Many SUV Buyers Will Trade Size for Fuel Economy But Still Want Luxury
A sizeable chunk of the SUV crowd still wants SUVs but is willing to downsize from large and luxury models to midsize utes - as long as the automakers continue to load them up with all mod cons.
SUV owners moving down in size (blue bars) are far more interested that others in keeping deluxe equipment, according to study by AutoPacific. Click on chart to enlarge.
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That's the word from AutoPacific, a global automotive market research and consulting firm headquartered in Southern California.
The company's research underscores the difficult choices - and technological challenges - the auto industry faces these days: we want vehicles with better fuel economy, which usually translates into smaller and lighter.
But a goodly percentage of us also want them to have power seats - front and rear -- backup cameras, power folding second- or third-row seats, power mirrors, power windows, power trunks and tailgates and more.
All those options require lots of electric motors, extra wiring and heftier components that can withstand constant adjusting - all stuff that adds weight, which, as we know, reduces fuel economy.
So what's a poor car company to do?
The numbers, according to AutoPacific, don't give the industry a choice: 17 percent of large and luxury SUV owners have moved down to midsized sport utility and crossover utility vehicles this year.
Most moved for fuel economy reasons - AutoPacific's researchers say fuel prices were cited as "a problem' by 61 percent of the move-down buyers. But most also say they don't want to give up features they enjoyed in their larger vehicles.
With every sale a critical sale theses days, telling thousands of SUV loyalists who are looking for smaller, more fuel efficient and better-equipped vehicles to look elsewhere isn't an option most car makers can afford.
The ability to cope with market conditions like this that determines the survivors.
Car companies that can step up to the plate with vehicles that satisfy our need for better efficiency without taking us back to the days of the Model T will be tomorrow's players. The rest? Memories.
- Posted by
- John O'Dell October 20, 2008, 3:01 AM
- Permalink
- Categories:
- Fuel Economy, Fuels & Technologies
- Technorati Tags:
- Fuel Economy, Smaller SUVs, SUV Buyers
I drove past a local gast station and saw it's 2.66/gal now! I wonder if SUV owners are still considering downsizing, and whether truck sales would start picking up.....
Blackadder...Right now, as you might expect, the overall economic slump is keeping people from looking at much of anything in the new car/truck arena, so we haven't seen an uptick in truck/suv consideration. I'd expect, if gas prices stay low into early next year, that as the economy starts to stabilize there might well be at least a slight uptick. But a lot of people have learned a lesson from the events of the past year and we expect that, overall, demand for fullsized trucks and SUVs is going to remain fairly soft compared to those segments' heydays.
$2.28 in Minneapolis now.