Dan Roth  0:03  
this is wheel bearings, I'm Dan Roth from Forbes.

Rebecca Lindland  0:07  
I'm Rebecca Lindland from Rebecca drives.

Sam Abuelsamid  0:09  
And I'm Sam Abuelsamid  from guidehouse insights. Alright,

Dan Roth  0:14  
we're gonna keep changing up the order so that everybody stays engaged and listens. I think that's the way we're going to grow our audience. Okay, who is it that let's get to what we're driving in Rebecca, you have spoken in such glowing terms about the BMW X three E, I want to know why you love it so much. Because the last time I was in an x three, it was kind of like

Rebecca Lindland  0:37  
well, it could be a little bit of because it was familiar and like putting on a favorite pair of old, you know, slippers. I had BMWs for 10 years. I had a mini first and then I had two x threes and an X five. And I will say that I, you know, there's things that I really, really loved about it and I think it just was it was very, very drama free, which I appreciate it. So one thing to note is that this was the the plug in electric. So it was the x three E drive the third the x drive 30. I think it's called x drive 30. He is with

Sam Abuelsamid  1:15  
his BMW a nomenclature is so ridiculous.

Rebecca Lindland  1:19  
It is it is ridiculous, only to be surpassed by Mercedes. So. So this one gets it has 60 up to 60 miles of electric range. And you're on unfortunately, I was only able to charge it on a low 110 to 110 volt, which then leads me to say that I really have to see about getting a high speed charger in my house. But anyway, so I think what I liked about it was that it just it was very familiar for me. The ergonomics inside was was easy to get to know, things were where I wanted them to be. So you know the wireless charging pad was right there which worked really well. The thing that did not work work so well was that stupid gestures thing like, I just end up doing that scene from When Harry Met Sally, what are you saying that you fit? You know, it just so i don't i don't see the value in the gesture and my favorite part was when it would remind me that it was their

Dan Roth  2:16  
gestures it Yes,

Rebecca Lindland  2:17  
yes. I would turn the volume up manually and it'd be like, Oh no, you can do that. No. So that so you know, it comes with the car unfortunately, because otherwise I would never pay for something like that.

Sam Abuelsamid  2:31  
Is it standard equipment?

Rebecca Lindland  2:33  
No, it's not I'm sorry. So it comes with part of a package you can would get like a heated steering wheel such as the executive package.

Dan Roth  2:40  
So you can disable all that stuff to I don't know, I'm pretty sure you can probably disable the the suggestions too, because the first time I had a BMW with the gestures, I was very skeptical as a guy. We don't need that and then I tried it on another one. And it's okay, okay, I get it. But every now and then you you'll stallions bold and it'll, it'll do something you didn't expect.

Rebecca Lindland  3:04  
Well, and that's the thing too is I just, I feel like it's, it's, it's a waste of, of investment in r&d. You know, it's one of those like, I just don't, I don't see what it really adds to the vehicle very much. There was other things I really liked about it. Certainly the acceleration with the E drive was very good. It seamlessly transitioned from using the when I when I ran out of my miles, which was, you know, pretty quickly, I seamlessly transition to the gas engine, I actually got almost 35 miles to the gallon. So let me so which was impressive, because I can tell you that my previous x rays got nowhere near that. And that was with a lot of stop and go traffic that was on the highway, it was definitely a combination. So from that standpoint, you're getting really really good fuel economy with very few compromises which I very much appreciated. I also really liked the navigation system and the heads up display was very, very useful. So there were things that were really really good about it. Like, I felt like it was that combination, as I said, of like, putting on an old pair of slippers that are super comfy and very cozy with some really new, very latest technology. You know, from an exterior standpoint, it's a pretty standard looking BMW, they haven't really pushed the envelope from a design standpoint. But that didn't bother me. Like, you know, I kind of liked being almost anonymous in you know, in a Gen X kind of way.

Sam Abuelsamid  4:42  
I'm certainly certainly you know, in Greenwich, Connecticut, you know, being an x three, you probably would be pretty anonymous.

Dan Roth  4:49  
Oh, yeah. I mean, yeah, x three and granted, she's almost like that's, that's the kids first car.

Rebecca Lindland  4:55  
If anything, I was like the oldest x three driver and the grant

Sam Abuelsamid  5:00  
You know, getting 35 miles per gallon, you know, is impressive, you know, especially if you can plug it in, you know, you know, I think it's just checking the EPA website, you know, it's 18 miles officially ready to 18 miles of electric range. You know, you can do a lot of your daily commuting without using any gas, you know, so and then once you go beyond that, yeah, 35 is pretty easy to do.

Rebecca Lindland  5:22  
Yeah, so I drove a total of 65 miles in Eevee range.

Sam Abuelsamid  5:26  
So in the course of a week,

Rebecca Lindland  5:28  
over the course of a week, I there was only a couple nights that I was able to charge it. The first night when I was at home, it actually didn't charge and and that was, you know, a court driver, operator error. I didn't realize that it wasn't charging. I thought it had I thought I had plugged it in properly. I was using an outside plug and apparently it didn't work.

