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Comments
Now, I'm not saying that GM and Caddy didn't have their issues in the late '70's and early to mid '80's, as they did, but from those pictures, boy do the Germans interiors look dated and cheap. The Caddy's, while dated still look luxurious and plush.
Last year, Car&Driver did a road "race" of early '80's diesels: They took an '82 Maxima, an '82 Olds 88 coupe and a '83 Mercedes and ran them from Michigan to California. I believe the Olds ran flawlessly, got the best fuel economy, and got there first. Then they auctioned them off on EBAY and I believe they gotr the most for the Olds.
http://caranddriver.com/features/all/2006/battle_of_the_diesel_beaters_feature/(- page)/1
I don't know about your new MB pic either. It's not an E-class, it's a W126 S-class. There's no such thing as a 1988 ES300 (if you mean a 300SE, it stickered at about 50K - I owned one of these cars), and the car pictured appears to have a non-airbag steering wheel, which means it is either a non-North American market car, or it is from before 1985. Air was standard on all MB W126 sold in North America (and the pic you show appears to actually have AC), so the point isn't well taken. Nearly all MB (and every W126) of this period also had power windows, and I suspect 99% of people couldn't tell MB-tex from leather to begin with. The point?
The stereo in that pic is also not aftermarket, that's a Becker Grand Prix, standard in all NA-spec W126 and optional elsewhere. The switches shown are all for standard equipment - the optional switches (heated seats, 2-tone horn) were on the console.
For the Caddy...a nice traditional car...but not everyone is into that kind of thing if they like to drive for fun.
It'd be cool to see a study of weird foreign interpretations of fins, which lasted for about a decade after they became passe in the US
(glad you liked 'em Fin).
Good values as sofas on wheels, however. Sadly, the top luxury benchmarks remain overseas.
Regards,
OW
What no one seems to grasp is that when Cadillac won the Dewar Trophy for "standards", the Ford Model T could have won it just as easily. Cadillac did not enter the competition, but rather an english car salesman, who happened to like what Leland was doing with Cadillac, entered the Cadillacs in the competition. The idea was to get some of the European car manufacturers to enter the competition too, but none of them did.
Luxury cars aren't necessarily throwaways, but their demand for costly parts and maintenance usually exceeds most people's wallets and patience. Things can quickly reach a point where your time and money is better applied to leasing a new one and letting the manufacturer pick up the tab on maintenance.
Caddy is no more the standard than Audi when they had their issues a few years back...and for that matter any brand that has that perception etched into the minds of current/perspective buyers. Mercedes is not exclusive here either. Excellence is excellence.
My guess is there is no company that has achieved this exclusively on a broad luxury basis, let alone Caddy. In my mind, they never were the standard anyway.
Regards,
OW
Ummm, Bumpy, the two classic car picturs you posted are of a 1974 Caddy, not a mid 80's Caddy. Just right click the image and click on 'Properties' to see the picture's origin (www.classiccars.com).
What's so pathetic about both Mercedes Benz and BMW is that the pics of the classic Caddy you posted STIIIIIIIIIIIIIILL look more luxurious than the pics of the modern 1988 Benz and 1986 BMW i posted...
Sad. So sad...
Fintail. I am curious. Why did you buy that thing? I'd seriously like to know.
As far as the Haters are concerned: You can buy a 1984 Cadillac Seville Bustleback with fake burled walnut trim for $15,000 in 1984, or shell out like $50,000 for a 1988 Benz 300SE that had real stained plywood trim. So keep hating on the fake burled walnut. GOOOOOO plywood!
Primitive? The car was easily the most advanced sedan in the world when it was introduced, and was so good that 10 years later, Toyota would give it flush glazing and call it the Lexus LS. Why did I buy it? I didn't buy it new...and for the price of a used Kia I bought a pristine one owner car of the best workmanship and comfort that gave me a few years of driving pleasure with very little maintenance cost.
Surely a bustleback cost like 25-30K in 1984? I mean, that was around the time my mom bought a new Ciera and it cost nearly 15K, and I think the piece of crap Chevy S-10 Blazer my dad bought in 1985 cost more than 15K.
And real wood of any thickness still beats plood
I think the original post was concerned with general perception of luxury, performance and service that Cadillac once enjoyed. There was a time when Cadillac was generally viewed as the best of the best. Being seen at the wheel of a Cadillac meant that you'd finally made your mark in the world. The phrase "this is the Cadillac of (TVs, refrigerators, stereo systems, whatever)" needed no explanation -- it was understood to mean "this is the BEST there is, ever, anywhere."
