BuickEnclave

Five Non-Luxe Car Brands Hoping To Graduate To Luxe Status

In the early and mid 1990s, the line dividing luxury cars from non-luxury was simple: $30,000. Today, most people would say it was $40,000, but they would get an argument.

After all, when a loaded Chrysler Town and Country or Honda Odyssey minivan crests $40K, can we really use that pricing standard? A luxury minivan?

Then, there is the discussion about brands. BMW is a luxury brand. Volkswagen and Hyundai aren't. Right? Not so fast. A Volkswagen Touareg SUV starts at $44,000 and climbs North with options to above $60K for the Hybrid version. Hyundai's new Equus sedan starts at $58,000.

Here are five brands seeking credibility with luxury car buyers and the products they are reaching with:

Chrysler: As Italian automaker Fiat restructures the Chrysler brands it has acquired after the U.S. automaker went through bankruptcy in 2009, it is hoping to position Chrysler as a kind of "value luxury brand." The Chrysler 300 sedan is the linchpin in the effort. While the base model starts below $28,000, the two other trim levels, Limited and 300C, easily reach between $44K and $48K when the technology, safety and luxury option packages are checked. "The 300 is for the successful person who doesn't forget whey they came from," is the way Chrysler brand CEO Olivier Francois puts it.

The new 300 is the second generation design of the car that captured the attention of the hip-hop community when it first came out in 2004. Snoop Dog and Jay Z were among those who praised the "gangsta" design of the car. That has been toned down in the new design in part to try and reach a broader audience--let's say, more the Black Eyed Peas and Linkin Park crowd than P Diddy and Cee Lo Green.

Tags: buick lacrosse, BuickEnclave, Chrysler 300, hyundai equus, Hyundai Genesis, Jeep Grand Cherokee, Jeep Overland, luxury cars, Volkswagen Touareg

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Report: General Motors No Longer Provides Tiger Woods With Free Cars

by Jeremy Korzeniewski (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Cars & Autos, Sports, Crimes and Misdemeanors

According to a report from USA Today (via San Francisco Chronicle), Tiger Woods no longer gets free cars from General Motors. No worries, we're pretty sure Tiger can afford to pay for his own ride anyway.

The news, attributed to Buick spokesperson Dayna Hart, comes as a number of companies like Tag Heuer and Accenture have canceled advertising contracts with the star golfer. GM, though, indicates that the free car agreement was scheduled to end on December 31st and therefore isn't necessarily a result of Woods' November 27th accident outside his Florida home.

Woods hasn't been a spokesperson for GM since the golfer's contract ended in 2008, but the automaker had reportedly agreed to let Woods keep his Buick and Cadillac vehicles for an additional year. As reported on our sister site Autoblog.com, the 2009 Cadillac Escalade Woods was driving (see above) will be repaired and sold.

[Source: USA Today via San Francisco Chronicle]

Source

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