30th Jan 2013, 16:38
Tell me... what is wrong with having a car that floats over the road with quietness and comfort? As far as GM being "plasticy", have you ever taken a good look at a Honda Element or a last generation Celica? Talk about plastic, those two cars represent Joan Rivers.
A few months ago I went on a road trip where a 2011 Camry was used, and the interior is full of plastic and cheap materials such as the headliner.
30th Jan 2013, 17:13
You think the "floaty" 90s GM cars were plasticky?? What do you think 99.9% of the Cruze's interior is crafted from? Steel?
And styling is definitely subjective, but I would not describe the Chevy Cruze as an attractive car at all, it is merely a bland looking compact car. Personally I would take any GM "floater" over one of these. Sadly, gas mileage would probably not be all that significantly different either.
30th Jan 2013, 11:39
The Chevy Cruze was a proven product; however, GM has really screwed up with Cadillac. They did good with reinvigorating their lower end brands, but just can't win over customers with their upper scale marques. The problem is that Cadillac is obviously trying to be like a European luxury sedan, it makes no effort to conceal that either. Kinda like saying "we know we suck, so we're just gonna copy the other guy's designs". Not a good marketing strategy.
The big cars from the 1980s and 1990s were hits (Lincoln Town Car, Buick Roadmaster, Mercury Grand Marquis, and Ford Crown Victoria). The Chevy Cavalier, Pontiac Grand Prix, Ford Taurus, and Ford Focus of the 1990s and early-2000s were hardly big, floaty luxury vehicles. They were midsize vehicles at the biggest, and they came from a time when Detroit was still trying to make a smaller car that could successfully compete with Toyota. Unfortunately crappy, cheap designs and shady quality control affected those mainstream vehicles.
The full-size vehicles that sold themselves well up to the early-2000s were destined to. They were the last of their kind, coming from a time in American history when we were on top. Nowadays we're afraid to be a great country again, because God forbid, it might offend somebody.