Re: Sunday Video : Clarkson's Car Years - How Japan Took Over the World and Then Lost
well, Japan vs Europe = 1 vs don't know how many. not really fair isn't it?
Why unfair? To you, or any consumer, I mean.
What do such facts matter? All consumers do is buy.
Japan doesn't need so many manufacturers. They each make a large enough range of cars, made in massive consumer numbers. They are replaced almost yearly, you can't keep up with what's new.
10 manufacturers? And what, one million different models?
There's a whole lot more in it for European cars; beginning with exclusivity and brand specialty.
They don't exactly care about mass manufacturing, the days of communism are over. (Japanese manufacturers stick to this agenda hence their sales are also dominating Europe, Asia is out of question)
Sure, they have their range of cars that are made in large numbers,
but they are not replaced every one or two years like in Japan.
They leave them as they are for longer. They are not exactly interested in rivaling the Japanese.
Japanese always wants to get above their European counterparts, when the latter actually does not even compare themselves to the Japanese.
Each of them (both the Europeans and the Japanese) have made iconic and somewhat legendary cars in their history. Today's perception of great European cars have come down from this.
Europeans; they prefer to manufacture
as they can make, and not
as much as people buy. The Japanese, as you know, does the latter.
Japan doesn't have luxury marques making small ranges of fine, hand-made automobiles in very limited numbers either. They're all about domination.
It comes down to
head or
heart for the average middle-class consumer.
A fail-free, ultra reliable, highly efficient and cheaper Japanese car, or
a reliable-but-expensive-when-things-go-wrong, car?
But on another note, the Europeans and the Japanese focus on cars of different categories, which is why the manufacturing numbers are totally different (and so are the pricing)
The world's best small cars/small sedans are Japanese, whereas all the cars in the middle/large exec, luxury, SUV, sportscar, supercar categories are all dominated by the Europeans.