at the time of that
article is preparing to go on sale in China. Strange,
strange days, very strange. Yeah, it's interesting how to have
that all works out though, I mean, you know, there's
a there's a market for everything, I guess. And it
(22:55):
does prove you know, this one of the questions you
asked before about this, this social will aspect, like, um,
we see it again and sometimes in clothing in the
United Kingdom. Um, I think it was Burberry or something
became popular with the the the non aristocratic element and
(23:19):
because of that, people stopped doing and people stopped wearing
this stuff. And yeah, furthermore, I just got one more.
I know, I'm just I'm going over more with these comparisons.
But on the show Brain stuff, we looked at UM
looked at studies of names. Is very interesting social pattern
(23:41):
that takes place with names that could also take place
with brands, and it's it seems that we can trace
the rise and fall of a name's popularity a first name. Right, Uh,
if we like, if we see what people in a
given year are naming their daughters or their sons, uh, basic,
and then look at their um, their income or their
(24:02):
wealth level, and then we'll see that people who are
lower on the economic scale in later years start naming
their kids those kind of names, which makes the people
at the top of whatever this measurement is stop naming
their kids those names. That's fascinating. I'm gonna have to
look that up. So maybe that's what's happening. Like maybe
there's a thing like that happens in Evan, a flow
(24:25):
that naturally happens, and this is just the way it's
working out right now. And maybe luxury and just so
we're clear on this before we move on, I want
to I want to tell you that I'm a believer
in the Lincoln brand. I really am, and I feel
like it's a luxury brand right now. I really do
because those cars, I mean, especially the mk Z, I
really really like the redesign of that vehicle. If I
could afford one, I would get one right now. I'm
(24:46):
kind of in the market and I would. I would
love to, but it's just a little bit out of
reach for me right now. But it's a big swing.
I I don't see the ten year thing. I mean,
I understand that that's you know, the Ford boss guy
saying that's what it takes. But and in thirty years.
Come on, I mean, I really think the global market
is going to have an effect that uh makes it
less than thirty years for sure. I hope, so, I hope. So.
(25:07):
But okay, one last kind of one last document I
guess that I wanted to talk about here, and it
comes from an article that's this again at this point
four years old, so it's it's a little bit dated
in the products that they mentioned, but the ideas that
are mentioned in this article, uh, some of these are
really evergreen ideas. And I don't know if we're gonna
have time to go through all this. We're kind of
running out of time here, but I'll quickly try to
(25:28):
summarize some of this stuff and and just go through quickly.
Stop me if you if you like. But the idea
was that USA today back in two thousand eleven, the
end of two thousand eleven, so it's not that old.
I guess maybe three or four years old. Um, they
got together with four luxury car executives or luxury car
brand executives and sat them down at a round table
(25:50):
and had a discussion about what makes a luxury vehicle.
And this is this is perfect because this gets the
you know, the the inside impression of what it takes
to be luxury from the top execs of these companies.
So UM a few people that they talked they talked to.
They talked to Don Butler, who is the marketing manager
for a General Motors Catolic brand. They talked to Brian Smith,
(26:11):
who was the vice president in charge of marketing for
Toyota's Lexis brand. They talked to um Ludwig Villish, who
is the I hope I'm staying there right, is the
president of BMW of North America, and Steve Shannon, who
is vice president of marketing for Hyundai Motor America. And
the reason Hyundai was invited to tables because of their
at the time brand new model, which was the Equis
(26:34):
And I think I'm hoping him saying that, right, that's
a weird name. It's e q u u S I think.
And uh they also have the Genesis Sedan, which is
another luxury vehicle, but I think they're mostly talking about
the because he goes to the dealership too. Yeah, exactly.
So they wanted to UM explore the new definition of luxury,
(26:55):
like what it takes to be uh M, a luxury brand.
