The following is a letter that I wrote and was published in BusinessWeek magazine.
BOOMERS WHO DO AND DON’T BUY DETROIT CARS
Your cover story on the American auto industry’s troubles attracting younger customers was an accurate portrayal of my generation’s total disdain for anything emanating from the Motor City (“Can Detroit make cars that baby boomers like?” Dec. 1).
As a Camelot baby boomer, I paid attention to Detroit throughout the 1960s and 1970s. The muscle-car years, perhaps Detroit’s last golden age, created a huge customer base when the boomers graduated from living room Hot Wheels tracks to real asphalt. We all matured into young adulthood driving used Chevys, Fords, and Dodges, which seemed to run forever.
Like many of my peers, I chose a Chevy (the new Cavalier) right off the showroom floor as my first new car. The original Cavaliers were the worst excuse for an auto since the Corvair-Pinto-Vega era.
My 1980s Chevy never saw the 1990s. I just purchased my second Honda, and I still drive my 1986 Subaru (with over 129,000 miles and counting). Good luck, Detroit.
Rich Teplitsky
New Hampshire
This letter was published in the December 22, 1997 edition of BusinessWeek, and I wrote it in response to a cover story BW had run earlier that month. Since the Internet as we now know it was in its infancy, I never suspected this letter would be anywhere 12 years later except in a musty scrapbook. But this whole exercise in reposting it seems really poignant given 1) the current troubles and uncertain future of the U.S. domestic auto industry, and 2) why many companies still haven’t learned their lesson about listening to their customers.
It used to be easy for companies to ignore customer complaint letters and heated phone calls from a few thousand irate and unhappy owners in the pre-Internet days. After all, that was just the price of doing business. Lemon laws helped, and domestic auto quality did begin to improve. But Detroit got drunk on the fat margins of SUVs and trucks and turned their back on those of us who wanted reliable, affordable and economical transportation.
The letter seems just as relevant, if not more so, today as when I wrote it back in ‘97. For this wasn’t the only letter I wrote about my disastrous experience with General Motors and my new Cavalier. All I wanted was a quality, reliable car that GM would stand behind. They never answered my letters about the numerous issues with my brand new Cavalier. But, surprisingly, GM did take notice of my BusinessWeek letter, tracked me down, and sent me a crack PR form letter inviting me to my local GM showroom to see how much better their cars were in 1997 compared to 1985.
Now the irony of all ironies is that the iconic Pontiac brand is dead for the time being, and the only cars that seem to generate some degree of excitement from Detroit are the “reboot and retro” muscle cars I lell in love with as a kid such as the Camaro, Charger and Mustang. They are all fun, interesting and good for company image, but when was the last time Detroit actually listened to its customers to find out what we really want to drive? With the world’s largest free opinion survey open to them – the Internet – perhaps Detroit will have one last chance to get it right. And maybe – just maybe – I’d consider test driving the Chevy Volt if GM ever builds it.