Whether or not the perception was consistent with reality is beside the point. So is the discussion of 80's models. The point of this discussion (as I understand it) is whether GM is able to anticipate and meet the evolving needs of the driving public to return Cadillac to its former glory status.
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I think Cadillac made an attempt to get into the true high end luxury market with the Eldorado Brougham in the late fifties, but this model was more glitz than anything and was a maintenance pig.
I would agree with you on BMW (mostly sports sedans) vs Mercedes (wide range of luxury/sport_sedan models). For prestige the Rolls is it, but is way out of range for nearly everyone. Mercedes is prestigious, and one can buy a C-class for a reasonable price (which may not be quite as much prestige as an S-class, but still is a Mercedes).
I have yet to see a new CTS. I did take my SRX back recently for the axle seal recall, but the showroom only had Corvette's, Impala's and SUV's to look at. But I do think the CTS with the new interior and re-sized body may replace the DTS as the popularly priced Cadillac.
Interesting to note that the Is Lexus The Standard of the World? discussion doesn't get too many comments.
I don't hear comments like the Rolex of can openers or the Mont Blanc of down pillows. Cadillac still seems to own the phrase - people just don't seem to make comparisons like that as much anymore.
Maybe because Timexes keep time as well as a Rolex with a lot less maintenance and expense, and Bics write better than most Mont Blancs?
Nicely put. Seems like many of we posters get all hung up about the word "standard". According to some folks, the "standard" term was used with regard to some race sponsored by Dewars that Cadillac had won. If "standard" of luxury/performance had actually been awarded to a car mfr on annual basis over years by some group such as WSJ, NY Times, Motor Trend, CR, Car and Driver, Road and Track, etc, then maybe it might be useful to use that term. But, that has not been the case.
Maybe we are really talking about the desire and capability of GM to return Cadillac to its former glory status and how close is it now in achieving that goal. But, some will say, what is "glory". Do we even know if GM has set goal to make Cadillac the top luxury car of the world? Have Wagoner or Lutz stated so or is it mentioned in GM annual report to shareholders? If they have set that goal, how will they know when they have met it?
Interesting. We still hear this phrase in advertising of the past that is used today. Look in the yellow pages and around. However I doubt you will see new ad campaigns using it and surely those under 40-50 would not think "Cadillac of ..." automatically when looking at something. Then again they would not think the "BMW of, or Merdedes of. However I believe I have heard "the Lexus of". Perhaps not in advertising but in comments.
Anyway if we look at what is out today the CTS and SRX are both considered right up there with the BMW and MB and Lexus. They may not be above them that "the Cadillac of" can be used but those who can get beyond their prejudice of domestic makers they would see that the CTS is worthy of it's place in the upper luxurydom. Pretty much most of the media has placed it up there. The SRX also is placed highly.
Is Cadillac so much higher than the others that "the Cadillac" could be used?? No way. In fact back in the 60's when this term was widely used those other marques just were not seen as much. Just not many around and Cadillac was at the top. Today it would be very tough to stand out among all these high end marques and no one does in every area.
What about Rolls?? Bentley? Now that's what I'm talkin' about!
Caddy as World Standard? Never to be seen again (if it ever really was). The Mark of Excellence is not used anymore for a good reason. Because it's not true.
BTW, I or my family have owed cars produced by the now infamous Big 3 for over 55 years. I just got tired of waiting and hoping. Now that the GM allowed the CTS to get interesting, I am waiting to see if they mess it up.
Regards,
OW.
Is it the most ostentatious? elegant? technical? highest priced? best price for the money? greenest? best quality? highest reliability?
It is not any of the above and yet may be all of the above.
for our purposes here I would say it is the product that when someone on the street sees it says: now that is a great car that I really want to aspire to/ have. It is what everyone says is the best of the best. Right now because this world is so flat I do not believe there is one marque out there that is the top dog.
But for this discussion I believe we should look for say the top 2 or 3 that meets my definition. Rolls and Bentley I would say they meet the above definition but are so much more expensive relative to others that they knock themselves out of the running. When Cadillac was the "standard of the world" (the world being the US at that time) the other marquees were not that far behind them in price. Sure the caddy was expensive but it was not 5 times the price of the normal car being sold.
So per my thoughts the BMW's, MB's, Audis, Lexi, Caddys are the ones that can compete for this "standard". I guess I would think that most would say MB is the standard compared to the rest. Sure it is not a performance car like the BMW but in my opinion if a high priced BMW is sitting next to a high priced MB I would say the MB has more prestige. Am I right here?
