Markham Lee_

Chrysler's Rebadging Plan: Strategic Blunder for Nissan?

Note the use of the word "potentially" in the opening sentence, I was writing this from the perspective of rumor or no it's just a bad idea period.

Also if you check my blog you'll see that SA aggregated multiple articles into one, so the messaging makes more sense on my blog.

I agree with the commentators who noted that margin wise the deal makes little sense as well.

Overall I just have little faith in this when these partnerships (in the past) have produced cars that were hits for the original manufacturer and flops for the company selling the rebadge.

When I was finishing college a coveted car was a '98/'99 Mitsubishi Eclipse, especially the Spyder version - even if they were still available, trust me, no one wanted a Plymouth Laser (or a Plymouth period). The reason for this is the weakness of the Chrysler brand, you can't successfully sell a rebadge when the consumer isn't especially fond of the "badge" in the first place.

As always thanks for reading, I always enjoy it when my articles stimulate conversation.


-M

Chrysler's Rebadging Plan: Strategic Blunder for Nissan?

SA writes the titles for the articles, not me.......

Rebadging has been a failure in the past and I doubt that will change in the future, because many consumers DO care who made the car and why bother with the rebadge when you can get the original? Especially when the original will have higher resale value? Besides most people research cars online and will be able to easily find out that Nissan made the car, which will likely push them to just buy the Nissan version.

If consumers didn't care who made their cars and just bought based on price, Detroit wouldn't be in trouble right now.

Chrysler's brands aren't worth much so it doesn't make much sense for Nissan (or anyone else to buy them), there is little point in putting a brand on your car that will cause people to think less of it.

-M