Dan Roth  5:48  
This is one of the things that's that can be confusing though, with absolutely charging them I had that issue with I forget which which car it was, whether it was a PG V or an Eevee. But it was the same thing. thing of like, is this thing? This thing plugged in is this thing is charging. And it turned out I think it was the leaf. I had it on a an ungrounded plug right in your old house. So yeah, I had to switch plugs and then it was fine it the charger could sense that it had a grounded plug in off it went,

Rebecca Lindland  6:20  
right. But I did not realize that it wasn't charging, which, again, you know, we get these cars for a week. So as an owner, I think you would get to know what the different colors mean and stuff because then when I came out that morning, and it wasn't charged, but I do wish that it had kind of flashed a little bit of like that because I looked at the dash because the dash actually said that it was going to be like 14 hours to a full charge. So I'm under the impression that it's charging. And so you know, but then when I did

Sam Abuelsamid  6:50  
just put it in its starts the 14 hour timer.

Rebecca Lindland  6:57  
Right, exactly. So you And then when I actually did get a charge, I was I was taking care of my mom. So it's up at my sister's. But so I plugged it into my sister's garage and the blue little like a little blue light inside the the charging device on the car. That changed, it was white. When I wasn't charging, it was blue when I was charging, that was the only indication that I had successfully charged it because otherwise it looked the same, because like the the experience from the dashboard standpoint look the same. And it actually wasn't charging. So these are just things to get to know

Sam Abuelsamid  7:37  
to Yeah, to, you know, for somebody who's you know, an owner of one of these vehicles, I think one of the advantages you do have is, you know, almost all of these including the BMW, they have an associated app. So you can actually monitor your charging on that because these vehicles are connected so you can check and see you know, it Charging, you can also use it to schedule your charging, you know, if you have, if you do have a 240 volt charger in your garage, right, you can plug it in, but have it not actually start charging until later, you know when your time your your local utility goes to off peak rates, so you pay less. So, you know, that for for regular owner, you know, for us usually sometimes, you know, I know with some vehicles, I've been able to get, you know, the app working on my own phone, you know, create an account and get it connected to that car and be able to monitor stuff. A lot of times we can't because they'll have that vehicle connected to a corporate account. Yeah. Right. And so, you know, we can't use the apps. But yeah, that that's that's something that would help for an average user.

Dan Roth  8:46  
Yeah, right. I think you do a we, as reviewers miss out on a big part of the ownership experience because you can do quite a bit through the app. Even with with navigation in the way they want. their cars to feel like an extension of that that smartphone experience where it learns your route. And it tells you Hey, you know, checks traffic around the times you would commute and stuff. So it tries to be, you know, very helpful and integrate in your life with the app. And if you don't have it, you know, then we're, we're we're reporting about the car, and the driving and sort of the things that we've always talked about, but we're kind of blind to that other part of the ownership experience. It actually may be really important and really delightful. Yeah. To an owner. This is the the same power train that's in the the MINI Countryman. Electric, right?

Sam Abuelsamid  9:46  
No, no, because countrymen is a transverse drive train so that the cut the countryman uses, it's actually through the road hybrid. So the electric motors on the rear axle on hype on the countrymen and then the internal combustion engine powers the front wheels. So this is actually the same powertrain that they use in the three series five series and even the seven series and the MDX five so it's it's a rear drive setup and the the motor is packaged between the engine and the transmission input.

Dan Roth  10:20  
Okay How is it is it pretty smooth like when it when hands off and stuff.

Rebecca Lindland  10:25  
I felt like it was very very soon and I have to apologize I misspoke at the beginning. It's not 60 miles of range them as you said it's 20 miles of range. But I got I drove it for a little over 16 miles in Eevee range. And it was very smooth. It was it was a really smooth transition. I didn't really notice it at all. You know, I guess the question in some ways is, is it worth it to invest in the E drive I and and I don't know if it is You know, it's obviously you're paying a little bit more there are you it is eligible depending upon your state it is eligible for for federal tax credits and state state level tax credits, it's actually not that much more expensive. So the extra 530 I starts at 43. This one starts at 49. And the one that I tested was almost was just over 60,000, that includes destination. So, you know, I think it's to Sam's point earlier of you can do a lot of driving in Eevee mode, you can, which of course will save on gas and and, you know, stopping at the gas station and such. But it does mean that you are charging it basically every night because it has a pretty short range. So it's that balance between you know, is it worth it to you or not I am a topic we'll talk about in a little bit later on the Nissan call with the ARIA eyes said, you know, how do we I asked the question of how do we convince consumers that an Eevee is better than what they have currently. And the gentleman whose name it wasn't alfonzo was the other guy who I don't know. And he said, you know, well, you don't have to go to the gas station. I'm like, Yeah, and I don't want to be argumentative. I don't want to be an ass. But, you know, I was like, Yeah, but dragging that cord through the snow every night, you know, or through the mud and the rain at home is not attractive, either. Like yesterday, I got gas in New Jersey, and I didn't even have to get out of my car in New Jersey. Ray, exactly, but you know what I mean? Like, I'm like, it's not a big deal to spend five minutes at the gas station. It is a big deal. And I've experienced this because I don't have I don't pull into a garage at night. I have experienced this, you know, slogging through the snow and the rain and it's gross and you know, so I think that you know this pH GB it's it's a nice you know, it's a nice to have and again for tax credits maybe if you're getting a you know if when if and when we all start to commute again maybe there's benefits to HIV lane access and special parking and things like that, but I can't say that I would tell our listeners you have to get this PHP. I will say that if this is the size vehicle, this five seat you know, kind of your compact SUV, if that's the size vehicle that you're looking for, I really did enjoy this vehicle. And by contrast, I'm actually actively right now driving the Mercedes GLC 43 AMG and I like it a lot. I will say that it's a little has a little bit more drama driving it. I do like I do like the X ray a little bit better. But

