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Going over a pretty big lineup of cars, from the days when Chrysler actually sold more than minivans, Dodge had a big variety, and Fiat and Alfa were dying in the marketplace (okay, some things don’t change!)...
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0:00
Hi, I'm Dave and I'm here to take you
0:02
through 2016.
0:04
That is well after Fiat took over
0:06
Chrysler after Daimler let go of it.
0:10
Cberus had a spin and Chrysler was gone
0:12
for a while. Sergio had had his chance
0:16
to make a mark on the company. He had
0:18
invested a lot into the factories and
0:20
there was all sorts of new product out.
0:22
So, we're looking now at the Chrysler
0:24
200 and this was a replacement for the
0:27
original Chrysler 200.
0:30
What we're seeing here is a 200C, which
0:32
is the topmost model, standard V6,
0:35
N-speed automatic, and a very pleasant
0:38
car. The one problem was access to the
0:41
rear seats, was a little constrained by
0:44
that sloping roof line that you can see
0:45
in some of these action-packed shots
0:48
provided by Chrysler back in 2016. Well,
0:51
probably back in late 2015. So, a lot of
0:55
people really like the 200. It turned
0:57
out to be pretty reliable overall. There
0:59
aren't any major problems that I know
1:01
about. The four cylinders could leak oil
1:04
in some years, and that was fixed mostly
1:06
through software by adjusting uh the
1:09
overlap in the valve timing. How popular
1:12
were they, you might ask? And I can take
1:14
a look in 2015 when the 200 was brand
1:17
new and just revealed, they sold 167,000
1:22
of them in the United States. In 2016,
1:25
that number plummeted to 57,000.
1:28
So, something was going on besides
1:30
critics getting all pissy over the rear
1:32
seat access. And just so that you're
1:35
aware, overall sales for uh FCAUS, as it
1:39
was then called, Fiat Chrysler
1:41
Automobiles US, actually it's still
1:44
called that under Stalantis, which is a
1:46
little weird, but I guess saves on
1:48
business cards. The sales in 2015
1:52
were 2.25 million. The sales in 2016
1:56
were 2.24 million. So the thing was that
2:00
cars plummeted. Uh they went down by
2:02
17%. Whereas SUVs and crossovers went up
2:07
by 5% and trucks and vans went up by
2:09
11%. So the 200C was there and the 200S
2:13
was there. The 200S was the sporty
2:15
version of the 200 family. So 200 C,
2:19
200S, and basic 200 all included in
2:23
those sales figures. So let's move on to
2:26
the 300C.
2:28
This was the first year for the newly
2:29
redesigned 300 and 300C and 300S, all
2:33
described as 300 in the sales figures.
2:36
In 2015, the 300 had 53,000 sales. 2016,
2:41
now we're in the second year, 53,000
2:44
sales. So sales did not go up or down in
2:48
the second year, but clearly the bloom
2:50
was off the 300 family and uh part of
2:53
that might have been that the Charger
2:55
was getting an awful lot of attention at
2:57
this point. So if I look at Charger
2:59
sales, nope, they were the same too and
3:00
so were Challenger. So uh the three of
3:03
them just continued along. Uh, I
3:06
remember my impression of the 300 family
3:09
when it went into 2015 was that uh, the
3:13
styling in the back looked a little
3:15
cheaper and the front looked a little
3:18
planer and overall it wasn't really a
3:21
major package to get excited about. The
3:23
Telmatics were supposedly improved, but
3:26
in reality they were far far far slower
3:28
and buggier. So, I still remember taking
3:31
a trip out to Pennsylvania, and it's
3:33
about a two-hour trip, and about halfway
3:35
along, uh, the radio started to have a
3:38
time lag between when I turned the
3:40
volume up or down or change stations.
3:42
And that time lag got longer and longer
3:44
until by the time that we reached the
3:47
end of the trip, it was about 3 or 4
3:49
minutes when between pressing the off
3:51
button and having it actually shut off.
3:53
So, some software glitches, they were
3:56
addressed through updates, but overall
3:58
not an improvement over the 2013 2014
4:01
series, and that might be why sales were
4:03
basically stable, not moving up.
4:07
And again, 300 was the base model 300C.
4:10
They added the V8. Uh they did an
4:13
experiment in 2013. I don't remember how
4:16
long it lasted where the 300C had a V6
4:18
because the V6 with the 8-speed
4:21
accelerated about as quickly 0 to 60 as
4:24
the original Chrysler 300C with the Hemi
4:28
and the 5-speed. It was really amazing
4:31
what the 292 horsepower Pentastar engine
4:34
and that 8-speed automatic did together,
4:37
including getting 31 MPG highway as
4:40
rated in 2013. In 2015's carried
4:43
forward, all the powertrains pretty much
4:45
as they had been. So, nothing too
4:48
exciting there. Now, next up, we have
4:50
the Chrysler Pacifica, the minivan. And
4:53
that's still the Chrysler Pacifica that
4:55
we have now, absent some small changes
4:58
to the front. Uh actually it's a
5:00
Chrysler Voyager that we have now which
5:03
also didn't get the changes to the front
5:05
and uh not a whole lot to say about it.
