To keep this on topic (sorry for the long post) what do I really dislike about the hhR SS? The fact that it's not going any further.

I'm not in the car business I'm in advertising and I know you can build a brand if you do three things. Make an excellent product , hit the right price point and inform people about it. It's really that simple.

People have short memories, but GAP use to sell hippy jeans, Banana Republic sold Indiana Jones clothes out of tents and Target was a cheap imitation of K-mart. They all changed perception and sales because they improved their product line and informed people. They also hit the right price.

Now speaking of Retro the BMW Mini sells 200,000 cars a year world wide, but offers many variants and does an excellent job of building a unique brand name. You can customize your mini any way you want, straight from the factory and btw performance does sell, as 20% of Mini sales and Cooper S.

The HHR may not "today" have the cache of a mini, but if done right it could. Look at the numbers.

Retro or not the HHR outsold the Mustang for the last three years.

The HHRs best sales numbers at 100,000 units was only 45,000 shy of the PT Cruiser's best year and the PT cruiser had the upper hand as it was the ground breaking retro car.

In 2010 the HHR in North America sold nearly twice what the VW new beetle sold worldwide.

All the the last three years the HHR's advertising was virtually nill, the HHR SS has never had a real advertising campaign. Compared to the Mustang that is reviewed in every U.S. car magazine what seems like every month, has a huge ad buy on television and is in print every time you turn a page (or a website).

But obviously GM doesn't want to sell 100,000 cars a brand that want to sell 300,000 and if you go on their website and scroll down the menu to cars, it's obvious that chevrolet doesn't sell performance or interesting cars (except the corvette and camaro) chevy sells appliances.

Since they became government motors they have killed of 4 of the SS brands.

That's fine, that's GM's business to do what they want (well I guess some government guys have an opinion), but it probably would be smart if GM looked back at the last time they cut off all their performance cars (from the first oil crisis).

That decision gave Honda, Toyota and Nissan a lot of business and turned GM into a truck company.

Now Chevy is probably running off sales to Hyundai and Mazda.

I still think a modern refresh of an HHR would sell and sell well, at least better than the VW beetle. Jeez, GM is staring down the face of 35mpg corporate fuel average and the HHR SS and Cobalt SS were the only two performance cars that GM sold that got good gas mileage, so they killed it to build more appliances.

But I'll never believe that a talented design team and a little more investment could not make the HHR modern and fast and salable in most of the world. I personally believe that GM should get back to it's heritage. Sure they must be modern, they have to offer modern connivence and good fuel economy, but the HHR SS was well on it's way to doing that.

Name me another fast wagon that sells in the U.S. in any numbers?

The only other fast wagon is the Cadillac V and it only has 2 cubic feet more cargo space with the seats up and with the seats down has less than the HHR. The V is a better car than the HHR SS but it's also three and a half times the price.

It's funny that when I bought my HHR SS I thought it was polarizing, maybe almost ugly, but the more I drive it, the more I see it compared to other cars the better it looks.

I've said it before in German car crazy Los Angeles the HHR SS draws huge attention, or none, never anything in between. The Valet parks it in front or behind the building. It's that polarizing. When it's in front of a restaurant, It's pretty strange to see a little $20,000 car parked next to BMW 6 series and Audi R9's.

IMO

 

I hate that it is FWD. If it was RWD I could even forgive the hard to read speedo. The car has served me well and is comfortable so those "hates" are truly minor. I also hate that I bought the car to carry my elderly parents in and that they both get car sick riding in it. It's the only car either of them has ever had that problem in. Odd.

 

i have the same problem! its such a pain in the elbow! :P

 

I have a 2010 HHR SS and I think my only complaint so far (only had it 2 weeks) is the width of the seats. I end up using the arm rest on the passenger seat half the time while I"m driving. The seats are comfortable but they are not very wide. I'm not a huge guy either.

Maybe I just got too use to having tons of room from my Avalanche?

 

^^^ same here - strange to think the pass.armrest will wear out before the driver side will

 

The thing I hate the most, is they arn't gonna make 'em anymore!

 

thats not so bad moon...at least there wont be a bazillion of em' on the road and we can keep our little club exclusive

 

only complaint after owning for a month is no arm rest. what's up with that?

 

You can add it.


Dave

 

Mine is gonna die someday! sad. 2008 192,000miles strong. My last Toyota p/u gave up by 175,000.