Dan Roth  13:51  
AMG is supposed to have a little bit more. Yeah. But no, I,

Rebecca Lindland  13:57  
I mean, I and I don't I don't mean that. It's not fun to drive I mean, the Mercedes is, is, it's tons of fun to drive. It's the other stuff

Dan Roth  14:05  
that you don't like as much as

Rebecca Lindland  14:06  
the other stuff, right? The Ah,

Sam Abuelsamid  14:09  
the undesirable drama. Yes,

Rebecca Lindland  14:11  
exactly right. No, no, this. To me most most drama is done just that's my Norwegian side.

Sam Abuelsamid  14:23  
You know, to your point about, you know, who should you know whether you should get the plug in hybrid? You know, I think this is, this is a larger issue, just in general with electrified vehicles, you know, the, the process of deciding what vehicle to buy today, you know, is in many ways more complicated than ever, you know, in the past, you know, when we were just talking about, you know, you might have a choice of different gas engines, you know, it's like, Do you want something that's a little slower, maybe a little more fuel efficient, or do you want something that's faster? You know, you go for the big engine or the little legend? Yeah. Now, you, you really have to take into account your lifestyle? Do you live in an apartment? Do you live in a house? Do you live in a house that has street parking, you know, like, like you do in a lot of city areas, urban areas? Or do you live in a house with a garage? Do you park your car, in the garage or in the driveway? All those questions are going to have an impact on your decision about what is the right choice for you. If you don't park in a garage, you know, a regular hybrid, you know, might be a better choice for you because you don't have to plug it in. You don't have to deal with any of that you still get great fuel economy. If you can park in a garage, you know, then you know the car, you know what you were talking about with respect to dragging the court around in the snow or the rain becomes kind of a moot point. One of the reasons why we see a lot of ATVs you know, being bought in California is a lot of these issues are not in it. They're not an issue for people in California whereas in Michigan or Wisconsin or Connecticut or Massachusetts, they are more of an issue if you don't have enough access to a place where you can plug in, then, you know, then a plugin is maybe not the right choice both automakers and regulators have started to realize over the last few years is a lot of the people that have bought plug in hybrids end up not actually plugging them in, in which case now, if you never plug it in, you haven't gained anything over a regular hybrid, but you've paid more for the vehicle you're hauling around extra math for that bigger battery, which is actually going to give you worse fuel economy than just a regular hybrid. And, you know, like, for example, in in England, you know, we're in London, they have a congestion zone, and you can get exempted from paying the congestion charge. If you have a vehicle that has a co2 rating below a certain threshold. You know, a lot of people bought plug in hybrids, you know, to get that exemption sticker, but now, they don't actually plug it in. You know, he found that something like 90%, you know, didn't plug it in, and a couple years ago, I was talking to before asking about their telemetry data on, you know, their plug in hybrids that they were selling, you know, how many, how many people actually charged. And they said that roughly a third people charged their plug in hybrids every day, a third plugged him in occasionally, and one third never plugged them in. So, you know, this is why BMW has been experimenting with wireless charging, you know, and particularly for plug in hybrids, you know, for battery electrics, you know, you have no choice but to plug it in, at some point, you have to do it. But for a plug in hybrid, you want to make that process as seamless and frictionless as possible. So, you know, in BMW did a pilot in Germany and then also last year in California with electricity, who makes a wireless charging system, you know, often you know, offering wireless charging, so you have a pad, you know, that you install on the floor in your garage. There's another receiver pad that goes on the bottom of the car, and you just pull in over the pad and it autumn. medically starts charging and you don't have to mess with a cord or anything. You know it works but it's slower than plugging in but then again you know for the size of a battery that's in a plug in hybrid, you know it's you know, you can usually get a full charge overnight anyway but it's also still considerably more expensive, you know that price is going to come down you know, so I think you know, by you know, the middle of the decade we'll start seeing wireless charging becoming more readily available, especially for plug in hybrids. And you know, then then those might become a more popular option.

Rebecca Lindland  18:35  
And it also does still require really kind of requires a garage. Yeah, because necessarily set outside.

Sam Abuelsamid  18:42  
If they can sit outside doors, the paths pretty flat, you just put it you know, you can mount it anywhere. You know these things are designed to be weatherproof.

Rebecca Lindland  18:52  
The price of installing a charger and the home has come down considerably as well. The charge point home Plex devices $700 At Home Depot, you know, they're down to $600. In some places, Amazon is working closely with a lot of these companies,

Sam Abuelsamid  19:07  
yeah, I looked around, you can actually find 240 volt chargers for as little as $400. And, and the you know, and then depending on, you know, how much electrical work you have to get done, you know, to have a circuit, it could be anywhere from, you know, three or $400. Or, you know, if you have a 240 volt circuit in your garage already, then you just plug it in, you're good to go. You know, otherwise it could be anywhere from a few hundred dollars to about 1000 bucks, you know, a lot of utilities will have rebate programs for chargers. So they will they'll give you you know, 100% rebate on the charger. So you basically get the charger for free.