At this time Cadillac does not have models to compete with the high end. At the low end (3, CTS) Caddy is very well represented. Time will tell if the newer models make the same inroads.
And please do not start a thread on how CTS has a cheap interior or whatever. It is recognized by the media as being right up there with the best of them.
I really don't want Cadillac to chase Lexus, BMW, and Mercedes too much. It is at the sweet spot for me as far as affordability. I'd have to defect to Buick if Caddy goes too high end. If Buick goes away, I have nowhere to go. Chrysler? Nah, the 300 is getting too long in the tooth. Lincoln? Feh! Nothing there anymore.
Not a problem and I agree. Your point is well taken.
The reality in my view is that visibly, edgy doesn't do it for me but inside, it is very nice inside. Previous to 2008, no Caddy was appealing at all to me. Therefore, I would not have cause to have the marque on my comparo list. 'Doesn't do anything great for me' also comes to mind as I review Caddy products.
Since the topic is Caddy's potential to be the standard, no current model says they are going to claim that any time soon.
Regards,
OW
The non-V CTS doesn't have a V8 anyway. I'm also pretty sure I read somewhere that they will keep on building the Northstar for those that want to count cylinders, even though the DI 3.6L makes more power.
Great point!!! Is it possible, with the advent of the Japanese luxury marks over the last 20 yrs, trying to emulate BOTH Cadillac AND the Germans, only with cust. svc. and Quality in mind, that what has happened is that Caddy has tried to remain true to it's recent history as being that luxury car (the "sofa"on wheels) that Americans aspired to own as they chased the American dream. Yet quality issues, not styling have nagged them.
The Germans on the other hand, have that import "prestige" on their side and have masked their quality issues by building a "supercar" image with gadgets and V-10's and V-12's and such.
Even early on, the Japanese made thinly veiled "gussied up" versions of their more popular sedans into Luxury Marques, but the quality and reliability is what allowed them to gain a foothold.
couple this with the fact that people come out of college EXPECTING the American Dream to be there waiting for it, there is nothing left for them to "aspire" to.
Caddy's Northstar V-8 has been around now for almost 15 years. It is one of the better V-8's on the market still. But, no V-12 bling, sticks that are few and far in between, and quality and reliability on par with the Germans, but (questionable now) historically behind the [non-permissible content removed].
They are criticized for not being as sporty as the Germans (not meant to be), but not as reliable as the [non-permissible content removed] (point well taken, but now in SOME question), so that kind of puts them in no man's land in the luxury arena.
What they SHOULD do w/ the CTS is pound it into the public's head that it is BIGGER and LESS EXPENSIVE than the 5 or E!!! Screw the magazines that compare it to the 3 and C!!! They may not get people looking for a 5 or E to buy into that, though they may, but they WILL get it into their heads that it is MORE CAR for the SAME PRICE as the 3,C,IS,A-4, etc.
Caddy may NEVER have been as good as it was looked at in the '50's or '60's, but it sure as hell was never as bad as people said in the '70's or '80's.
The CTS-V has basically the Corvette ZR-1 engine, detuned to "only" 550 hp !
According to the industry examiners at CNW Research, Cadillac’s fortunes appear to be slipping away at the margins.
In the firm’s July installment of their Retail Automotive Summary, their Aspirational Index (which judges a brand’s attractiveness to consumers) reveals that Cadillac’s rising star is beginning to falter. In the mid-Nineties, the marque rated only a 4 on a 10 point scale. With the brand’s dramatic rebound beginning in 1999, its score climbed for five straight years, flattening out in 2005 and 2006. It has now slipped under 8.0, the brand’s lowest mark since 2003.
The ‘aspiration age’ for Cadillac buyers has also swelled from 30.3 just three years ago to 35.9. Interestingly, Cadillac trucks (read: the Escalade brand) went from 25.7 to 32.7—a 27 percent increase. This suggests that Cadillac’s appeal among buyers in that most coveted of demographics (18-35 years old) is slipping.
Editor’s Note: Cadillac’s disappointing trending seems like a fairly predictable result of its aging bread-and-butter product line (think: CTS, SRX, XLR, and STS). Older consumers seem to be less concerned with purchasing new models than they are with other factors (witness the devoted elderly audiences of such long-running cars as Cadillac’s own DeVille, or Ford’s Crown Victoria). We anticipate an uptick in Cadillac’s scores once the 2008 CTS filters into dealerships.
