All right, which of you guys spent your hard-earned Dollars on a new Dart?
It’s the beginning of October, and you know what that means! Or, if you don’t, this is when we’re getting all the juicy numbers from automakers as they release their third-quarter sales reports. And most of the numbers…well, frankly aren’t that interesting. So, Toyota sold tens of thousands of RAV4s. Ford sold 207,732 F-Series trucks! Yeah, who cares? But when someone buys a brand-spanking new Dodge Journey…I and so many of my fellows in the industry just have to take a second and ask: “What exactly led you to do that?”
And so it goes, because this past quarter six of you — yes, half a dozen — somehow bought brand-spanking-new Dodge Dart sedans. Remember that? The Dart? That went out of production way back in 2016 (which feels like a freaking eternity ago)? Anyone? Bueller?
In fact, Dodge and its sibling brands under FCA/Stellantis keep churning up so-called “zombie cars”, when we keep seeing people getting their hands on shiny Caravans or Fiat 124 Spiders or…wait, two of you bought new 500Ls? Seriously!? Oh, and circling back around to the Dodge Journey, 13 folks out there managed to snag one of those, half a decade after it went out of production.
I get the person who managed to snag a new-old-stock Viper. That’s one thing (it’s cool!), but the Dart…it’s just a little compact sedan. Actually, some people out there are probably all too keen to give it tons of crap, but in fairness the car did its job. It, like the related Chrysler 200, offers up a small, front-wheel drive car at an affordable price. Dodge tried to give it a little pizzazz, too, offering it with some sporty trim and a manual transmission — something TFL’s own Andre Smirnov strongly preferred. The company sold more than 330,000 over the car’s five-year lifespan, so demand was pretty decent at the time.
But the world has moved on quite a bit in the past decade. Small sedans have fallen out of favor (particularly among the Big Three), and the Dodge Dart has been consigned to the history books…or so we thought. Apparently it’s another example of a Chrysler-conceived car that just won’t die, because you guys keep finding them hiding on a back lot somewhere. Apparently you didn’t take Tommy’s advice.
Oh well — I hope you six got a killer deal for your new, nine-year-old car!