Rebecca Lindland  19:43  
So I'm actually going to be looking into this, I do have a 220 volt because my solar system runs off of it, it's in the garage. I'm hoping that they don't have to, they can basically fit it on the same wall. But I will document my experience and let our listeners know

Dan Roth  19:59  
you back to your question about how to convince buyers that the hybrid or the electric is the thing to buy, I think when you start to when you do the calculation of comparing the the cost of gas versus the the additional costs of the electric car and try to make that sort of pencil out your sort of payback period, it that's bad looking math is kind of never gonna get there over the certain course of normal ownership. But really, I and this is a really it sounds like an automaker PR statement. But really the the best way to convince somebody about ease and pH TVs is just drive one. In electric mode, they drive so electric cars drive so well. They're just it's such a different experience. It's really pleasant. I think that makes a bigger impact than like, Oh yeah, you know, you can run it off batteries for you know, most of your driving and stuff.

Rebecca Lindland  20:57  
The marketing of EBS. has never been accurate in my mind they they really push this as an urban solution, which was a terrible idea because very few, you know, urban people have access to a charge error

Dan Roth  21:14  
once a car at all and an urban

Rebecca Lindland  21:16  
array. I mean, they but again this is they based it very much off of a California experience. And and I am biased in that the New York you know, the New York Boston cities that I've lived in, tend to not have access to electricity blog, you get nothing right. Yeah. This is this is a great suburban solution. Yeah. And always has been it you know, you take the train into the city, but you drive from your McMansion to your train to the train station and you go to the same train station, because you've got to have a permit for that train station. So you go to the same place every day, and then taking the train in. That's a great solution and having charging ports at the train station even would solve a lot of these You're there, you know, you know, you're going to be at the office for 10 hours a day, have the ability to charge it at the train station. And, you know, I when I was on the bearish electric vehicle deployment, I talked about this, you know, work with some of these companies, local companies or companies even that are in the city that people are working for. So if you're, you know, working for Bank of America, and you're working in the city, have Bank of America sponsor charges at train stations, yeah, things like that. Like it's a broader scope.

Sam Abuelsamid  22:28  
But the original, the original challenge, you know, was, you know, urban areas tend to be where you have the worst air quality problems. So they wanted to they wanted to replace ice vehicles with electrics in urban areas, because that would address the air quality problem. But, you know, as he said, it has its own issues because you know, where are you going to charge it most people that if you live in an urban area, you know, odds are you don't have any place, you don't have a dedicated place, or if you do, you probably don't have someplace to plug in. And, you know, the other the other challenge, of course, was the cost of batteries in the first generation TVs was so shy, that, you know, you ended up with cars like the leaf that had a relatively short range. And so again, that tended to suit the urban environment better where you didn't need the range. But, you know, as we've learned over the last decade, you know, the ones the the, the argument for EBS that really appealed, was the performance argument. And yeah, that's what people ended up actually buying. And that's why Tesla has been successful.

Rebecca Lindland  23:33  
So I have a second vehicle but I've spent a lot of time we can we can pass on that one.

Dan Roth  23:38  
Well, can you at least give us a tease what

Rebecca Lindland  23:41  
it was it's a it's a little fee of 500 X and it was a riot. Oh, okay. And it broke by you know, Fiat, obviously is not doing very well. And this thing was just a riot. I mean, it was fun to drive your zipper around in it, you know, it's it's kind of almost old school, I think and the only the only way Little bit of a shock to me was first of all, the fuel economy was absolutely terrible. Yep. So I got it. I got 22 miles per gallon and this thing. It's rated for 26. And I wasn't I mean, yeah, I was kind of tossing it around sometimes but but the other thing too,

Sam Abuelsamid  24:18  
and it wants to be tossed.

Rebecca Lindland  24:20  
Well, it does. It wants to be tossed. The other thing too, and we've talked about this on this program before, destination charge of $1,495 which is insane that x three has a destination charge of 995. But we talked about the price or this fee of 500 X was 35,008 95 Are you kidding? Oh,

Dan Roth  24:41  
that's that's a that's a who pass retail kind of thing though. Yeah, that's

Rebecca Lindland  24:46  
still that's obviously you're not gonna pay but it is stupid. It is so so absolute blast to drive. You know, super cute you talk about not being anonymous and having a lot of fun drama. This was a fun drama. Not anonymous. Everybody looks Data kind of car, but for $35,000 or so many better choices, and that's why is where they are today.

Dan Roth  25:08  
All right, well, we'll pick that back up next. There you go. Sam, what have you. You've been driving you've had a couple of vehicles as well.