5:08
It came out and it was years before they
5:10
actually did the hybrid that was
5:12
originally supposed to show up and that
5:15
was I was told because they were having
5:18
some problems the original design that
5:20
they eventually addressed and it's
5:22
better to address the problems and move
5:24
on than to release something that's
5:25
broken when it first shows up. So, a lot
5:28
of people were very impressed with the
5:30
Pacifica, which had standard uh sound
5:33
dending, active sound dending, which was
5:35
very clever. Used the stereo speakers.
5:38
So, a lot of people liked the Pacifica,
5:40
and 2016 was the first year. So, it's
5:42
not too surprising that the sales were
5:44
62,000 because it was a midyear launch,
5:47
so it didn't have a full selling year.
5:49
Uh, it was very sophisticated. It had a
5:52
very nice suspension. It was very quiet
5:54
inside with active sound deadening and
5:56
it beat the town and country at least.
5:58
The town and country had been 97,000
6:00
sales the year before 2016 59,000 but
6:04
again it was only made for part of the
6:05
year so it doesn't really count. Now
6:08
that brings us up to the more exciting
6:09
world of Dodge. And Dodge at that point
6:12
had the Dart. Uh the Avenger was dead
6:16
for two years. So they only sold 45 of
6:18
them in 2016. So there's no point really
6:19
talking about them.
6:21
uh the Charger, the Challenger, the
6:23
Viper, the Journey, the Caravan, and the
6:25
Durango. And the ones that are still
6:28
around today are the Charger, which has
6:30
been completely redesigned, and the
6:32
Durango,
6:34
which means that the line was pretty
6:36
much decimated. Of course, 2016 was also
6:38
the last year for the Dart because uh
6:41
Sergio decided it wasn't selling well,
6:43
wasn't profitable, was too unreliable.
6:45
So took away its factory, took away the
6:48
200 factory and basically killed both of
6:51
them. But believe it or not, they
6:54
already had the Hellcat in 2016, which
6:56
was terribly exciting. 700 horsepower
6:58
from a production engine is crazy,
7:01
especially when you consider that the
7:03
next step before that was just 485
7:05
horsepower and that it beat the Viper in
7:08
uh horsepower. So uh wow. So, Challenger
7:12
sales actually went down ever so
7:14
slightly from 66,000 to 64,000,
7:18
but I suspect that people spent more on
7:20
each one and it was more profitable,
7:22
especially with the Hellcat cell.
7:25
So, that's really pretty amazing. The
7:26
Challenger was a very nice package.
7:28
Again, uh I believe
7:31
my memory says it was redesigned for
7:33
2015. I could be wrong about that. They
7:36
kept the looks, which was important. It
7:38
It's still a beautiful car. It's really
7:41
kind of a shame that they decided not to
7:43
continue them, but 64,000 sales that
7:46
beat the 300.
7:48
Then there was also the Charger and
7:50
those sales again about the same. It uh
7:52
the Challenger dropped by 3%, Charger by
7:54
1%. That's pretty much random
7:56
fluctuation there. Uh the Charger went
8:00
from 96,600
8:01
sales in 2015 to 95437
8:05
in 2016. Not a big drop. and the Charger
8:09
also. Uh you still had the V6 in both of
8:12
them and then you went up to the 5.7
8:15
Hemi in all three of them. And then you
8:18
went up with the 6.4 Hemi and the
8:20
Charger and Challenger and 485
8:23
horsepower, which is nothing to sneeze
8:25
at in the Challenger and Charger. And
8:27
finally, the Hellcat with its 707
8:30
horsepower. Uh the new Viper was almost
8:33
certainly a disappointment. Only 690
8:35
sold in 2015, only 630 sold in 2016.
