Call it a case of really bad timing.
Kia Motors has just released its first V8 powered full size SUV, the Borrego, to a U.S. marketplace. So what happened to the small, fuel-efficient cars that Kia once specialized in? Apparently after the release of the Borrego, Hyundai's partner in crime plans to head back to its more economical roots.
Currently Kia has been hyping its fuel-efficient Spectra sedan with an ad campaign that implies drivers of the subcompact so rarely have to fill up for gas that they forget which side of the car the gas fill cap is located on. Speaking from experience, many of us here at Automotive.com have that same problem with our own cars, gas guzzlers or not.
Perhaps that is merely a side effect of some sort of early onset Alzheimer’s, but we digress.
One fuel-efficient vehicle that Kia has had a great deal of success with is the Europe-only Cee’d. Yes, that is actually the unfortunate title of what is actually a class-leading economy car. In addition to the usual Hyundai-Kia four cylinder petrol engines, there is also the option of a 50mpg+ turbodiesel. It is just as good as the best competitors from the likes of Peugeot, Renault, and Honda according to the automotive press in Europe.
While we wait, Kia has just released the stylishly Scion XB -like Soul subcompact. Soul?
Cee’d? What the heck Kia? Has someone at the corporate offices been dipping too heavily into the special purple Kool Aid? We haven’t heard of such bad monikers for cars since the bad old days at GM in the 1980’s. Personally, we could never think of the Cadillac Cimarron without imagining it as really being the Cadillac Cinnamon. Hmmm. Cinnamon.
Just to plant a, ahem, seed of thought into the corporate consciousness at Kia Motors, we think that the U.S. market is crying out for a fuel efficient car like the Cee’d. Just, hopefully, without the dreadful nomenclature. With sales of gas sippers like the Civic steamrollering previous giants like the Ford F-series, the timing couldn’t be better.