And again a couple of things that they mentioned. The
products are a little out data because they're talking about
stuff that's gonna come out in two thousand twelve. But
the evergreen ideas, you know, the things that they said
that I thought made most sense were, um, you know,
just some things that I highlighted here and we'll go
through them the So just for instance, the Cadillac brand
(27:15):
rep said, the definition of luxury changed. Luxury was size, space, comfort,
and presence, but now luxury is defined more by the
feel of the vehicle, he says. And the Toyota rep said,
the difference isn't just in price. Luxury has to do
with the overall experience the car, the dealer, the reputation
of the brand, and the satisfaction of owning that certain
(27:39):
So you know, it's like it has to do with
your own personal satisfaction when you get into the vehicle,
you you really enjoy driving that product, Uh, you know.
The BMW rep said, Um, it's all about emotion. That's
what distinguishes the luxury car from the mainstream R And
that makes sense from BMW because they're into the driving experience,
the driver's car. Um Honda, this is an interesting take
on the whole thing. They say, time saved and hassles
(28:02):
reduced are the essence of luxury appeal. So they're saying that,
you know, whatever is easiest for the customer is is
a true luxury and it kind of again, that kind
of makes sense that they would they would say that. Now,
the other, the other angle this whole article took was
that and it's not really a problem, but they call
it a problem. The problem is that um luxury items
(28:27):
are starting to creep into mainstream vehicles. So you might
have a twenty economy car that offers luxury options that
were only available thirty years ago as an expensive option.
So the exclusivity is watering down exactly right. Yeah, So
it's uh, you know, it's it's all being um, oh well,
I guess water down is maybe the best way to
put it in yet. So it's, uh, it's it's like
(28:47):
you're you're maybe not getting quite the exclusivity that you
did before, but you're able to afford the features that
were at one time luxury that you saw his luxury.
But now luxury vehicles have taken another step higher. I
mean there's luxury cars out there ben that have night vision. Now,
did you know that they've got electro chromatic you know
sunroofs that you know you touch a button into two
(29:08):
dim them or you know somewhere in between whether they're
opaque or transparent. Um, just amazing stuff. Massaging front end
back seats, which sounds like a bad idea. Yeah, it
kind of does, I guess, but um, you know, the
the idea is that the the brand name can be
tarnished by water down models. Is the case with with
Cadillac because um, remember they had the Cimarron back in
(29:32):
the Cadillac really suffered because of that and other brands
didn't have to come back from stuff like that, but um,
Hyundai has never had to deal with that because it's
brand new to the game there. But that's another problem.
Means that it's not a well established brand, and if
you're looking at the luxury vehicle, you might not necessarily
think that, you know, you'd want to get a Hyundai, right, Well,
(29:53):
it's a great vehicle. If you're in that market, you
kind of want to be part of that long story,
you know, the rules Royce store, which is which is uh,
just an amazing kind of journey that people feel like
they're a part of when they own a Rolls Royce. Yeah,
there's there's another side to this though, too. You can
get you can get caught in the crossfire here. There's
(30:13):
a great note um from Butler that you mentioned earlier,
you know, the with Cadillac. Uh, I just want to
read this. He said, our heritage is a hundred and
nine years. People think fondly of the Cadillac. The problem is,
quite often it's the same way they think about their grandfather.
They love their grandfather, but they don't want to spend
(30:34):
a lot of time with them, which is just poignant.
I understand what he's saying. Yeah, so that's a hundred
thirteen years now. You know, I went through I actually
you know what we're talking about. I went through and
kind of laid out how many years all these manufacturers. Yeah,
so as I found the dates from all these new Cadillac,
as you mentioned, was found at nineteen o two. That's
a hundred and thirteen years now. BMW has been around
(30:55):
for ninety nine years at this point, Lexus years and
then Hyundai if you want to consider the the nine
l Z, which was their first full size sedan, which
later became became the Equis model UM. If you want
to consider that as like their entry level luxury offering.
They've been around since I think the company is founded
(31:18):
in very different So we're gonna give them sixteen years
in the luxury market. Okay, I think that's being favorable.