Sam Abuelsamid  25:15  
Yeah. So let's let's start with the the Honda CRV hybrid. How do you

Dan Roth  25:20  
want to keep it all BMW

Sam Abuelsamid  25:22  
will come we'll come to that in a minute. I'll keep I'll keep the Honda relatively short. You know, last when you had it a couple of months ago, Rebecca, you talked about the the noise that was coming in. I did. And you know, as soon as I started the car up and put it in reverse to maneuver to reposition it in my driveway. I immediately heard it, I knew what it was. And it is the sound that they know that manufacturers are adding to electrified vehicles when they're in Eevee mode, you know, to alert pedestrians around them. And you know, the the challenge with With this, you know, when you're creating these synthetic sounds, is, you know, how do you come up with something that is going to provide alerts to, you know, vulnerable road users around you that, hey, there is a vehicle here because, you know, someone who's visually impaired, you know, if they're, you know, if they're standing at a crosswalk, they can hear most of the time here an internal combustion engine car coming towards them, but it's much harder to hear an Eevee you know, coming towards you, or hybrid, that's an Eevee mode. And so they're, they're adding these sounds to the vehicles that typically phase out, you know, somewhere around 20 miles an hour. So it sounds like the one you had, that sound was on all the time. The they may, they may have made a software change somewhere along the way, because the one that I drove, it only came on when you actually put it in gear when you put it in reverser and drive. So when it was in park, though, it was completely silent.

Rebecca Lindland  26:58  
That sound and I appreciate it. what it's trying to do, but somebody who is vision impaired would be more likely to call a vet because it sounded like a sick cat

Dan Roth  27:13  
missing out on an opportunity.

Rebecca Lindland  27:16  
But it was like it was I mean, it's like a minor key nails on chalkboard sound I don't know.

Sam Abuelsamid  27:26  
I suspect that the one you drove in a pre production model it may have had an early a different sound because the one I had you know, more like, you know, kind of a spaceship kind of sound to it.

Rebecca Lindland  27:37  
Oh, gosh. But the other thing to people people that were walking, it didn't alert people it alarmed people.

Sam Abuelsamid  27:46  
Yeah, that's why I suspect that they may have changed the sound in between the time you drove it and Okay, what I drove because

Dan Roth  27:54  
on this podcast, they listen Exactly. I think they're missing an opportunity though to make the sound some thing that you can like you know if you download ringtone you can download your your alert.

Sam Abuelsamid  28:04  
Well and i think that you know, Porsche Porsche actually on the icon actually is offering you know, you can you can buy different sound packages for the icon at an extremely exorbitant price. But you know, it's a Porsche so it must be but you know, I think we will see manufacturers start to do that. I'm guessing we're gonna see you know, more of this, you know, trying to try to find the right kind of sound to you know, give you a audio hint of what it is that's coming at you you know, and provide that alert to, you know, to people that hey, there's an electrified vehicle in the area. Beyond that, you know, the the rest of it, you know, the crvs you know, it's a nice it's a nice compact crossover, you know, we took it to to go out to the lake and you know, took Daisy and out there, you know, the paddleboard and everything and you know, it's great, you know, it's fairly roomy, you know, it drives fine, you know, the driving dynamics. The CRV are good It doesn't get the most exceptional fuel economy it's it only got about 35 miles per gallon during my week with it and you know I wasn't beating it up or anything you know and you know compared to the rav4 or the Escape Hybrid, you know, they definitely do better they get closer to 40 miles per gallon 35 is not bad for you know, it's it's much better than than a typical gas engine in a vehicle of this type. But it's not it's not exceptional. And you know, and then of course you know, we have we had the complaints about the infotainment system in there which we don't need to deal

Rebecca Lindland  29:37  
with you know, what's your point Sam the I'm just looking back because I had the Hyundai Sonata Hybrid that got 46 miles forget I met and it's a sedan granted but still to your point like that. I look back to and see what I got on the CRV I don't remember right off the top of my head but yeah, that that was kind of a little bit unremarkable. I thought

Sam Abuelsamid  30:03  
yeah, I've actually got the Sonata Hybrid in the driveway right now I got it the other day. And so far it's getting like 52 so Wow, yeah. And it actually makes kind of a similar sound to the CRV although it's not as prominent when you're outside I actually really noticed it when I was going through a parking garage. It was much more noticeable in there because you get the reflection of the law. Okay,

Rebecca Lindland  30:25  
so I did not notice that in the I did not have that same experience with the sound

Sam Abuelsamid  30:32  
it's much more subdued in the Hyundai

Rebecca Lindland  30:34  
and you know what it looks like I got 35 miles per gallon

Unknown Speaker  30:39  
with the Honda with the Honda.

Dan Roth  30:41  
Okay, so I guess it's about what it's gonna get is about 35 miles per gallon

Sam Abuelsamid  30:44  
and i think that's that's what most people are getting is somewhere around 35 six, so

Dan Roth  30:51  
35 Yeah, that's that's still pretty good for that size, that size

Sam Abuelsamid  30:54  
to getting 22 and the fee at 500. No, vehicle, right? Absolutely

Rebecca Lindland  31:01  
know for sure. I mean, and a much more useful and for sure so yeah, so it looks like that's what that's what I average

Dan Roth  31:08  
but the so the class though the the rav4 and the the escape probably do a little better.

Sam Abuelsamid  31:16  
Yeah, they got about 40 to 42 Yeah.

Rebecca Lindland  31:20  
I mean when you think about it like that is absolutely fantastic because remember that it was always like the goal was 40 miles per gallon for cars like that was a stretch goal. So from that standpoint, it's really impressive when we're talking about these numbers.

