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Ah, minivans. So cutting-edge. So versatile. So '80s, in the minds of many people--enough people to make sales of minivans drop in recent years, and those sales drops have caused automakers such as Ford and GM to retool their model lineups, substituting crossover vehicles in favor of minivans.
But not Chrysler.
According to the Boston Globe, The "point-five" in Detroit's "2.5" is sticking to its guns by unveiling new 2008 versions of its best-selling minivans, the Chrysler Town & Country (pictured) and the Dodge Caravan. And it's hoping that buyers sit up and take notice of the reskinned people-movers.
A leading analyst, Erich Merkle of IRN Inc. in Grand Rapids, Mich., observes that the new minivans show "a more hard-edge, upright, industrial design than the current jellybean look. . . . Chrysler is taking some risk here. They're taking their number-one-selling product and they're laying it on the line. That shows some machismo when you can take your number one product and turn it upside down. I think it will hit a home run.
Chrysler has to hit that ball out of the ballpark, because minivans--a product category that Chrysler invented way back in 1984--are so central to its lifeblood. Minivans are to Chrysler what the F-150 pickup is to Ford: its biggest-selling vehicle, representing 20 percent of its yearly sales.
Although its competitors have claimed to have seen the writing on the wall vis-?-vis declining minivan sales, and have introduced new CUV models, Chrysler thinks that its customers will continue to stick with the traditional minivan, but in versions that will pique the public's interest in new features, such as more directed lighting, door pockets, and built-in rear-window adjustable sunshades.
So although the competitors will try to shift buyers to CUVs such as the Ford Edge or the Saturn Outlook, some buyers will remain wedded to the big box with sliding doors on wheels.
Ford Aerostar owner Ernest Bukovitz, 44, of Monroe, Mich., said he'd consider something other than a minivan, but it would be a hard switch.
"I love my minivan," Ernest Bukovitz, a Ford Aerostar owner, enthused. "I like the two sliding doors they have now, all the cup holders, and the climate control in back. And when I take those benches out, I can haul things in my minivan that you can't even haul in a pickup." (Bukovitz hauls both children and building materials in his minivan.)
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