Sales stalling, Smart takes to the street
Just 61 inches high and 106 inches long, the two-seater Smart fortwo is not exactly a family car, or the sort of vehicle you’d use to travel across the country. Its diminutive dimensions are designed for the tight squeeze of city driving, and for potential buyers like David Carroll, who is definitely not diminutive, it’s hard to know whether they’ll fit inside comfortably.
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Of course any auto enthusiast reading this knows the only thing that will save them is $4.00 a gallon gas. With cars like the Volt coming out, I suspect they are in a downward spiral they can not pull out of.
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We have the answer for them:
Source: Sales stalling, Smart takes to the street
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“I thought I would look like Fred Flintstone in it,” said Carroll, after taking a first-hand look at a fortwo at a recent sales promotion event in Annapolis, Md. “But sitting inside one has really changed my mind.” This personifies the problem faced by smart USA, the U.S. distributor of the fortwo minicar. Many potential customers who thought the fortwo was a neat idea as a second city car when the vehicle was first splashed across the media a few years ago feared the car wouldn’t suit them in reality. Smart’s perception issue has plagued the company and weighed on sales. In 2009, Smart sales plummeted to 14,600 units from 24,600 the previous year. And so far in 2010 sales are off another 60 percent from 2009’s dismal rate. |
Of course any auto enthusiast reading this knows the only thing that will save them is $4.00 a gallon gas. With cars like the Volt coming out, I suspect they are in a downward spiral they can not pull out of.
Quote from the article:
Recognizing the need for Smart to start selling its cars rather than just taking orders from consumers, Smart has hired Jill Lajdziak, formerly general manager of GM’s Saturn division, to boost its marketing effort. With her new vice president of marketing, Kim McGill, Lajdziak has plotted a strategy of focused web and print advertising plus product placement in movies and TV shows. |
We have the answer for them:
Source: Sales stalling, Smart takes to the street
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