Sam Abuelsamid  31:33  
Yeah, and, you know, even you know, when they were doing the, you know, the the new CAFE standards, you know, over the past eight, when they talked about, you know, 54 and a half miles per gallon, that 54 and a half mile per gallon threshold that was actually the on adjusted value that's based on the old original two cycle system. You know, which was always very optimistic number and that 54 miles per gallon in terms of the labels values that we actually see in real world fuel economy, that actually translates to roughly about 4041 miles per gallon, real world. So, you know, having these compact crossovers that are actually getting real world 40 miles per gallon today, you know, proves that it, you know, it is very feasible to get, you know, to hit that threshold, you know, in the type of vehicle that most people are buying today, you know, or a lot of people are buying today. You know, it's, it's very practical, and you're not sacrificing anything in terms of performance, you know, these, these things have, you know, as good acceleration, as you know, anything we were driving, you know, 10 1520 years ago, you know, terms of mainstream vehicles,

Rebecca Lindland  32:42  
well, if anything, you know, when I had the Prius, and that, that was a little bit more of a compromise. I felt like it's still but from an overall experience, you know, I yesterday, I went to pick up something and In New Jersey, and the guy that I bought it from I posted on my Instagram, the guy that I bought it from had a 10 year old Prius with 306,000 miles or three, it has 310,000 miles on it now, absolutely loves the thing. So it served its purpose. But there's so many other vehicles out there now that aren't compromising, and still getting these, you know, just incredibly, incredibly good fuel economy numbers. Right. And

Sam Abuelsamid  33:27  
and I think that's a, you know, that's a big part of why, you know, we've seen the shift, you know, you look at Toyota sales, there's been a shift from Prius, you know, to other vehicles, you know, particularly the rav4 hybrid. You know, the rav4 hybrid is now Toyotas best selling hybrid is almost 200,000 last year, versus about 67,000 priuses. You know, and so is that what Prius is down to 67,000?

Yeah, the, you know, the Prius, you know, has been hit in two directions. You know, the people who were early adopters are really Green enthusiasts, you know that were Prius owners, a lot of them have gone to EBS, and then, you know, the rest, you know, that just, you know, wanted something with better fuel economy, they've they've shifted over to other hybrids, you know, that are, you know, more along that are less weird looking for one thing, you know, that offer other other capabilities, you know, like what you have in a crossover where, you know, you're in most cases you're not giving up that much in terms of fuel economy relative to a Prius, you know, yet 50 miles per gallon versus 4042. But, you know, once you get past about 35, you know, 35 to 40 miles per gallon, you know, because when you look at the actual fuel consumption, how much how many gallons of gas you're using, per per mile or per hundred miles, that number starts to decrease. You know, it's it's an inverse relationship. And I can include an article link to an article I wrote back in like 2008 or nine for auto blog dream that explains it all. Yeah, I'll put that in the show notes. But yeah, I mean, you know, once you get past 40 you know, the incremental reduction in fuel consumption, and co2 starts to start to taper off pretty dramatically, but it's

Dan Roth  35:09  
much more expensive to

Sam Abuelsamid  35:11  
Yeah, so the difference between 40 miles per gallon and 50 miles per gallon, in terms of your environmental impact is actually very small. Especially, you know, given, you know, for the average number of miles that, you know, typical consumers drive 12 to 15,000 miles a year. So, anyway, I think that's enough about the, the car. The other one I had was the BMW 840, which can

Dan Roth  35:35  
see quite a bit more fuel.

Sam Abuelsamid  35:37  
Well, more Yes, but not as bad as you might think. So the 840 is the entry level version of the eight series as funny I was thinking is that as I drove this thing, you know, the first time I ever drove a BMW was 30 years ago. You know, when, when I was in my first job after college, working at GM, working at the gym, Proving Grounds on ABS for for what was that Dulko marine. And, you know, GM had a fleet of competitive vehicles that they used for benchmarking. And you know, at the time, you know, they had somewhere between 150 and 200 vehicles, you know, in the fleet around, mostly mostly around Michigan, but in other areas as well, that they rotate, you know, when they weren't doing specific testing with them. They rotated them through various departments at Milford and at the tech center. You know, to get give people an opportunity to try them out. And the first BMW i ever drove was an 850 I the original eight series. Ah, yeah. Which debut happened to have debuted that year.

Dan Roth  36:42  
So what did they think that that was competitive with?

Sam Abuelsamid  36:46  
BMW 5850?

Dan Roth  36:47  
No, no. What did what did GM think they made they competed with the 850? Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid  36:54  
Nothing really, at the time, probably. probably the closest thing that you know that they may have been made. had been a stretch goal for them was would be like the Cadillac volante.

Dan Roth  37:03  
I would have been quite a stretch. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker  37:06  
Stretch.

Rebecca Lindland  37:07  
guy. I had the 858 40 back in March. I'm sorry, April.

Sam Abuelsamid  37:13  
It was delish. Yeah. And Dan, you had the convertible.

Dan Roth  37:16  
Previously, I had the I think mine was the 850. I had it last last summer and I, I that car is so much. But when you start to, to, to understand who it's for and what it does, it's actually it's really really well done. It's so rigid, the convertible and I'm sure that the coop also is just solid and it performs. I mean, you really can't fault these things for for performance anymore. They all perform so well that they just scramble your brain anyway.