That is very sixteen years versus d and thirteen years.
You're you're more likely to consider or to associate Cadillac
or BMW being a luxury brand versus Hyundai, Yea or
or you know any of those, I mean, Infinity, all
(31:40):
those brands that just kind of popped up are Acura well,
because name recognition is such a big part of it
and brand familiarity. You know, the question is like why
am I spending this much money for Hunda? You know
what I mean? But you know what, let me tell
you this this and this plays right into the Hyundai thing.
And this is maybe the last bit that I want
(32:00):
to cover from this article. And I thought, this is
really showing, this is really really telling, I guess, um,
the role of the dealer, And this is how the
exacts talk about how the dealership experience plays into this
whole thing. And we know the story of the rolls Rice.
As you just mentioned, you know that you can go
in and and really design the whole thing from from
from the you know, bumper to bumper. Anything you want
(32:21):
is is it's it's all just a matter of how
much money you want to spend on the thing, anything
you want. So this is really the dealership experience for
the rest of us. I guess you know, how comfortable
are they going to make it and and what part
does that play in it? Well, okay, so here's how
they looked at it, Lexis. I'll break it down by
by brand Lexus. Um they the rep said, or the
(32:41):
executive said, luxury is at least fift of the dealer
dealership and the experience. The luxury side is people that
want to come in and feel like their needs are
being met at the dealership, and we work hard at that.
So they're trying really hard to make people feel welcome
to the dealership and that you know, we're going to
take care of you no matter what it takes whatever,
exactly right. So Honda's experience is even even more extreme.
(33:04):
Um they say, time spend of the dealership actually gets
in the way of a luxury experience, so Honda lets
them avoid it. Because EQUA shoppers needn't even visit the dealership.
The car will be brought to their homes or offices
for test drives and then picked up and dropped off
for service. So that's one thing that's that's one thing
that you can't get more of time. So they're they're
sign conscious. Yeah, very time conscious. All right, and you'll
(33:28):
get to these last two. Cadillac says, we offer the
vehicle pick up and drop off as well. But there
are people that want the relationship with the dealership as well.
They want to they want to know that it's not
just a transaction, you know, it's not just all about money.
The person. They want to know that the person there
actually cares about me, the person respects me. The person
also looks out for me as well, so that's important.
We'll actively say like stuff like, hey, Scott, you know,
(33:51):
since the weather's coming in, we're gonna go ahead. And
I know that you just dropped this off for a
quick oil change, but we wouldn't a haad detailed the
car too. Yeah, yeah, stuff like that, I mean, Cadillac
would it would be likely to happen there? Um, all right.
The last one is BMW and this is the kind
of the opposite end of the spectrum. Um, he says,
I would rather, I would rather say, being the purveyor
(34:12):
of the ultimate driving machine, that the product is more
than fifty. So he's saying dealership is important, maybe a
little less than fifty. It's mostly the product in this case,
because we we sell a driver's vehicle and that's what
it's all about, which is in line with what their
their mission is. They say that it does. I mean,
but it is. It's a luxury brand. I mean it
(34:32):
really is. And and and I think somewhere in here
they said, you know, someone who is going to buy
a BMW is is perfectly fine getting a you know, BMW,
the the M three, versus getting like the seven series,
which is a great, big four door sedan. And they're
not asking for a bigger car. They know it's a
luxury car, but it's a luxury sports car and they're
happy driving it. They're not They're not wanting the M
(34:53):
three to grow to gigantic size for that plush right,
they want it for what it is. Yeah, they don't
need a bunch of cushy bench seat lazy boy reclining
type interiors. Yeah, but you know there's other BMW buyers
that do want that, and they go into the higher
you know, the higher number series vehicles. I get that.
I I get the experiences different for all of these manufacturers.
(35:15):
And that's across the board. You know, the ones that
weren't invited at this round table as well. Um, they
would all have different answers. And again, this is a
little bit frustrating. And if there's no strict definition luxury,
you can't point to it and say that's lexury, that's
luxury because of this feature or because of that feature.