8:40
Uh, the redesigned Viper was a lot more
8:43
controllable and a lot more comfortable
8:45
than past Vipers. They basically raised
8:48
the price, but they raised the
8:51
accommodations quite a bit. Now, what I
8:54
can't show you in in this video is the
8:56
Dodge Journey. And, uh, we forget about
8:59
the Dodge Journey. Now, it was kind of a
9:02
cheap uh derivative then of the Dodge
9:05
Avenger, which means it came off the
9:07
Mitsubishi Galant uh base, and
9:10
originally those were not as well done
9:14
as they could be. And even before they
9:16
were released, people at Chrysler
9:17
realized that and they said, "Okay,
9:20
let's do a serious redesign of all these
9:22
cars." And so you ended up in the
9:25
mid2010s
9:26
after Fiat took over
9:29
that those changes which were initiated
9:31
under Daimler Chrysler ironically and
9:34
kept going through Cberus came out under
9:36
Fiat and they affected the uh Dodge
9:39
Avenger the Chrysler Sebring and the
9:42
Dodge Journey but they had a hard time
9:45
convincing auto riders that they had
9:46
done anything at all. So here we have
9:48
the journey 108,000 in 2015 drops 1% to
9:52
106,760
9:54
or so in 2016 in US sales. So it's
9:58
pretty much stable again from year to
10:00
year. Base model 4-cylinder then a V6
10:04
but just to 80,000 which was
10:06
disappointing because the journey by now
10:08
was really a very worthwhile vehicle. Uh
10:11
then there was the caravan the old
10:13
minivans that Chrysler was still making
10:15
and would continue to make. And believe
10:17
it or not, with the Pacifica now in,
10:20
customers flocked to caravans partly
10:22
because of great pricing. So sales went
10:25
from 101,000 the year before to 128,000
10:30
in 2016 in the US alone, which is pretty
10:34
amazing. Um, and finally, the Durango,
10:37
the one which continues to this day, uh,
10:41
mostly unchanged from 2016, in fact, uh,
10:45
went from 65,000 to 68,000.
10:48
Now, what about Jeep? What about Jeep?
10:51
Well, I don't have video for anything
10:52
but the Renegade, which is a little
10:54
bizarre. Uh, but they did have the
10:56
Renegade, and that the sales just shot
10:58
up in 2016 from about 61 to 107,000
11:02
sold, which is pretty darn good.
11:05
uh and would be quite good for the
11:07
Renegade generally speaking throughout
11:09
its life. That was a joint project with
11:12
the Fiat 500X mostly done in India and
11:16
after when it was about to be introduced
11:19
they looked at it and said back to the
11:21
drawing board and two years later we
11:23
actually got the production model. The
11:26
Compass and the Patriot the originals
11:28
were still out. Uh, and those were also
11:31
based on the basic Alant platform and
11:35
those did very well. The Compass just
11:37
shot up to 94,000 sales, but the Patriot
11:40
drowned out with 122,000 sales, about
11:43
the same as the year before.
11:46
So, it turned out that people liked
11:48
cheap four-cylinder Jeeps at that time
11:51
and but they liked real Jeeps even
11:54
better. So, the Wrangler did 192,000
11:57
sales. That's actually down quite a bit
11:58
from the year before. They had 22,000
12:01
sales in 2015,
12:05
but 192,000 Wrangler sales. That's
12:07
crazy. It's like be, you know, when AMC
12:10
was there and before AMC, Jeep would be
12:13
happy with 100,000 sales a year of
12:15
everything, including wagon ears,
12:17
Cherokees, blah blah blah,
12:19
you know. And here we're showing uh
12:23
almost 200,000 Wranglers alone. The
12:25
Cherokee 200,000. This was of course the
12:28
new KL Cherokee, not the old XJ, uh, as
12:32
you would imagine. And that was down a
12:33
bit from the year before when it had
12:35
221,000 sales. It's still, I think, more
12:38
than most people expected. Keeping in
12:41
mind that the Cherokee did hit kind of
12:43
the heart of the American crossover
12:45
market, but was also truly off-road
12:47
capable if you got the trail rated
12:49
version, and that actually could do the
12:51
Rubicon Trail and did do the Rubicon
12:53
Trail.
12:55
The Grand Cherokee was up by 8% to
12:57
212,000. So that was Jeep's best.
13:01
Finally, we end up with Ram and the Core
13:04
Ram did about half a million sales,
13:07
489,418.
13:10
That was up 9% from the year before.
13:13
Promasters were at 40,000 sales a year,
13:15
which is pretty darn good. And ProMaster
13:16
City at 16,000, which is about as good
13:19
as they ever got. Promaster City just
13:20
never caught on. Imported from Europe.
13:23
And then you have Alfa Romeo and Fiat.
13:26
If I'm looking here, Alfa Romeo did
13:27
about 500 sales. So, not a big
13:32
difference there. And Fiat had one of
13:34
their best years with
13:37
about 32,000 and change. Uh, just doing
13:42
some quick math in the back of my head.
13:44
And the 500, they sold 15,000 of them. I
13:46
bet they'd love to sell 15,500s this
13:49
year. And that's basically the 2016 uh
13:54
Fiat Chrysler or Chrysler Fiat lineup. I
13:58
hope that you like looking back at uh
14:00
it's only been about 10 years since
14:03
these were new. Uh I hope that you like
14:05
looking back at them. Take care.
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