December 19th, 2011 • by David Zatz
You’ve seen that headline before, and it’s nearly always attached to some trendy list that doesn’t make much sense to anyone who’s given the topic much thought.
I mean, really, how do you define “worst?” Is it in sales? Reliability? Failure to live up to their promise?
CNN Money apparently counts disappointing sales, since they put the new Fiat 500 onto their worst cars of 2011 list, citing the lack of 50,000 sales in 2011. Well, given that the 50,000 cars/year was presumably meant for full sales years, and the Fiat 500 wasn’t even launched until the year was more than half over, and the first 100 dealerships weren’t even open in October, … who’s really surprised?
And is it really the car’s fault if it’s not selling well?
Let’s look at some other cars that bombed in the marketplace. 1970 Dodge Challenger. 1970 Plymouth Barracuda — heck, any Plymouth Barracuda was a sales disappointment. 1967 Dodge Charger. Plymouth Superbird. Dodge Charger Daytona. Any car with a Hemi.
What are those cars worth today? Have any of them made it onto a “ten worst cars” list since 1970? (I doubt they had such lists in 1970, but I’m not sure.)
So … the real top ten worst cars of 2011. I’m not able to give you that list. I don’t know all about what was sold in Europe and Asia, and I’d imagine some of them would qualify. I’d be tempted to assign uglymobiles such as the Nissan Rogue to the list but that would be unfairly imposing my taste on you.
The worst cars of all time, that’s easier. There’s one of the most popular, the Ford Model T, because of all the people killed in them — because Henry Ford would not update any of the safety features over time. The early Model T might not deserve to be on the list but the late ones sure do; by then everyone else had upgraded. Just being simple and cheap is not always enough.
The 1957 Chrysler, Plymouth, Dodge, Imperial, and DeSoto lines certainly qualify in terms of owner disappointment, quality, and destruction of the brands they came with. The premature rustout and myriads of problems owners had with these cars probably did more to destroy Chrysler Corporation long-term than anything else since the Airflow apparently traumatized the company’s leaders.
Edsel is usually on the list but it was basically a good car, just a sales disaster.
1976 Volare/Aspen deserves to be there for the same reason as the 1957 Chrysler Corporation lines. Amusingly had Chrysler kept the Valiant and Dart names, many writers think they could have kept going without the same problems, because Valiant and Dart had built up so much goodwill. That said, the Valiant and Dart type of car only had a few more years of life — okay, 13 years — but only a few of those with high sales. Then the K-cars came, and most customers took one look at the well-made (yes) K-cars, with more responsive powertrains than the choked sixes of the Volares, similarly sized interiors and trunks, and double the gas mileage, and gave up their old rear wheel drive dinosaurs. I think if Chrysler had still be run by Walter P. Chrysler in the 1960s, we’d have had the K-cars in the mid-1970s (based on what they’d learned from SIMCA), but that’s just me.
On a personal note, I’d be tempted to put in the 1976 Camaro for the same reason as the 1957 Chryslers. A great looking car, fun to drive, comfortable, quiet, and terribly engineered and built.
I could go on until I reached ten cars, but if I really wanted to ape the shiny flash media guys, I’d have done one car per page, with big photos, and no real reasons for my choices. So instead I’ll leave it here for you to finish.
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