Sam Abuelsamid  37:49  
Yeah. Well, you know, as I was working on a review the other day on this thing, you know, I started going back and pulling up some of the specs on the eight 50 psi. So this was 1990, almost exactly 30 years ago that I drove this thing it was,

Rebecca Lindland  38:06  
wow. Yeah, that's amazing. And

Sam Abuelsamid  38:09  
that 850 I was powered by a five liter V 12 engine, which I would take all day, any day. I don't care if it makes two horsepower. That thing at 296 horsepower, and just over 300 foot pounds of torque, which at the time, you know, I mean, that was a lot.

Dan Roth  38:26  
I don't know, that wasn't, I mean, that's just that's the

Sam Abuelsamid  38:28  
same imagine in 1990. That was quite a bit. So it's pretty powerful. Let's see 200 that's about

Dan Roth  38:33  
the same amount of torque as you'd get from Well, I mean, I guess it's five liters. So but from the the three or two from the Ford, right.

Sam Abuelsamid  38:40  
And in fact, you know, I had at the time, I had just bought a five liter LX Mustang, which had 225 for it, so that was 1990. Yeah, yeah. You know, now, you know, that's, you know, four cylinder engines. You know, getting the bulb idle. You know, so this thing had, you know, shy of 300 horsepower from a V 12 engine, which was a beautiful engine. I mean, it was smooth, silky and it just, it was amazing. But that that car and you know it that thing, it had a unique look to it, it was very unlike almost unlike any other BMW The only thing that was, you know, that was remotely like it, you know, was the original m one you know, it had, you know, this very slim nose you know, and Daniel and I were chatting with Casey list the other day, you know about how BMW grills have gotten insane you know, the original h series had this slimline nose with this tiny little version of the twin kidney grille and had pop up headlights and was the only other BMW with pop up headlights was was the one original m one, you know, which also had a similarly small version of the twin kidney grille. You know, and in some ways you know that that car That was that was an interesting period for BMW design, you know, because they were, it was the first attempt to kind of transition away from their classic look, you know, of the forward leaning grilles, you know, the sedans and coupes, you know, from the old six series and the threes and the five series and the original sevens to something more contemporary and modern, you know, and that same period, you had the Z one roadster, which had the doors that, you know, slid down into the sills pocket doors. Yeah, exactly. pocket doors. In fact, my house has pocket doors. Yeah. But, you know, so you had those those weird doors. You had the, you know, that was the the 36 three series, you know, which, you know, was a dramatic change for the three series, you know, what, all the threes before that, you know, have the same kind of classic BMW sedan look, you know, and they've made a dramatic shift. And then, you know, through that period, the first half of the 90s they were doing a lot of interesting things. And then, you know, they went through several, they've gone through several phases over the years since. But, you know, this new age series, you know, is much, much less of a step out for BMW. And it's funny when I posted a picture of it on an Instagram benway dilla, who used to write for Jalopnik he, he's a common, she that's a funny looking Mustang. And in fact, when you look at it and profile it, the profile is not dramatically different from a current generation Mustang. It is larger, it's almost a foot longer than a Mustang. But you know, it's got a similar kind of, you know, profile to it. And, you know, so it's, it's much less of a departure design wise for BMW, but I think it is executed beautifully. I think it you know, it looks fantastic on the outside. Looks really nice on the inside. You know, again, going back, I look back at the original current driver review of the 50 I that respect Suppose wrote in 1990 and, you know, the interior, you know, BMW interiors in those days were often very stark, you know, you had, it was a very driver oriented, you have the center stack that was tilted towards the driver, but, you know, typically very black Stark, you know, this is so much more luxurious, you know, it feels like $100,000 car, which is what this one cost is $101,450 which is

Dan Roth  42:25  
quite a deal compared to the original when you adjust the dollars.

Sam Abuelsamid  42:28  
Yes, yeah. Again, that 850 I in 1990 was $90,000 adjusted for inflation today. That's $175,000

Dan Roth  42:38  
Wow. And that that first 850 I they, they really did look like no other BMW and they look like nothing on the road. They still look modern today, which is that's a design testament. But those were the first I think production car with Canvas or can so Controller Area Network. So I recall just colloquially there was a couple people had them in town. And those cars were absolute nightmares to own more than the, like typical high end German car was, which was no nope.

Sam Abuelsamid  43:12  
One of the one of the neat details of that V 12 engine, it actually had to complete engine management systems,