Regards,
OW
I'm not sure about Europe, but here in the US, the CTS has two 3.6L engines - the base one makes about 255hp, the direct injection one makes 300hp. There is definitely plenty of room between the 300hp CTS and the 550hp CTS-V for a V8 option.... But in this new era of $3.50 gas, 35mpg CAFE, etc.. I don't know.... They will definitely have a turbo-diesel for the CTS soon - I think it's already on sale in Europe.
Easy there, big fella. While the new CTS is clearly the best Cadillac in 40 years (please don't pretend that any of the 80s Caddies were anything more than pathetic), it leaves something to be desired for us stick aficionados. Every review of the MT version of the CTS that I've read pans the stick. I don't doubt that the automatic can hold its own against the foreign competition, but as long as my knees hold out, I have no interest in a car with fewer than 3 pedals.
I'm at least 2 years away from replacing my 330i. If Cadillac can work the kinks out of the manual tranny by the time I'm ready to buy, then the CTS will be a serious contender. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect the same level of gear-shifting satisfaction from the 2010 CTS that I'm used to from my 2001 330i.
Weren't you the poster who agreed with Consumer Reports when Consumer Reports remarked how elegant and real the fake wood in the 2007 Toyota Avalon looked? What, then, makes the fake wood in the early 80's Cadillacs any different (late 80's Caddys and beyond went with real wood trim)? Could it be that the Cadillac is a domestic car and the Toyota is an import? And if that's the case, what difference does origin of manufacture matter when fake or real wood trim is discussed?
In fact, looking at BMW's from the 1980's and Yugo's from the same decade, we can swear they're from the same manufacturer...
Nothing from Germany could ever touch the ElDorado, which explains why Elvis and F. Sinatra owned them. The best Germany could do is resurrect WWII-era vehicles, add power steering to them and a huge 6L engine, old technology and ugly interiors with high noise levels and a truck-like ride ("I bought my 300SE 1988 Benz for $50,000 because it's vault-like solid. Like my F-350 SuperDuty pickup."), so we saw nothing significant from Germany until this century.
Japan started making nice luxury cars in the 1990's, starting first in 1991 with the Lexus LS 400. Before that, Cadillac was the luxury car.
If I'm wrong, then please support your argument with something like pictures instead of vagaries. Thank you.
You can't do it though, because everything from Germany was crude and primitive up until the 1990's. If I'm wrong, show some pics of german cars that cost around $30,000 new from the 60's, 70's, 80's. You can't do it without embarrasing Germany...
.
I'd suggest that car X is prestigious if significant numbers of upper-middle & upper-class professionals/managers/entrepeneurs buy (or lease) it. In my town, which is a fairly affluent NYC suburb, this segment of the market is voting German with its dollars. From what I've seen, this is true of most demographically similar zip codes on the east & west coasts. It might be different in the flyover states.
It wasn't always this way. When I was a kid - in the late 50s & early 60s - Cadillac owned these buyers. The only serious competition came from Lincoln. I can recall just one Mercedes in my home town (also a fairly well-off NYC suburb), & it belonged to a career Foreign Service officer who brought it home after completing a 2-year stint in West Berlin. Apart from this, Cadillac was the car of choice for the local ruling class. No one thought that this would ever change.
But it did. By the later 1980s, the doctors, bankers, lawyers, stockbrokers & successful businessmen were driving German iron: Mercedes, for the most part. The only exceptions were folks who, for personal reasons, would not buy anything made in Germany. By this time, the typical Cadillac buyer was either old or a member of what I'd call the blue collar aristocracy - the Con Ed foreman who had worked a lot of overtime, for example. Nothing wrong with that, mind you, but certainly not nearly enough to sustain a luxury brand.
So I'd say that if Cadillac can recapture a significant chunk (20 or 25 percent, say) of the upper-middle & upper class market segment, it will be perceived as a top-tier player.
What difference does it make? I own a 2001 BMW 330i, not an 80s BMW. My car is 2 generations removed from the 3-series cars of the 1980s. Your question doesn't make sense.
I have a great deal of respect for the Cadillac brand. The Caddies of the 50s & 60s were magnificent cars. Consider the '57 Sedan de Ville, for example, or the '64 Coupe de Ville. Beautiful cars. The '67 & '68 Eldorados are simply drop-dead gorgeous. So I'm no Cadillac basher. But after '73, Cadillac lost its way.
If you were a Cadillac marketing manager & you had to develop an ad campaign that tied the new CTS to the one of the great Cadillacs of the past, which car would you pick? A timeless beauty from the 50s or 60s or one of the rolling bathtubs from the 80s?