A
AALARD
Guest
PT Cruiser nears end of the line
AUBURN HILLS, Mich., (UPI) -- The PT Cruiser, now near the end of its production run, is a bit like the little Chrysler that could, an industry analyst said.
"It's plugged along and it still has a loyal fan base," Jim Hall, managing director of 2953 Analytics, told the Detroit Free Press Tuesday.
However, after sales bottomed out at 5,452 this year, Chrysler decided to the plug on the PT Cruiser, which first went on sale in 2000.
The last day of production for the small, retro-designed car is July 9.
About 1.3 million PT Cruisers have been sold, marking the car as both a darling among consumers and a missed opportunity for Chrysler, the newspaper said.
"For a while, it was the best-selling Chrysler-brand vehicle," Hall said.
But Chrysler failed to capitalize on the car's success, treating it more as a novelty item than a vehicle consumers could use to identify with Chrysler or see the company as a design-innovator, the newspaper said.
AUBURN HILLS, Mich., (UPI) -- The PT Cruiser, now near the end of its production run, is a bit like the little Chrysler that could, an industry analyst said.
"It's plugged along and it still has a loyal fan base," Jim Hall, managing director of 2953 Analytics, told the Detroit Free Press Tuesday.
However, after sales bottomed out at 5,452 this year, Chrysler decided to the plug on the PT Cruiser, which first went on sale in 2000.
The last day of production for the small, retro-designed car is July 9.
About 1.3 million PT Cruisers have been sold, marking the car as both a darling among consumers and a missed opportunity for Chrysler, the newspaper said.
"For a while, it was the best-selling Chrysler-brand vehicle," Hall said.
But Chrysler failed to capitalize on the car's success, treating it more as a novelty item than a vehicle consumers could use to identify with Chrysler or see the company as a design-innovator, the newspaper said.