It's more of a field thing, and it's and it's
based on your own impression and management of these companies.
(35:37):
Let us be honest, Scott, management of these companies. Uh,
each group is defining luxury car in the way that
makes their products seem the most luxurious. Yeah, I mean,
I hope we've got our listeners thinking a little bit
about what is luxury to you and what's the what's
you know, the Maybe you can help to clear up
(35:58):
the lines. I guess between lugsury car, luxury sports car
or entry level luxury car, versus luxury car or um
ultra luxury or whatever's the only real luxury car. I guess,
and I know, this is just some people trying to
reclassify vehicles so that they have their own little tagline
or their own sales approach or whatever. But but what
(36:18):
really does set apart luxury brands or luxury products for you? What?
What what makes it a true luxury and what matters
the most to you about that? Right? Yeah? And it
could be the dealership, it could be the product. It
could be uh, you know, the way it makes you
feel when you drive it. It could be the social aspect.
You know that the people admire you when you pull
up into that car. You think that you think that
(36:40):
they do uh monocle in your top hat. Yeah, maybe
you're Maybe you're just you know what, and there's nothing
wrong with this. Maybe you're just really proud when you
hand the keys over to the valet and they see
what kind of you're driving. I mean, I can understand
the feeling behind that. But what is it about it
that makes it feel like a luxury car to you?
And what makes you proud about owning that product? Yeah? Personally,
I see them when whenever I see somebody with a
(37:02):
car like that, you know, I think of it as
an investment because it lasts so long the resell value
can be great. And also, yeah, there is some cachet,
but those companies are typically very good to their customers. Okay,
can be and I well okay on this, but but
think about it like that that old Rolls Royce that
we keep seeing at these shows around town here. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
(37:23):
that thing has dropped significantly in value. It's the mid eighties,
it's race right, and it's probably yeah, it's like early nineties.
I don't know how much that can cost, but um,
it's definitely not worth it definitely dropped. Okay, well we
have okay, we have to talk about this for you
real quick. Okay, alright. So, uh so one of the
shows we went to, we started seeing the same Rules
Royce show up. And I had always thought man would
(37:46):
be amazing good one, but they're so expensive and it's
a great car, and it's a great car, it's in
great shape. And so Scott, you came back one day
and said, well, you know, I actually I looked at
the prices of this and uh when you told me
the price, I was shocked. Yeah, it's it's like an
economy car price. Now, yeah, a little bit more, which
is you know what? So maybe I am wrong there
about the resell value on these. I just assume their
(38:08):
cars you can keep forever to the point where they
become well, they devalue so much initially. I mean, you know,
they've got such an initial high price that they ask
at the dealership, and then as soon as you drive
off the lot, you know the old story that you know,
it's it loses the value or whatever it is, and
then every year after it starts to come down unless
it becomes a collector's item or it's so rare that
(38:30):
you know, you're you're left with one of only ten
on the road or something, and so it starts to
gain in value. Yeah, or unless you know, four or
five decades pass, right, and if you can keep it
going that log, yeah, you know what, it probably will
come back and yeah, it's be going to hang on
to it that long. I don't know, So let us know.
If you want to learn some more about luxury cars,
you can check out every podcast we've ever done car
(38:52):
stuff show dot com. In fact, our very first episode
was on luxury Cars of the Future, right it was,
which is kind of dated now is wailed, but but
go easy honest with that one, and you can find
us on Facebook and Twitter as well. Right to us. Yeah, please,
we have a lot of questions. We didn't have a
bunch of answers, but we want to hear what you think,
(39:14):
so check out those Remember those questions we asked at
the top, and right to us with your responses. We
are our stuff at how stuff works dot com. For
more on this and thousands of other topics is how
stuff works dot com. Let us know what you think,
send an email to podcast at how stuff works dot com.
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