Consumer Opinions About The Automobile Industry

Consumer opinions about the American Automobile Industry

I think we should start first with looking at the American Automobile Industry in general than look at the products they manufacture. The U.S. or American Automobile Industry is one of largest in the world, between 2008 and 2013 over 8 million passenger vehicles were manufactured by 13 different companies [1]. The automobile industry accounts for 3.5 % of the gross domestic product of the United States, at the end of 2012 the industry employed more than 786,000 people. Practically every major automobile manufacturer in the world now produces car in the US, in addition to manufacturing they have testing facilities, research and development and several have transmission manufacturing

Powers Award [2] this award has as several different categories. The biggest is the Vehicle Dependability study [3], this study is conducted on cars over a 3yr period and records problems in 177 different areas, as reported by the vehicle owners, the study I referenced is from 2012 to 2015. The numerical break down is ranked on a per 100 cars basis.

It is important to note in the results 8 of the top 10 are cars which are produced in the U.S, 4 of the top 10 are American companies, General Motors has three brands with Chevrolet, Buick and Cadillac, Ford is represented with Lincoln.

This was a big step for the American Automobile manufactures considering back in 2009 both General Motors and Chrysler Corporation were in bankruptcy and without the help of the federal government and bailouts to the tune of 80 billion dollars [4] it is unclear where they would be today, if around at all.

Manufactures heeded the message consumers were sending them and started with redesigning many of the models in production and introducing technology which many of their foreign counterparts already had. They had no choice but to improve the product and win back the American

Today most cars have Bluetooth capability, it is offered as additional cost item in most cases, Apple has jumped onboard and created a dashboard in some make that has the familiarity of your IPhone, the thought is this will be less distracting to the driver. Manufactures are moving towards a car that will have voice recognition meaning you will never have to take your eyes off the road.

People typically do not buy a car just to have one, consumers are hanging on to older models before taking the leap into a new vehicle. The automobile industry sales are on the uptick and have been for the last 2 or 3 years’ performers better and are holding their values a little longer. Lower interest rates have helped the industry as well.

It is tough to find any hard data on Consumer Opinion regarding the Automobile Industry, most of the success is based on the number of units sold. The amount of units sold is based on discretionary spending or consumer sentiment, in an article by Marketrealist.com [7] consumer sentiment has been holding steady and the automobile industry is reaping the rewards, this article was based on the 4th quarter of 2015. I think it is safe to assume the consumer must have a good opinion of the auto industry in America based on the amount of American made vehicles they are