Dan Roth  43:18  
right, because there wasn't a lot of

Sam Abuelsamid  43:20  
main one for the right bank to talk to each other. It was the first one with with throttle by wire. So you had a complete throttle by wire system. And if one side if one engine management system failed or sensor failed on one side, the thing could actually continue to run on the other half of the engine on the six cylinders, you know, just because it had completely redundant engine management system for the other side of the engine. So it was it was pretty wild. But yes, they did have a lot of issues with them. But this, this 840 I drove the six cylinder engine so it's half the, you know, half the number of cylinders makes 335 horsepower and 368 foot pounds. Torque now, you know, which is more power and torque than that V 12 did from only three liters. It's more fuel efficient. I got about 22 miles per gallon with it. It's faster, it's about two seconds faster, zero to 60. So the rear drive 840 I'll do about four six, according to BMW Four, three, if you get the all wheel drive wheel, the V 12 850 was 6.3 seconds for the same thing. It weighs 200 pounds less, even though it's, you know, bigger and has a lot more features in it than than the original one did. So we've made tremendous progress in over the last 30 years. I just, I don't know that this one will be as memorable as that original eight series was. But you know, it's in in every objective way. It's a far better vehicle than it was then. And I really enjoyed driving I was gonna say to so all of those assigned Did you like it? Yeah, I loved it. It was great. I mean, you know, it's one of those typical coops, you know, that has a back seat, that's the look at it, why bother, you know, just make a nice carpeted shelf, you know, packages or cargo luggage on, you know, for a weekend road trip. But, you know, other than that, you know, the, the rest of it is great. I didn't bother, you know, I didn't bother turning off the gesture control or trying to use it, you know, it's stupid. But you know, the rest of it, you know, it just worked great.

Rebecca Lindland  45:33  
Yeah, I loved it. I had so much fun with this. I had it back in April and it was still you know, we were knee deep in quarantine and no traffic. So I'm we're driving it across the Tappan Zee Bridge here. And just being able to fly the new Tappan Zee

Dan Roth  45:51  
to so it's like, you just look down. You're like, holy crap. I'm doing 120

Rebecca Lindland  45:54  
Oh, my gosh, it's so true. And it just was such a cool again. Like that, you know, that sort of classic BMW, really the ultimate driving machine it continues to be that and, and I loved it and the interior I had the black and red interior, the interior was just to die for. And I the gesture control, I was able to pretty much just ignore it. But I like the dial that they have in there. I think it's really easy to use. It's funny, I was just looking back at my pictures, and I actually don't have my fuel economy, unfortunately. But I don't think it was terrible. You know, I didn't remember thinking it was like, Wow, that was bad. But mine topped out at 100,000 just over 100,000 and some change. But

Sam Abuelsamid  46:41  
yeah, even if you get the the MA competition coupe, you know, that was priced at 146, which is still less than, you know, the adjusted price at the 850. And it's a far faster car. Yes, yeah, higher performance. And

Dan Roth  46:54  
that's like Yeah, I remember that with the 850. So the 850 has the twin turbo VA, right Yeah so performance was without question impressive. It sounded good it was quick I mean that it's for for that sort of competitive set like what does it compete with it competes with like the Mercedes SL.

Sam Abuelsamid  47:15  
Yeah Mercedes you know the Mercedes S Class coupe you know and convertible you know the SL is a two seater the S Class coupe i think is more the direct competitor for this one and you know maybe you know the the Lexus LC Yeah, these these grand touring coops that are you know, fairly relatively high performance but really more for you know, luxury you know, to go you know, go long distances at high speeds, you know, with a partner you know, I was down with the sports car Yeah,

Dan Roth  47:48  
yeah. GTS are where it's at. Absolutely.

Sam Abuelsamid  47:51  
Fantastic.

Dan Roth  47:52  
So cool. I'd have a hard time choosing anything between the BMW in the in the the Lexus the

Sam Abuelsamid  47:59  
the The DLC is great, because like we know LC drives so well and that and that V eight engine sounds so good.

Dan Roth  48:10  
Yeah, I do like a Mercedes. I don't know. I'm just gonna have to try them off to dry so went completely different it's been truck Hill up here. So which has been fantastic for all the home improvement but this week it's a 2020 Ford F 350 Platinum with wow with the 6.7 liter power stroke so

Sam Abuelsamid  48:36  
that's probably more expensive than the I know

Rebecca Lindland  48:38  
much was that things

Dan Roth  48:40  
at roughly Yeah, so a bargain it's it did surprise me it's not quite as expensive as I thought it would be. And that's even with like the $600 of for the white metallic paint where it looks. It looks sharp, it's it. It's a good looking truck. It's clearly super capable in a way that I'm not going to be to really evaluate, but one of the things I did notice about it was even as an F 350 it doesn't write offensively stiff. So you you could you know if you had a need to do daily it, I guess

Sam Abuelsamid  49:15  
it you'd be surprised how many people actually do

Dan Roth  49:18  
it. I mean, the 6.7 liter power Cirque is like hugely powerful. It's very well behaved, you know. It's not like the old diesels and I think that's been pretty much what we've said about diesels for a long time now it's just like it starts up pretty quick. There's no waiting for the glow. It is pretty smooth. It's got enough of the diesel sound so you you feel like you bought the big rig. The Platinum has a nice interior and this isn't even the top trim level of F series truck if there's there's another one above.

Sam Abuelsamid  49:55  
There's Limited is limited above Platinum or below platinum. I can't keep talking. I'll look it up. Yeah, it's

Dan Roth  49:59  
not top trim it's I think it's like second to the second to the top and you know it's a crew cab I don't know how many configurations This is available in but this is this is the crew cab with I think the six and a half foot bed and the hundred and 60 inch wheelbase. So it's it's big it's it's a long truck but it's not quite as gargantuan has some of them can get so it it will fit I think in most most places that you want it to go and most garages it's it's a nice luxurious place to be I will say you know Ford Ford is really leaning hard into trucks and they're doing a great job at it. You know this is a very well thought out truck. Just all of the the setup for towing and the features with the camera so that you can hook the trailer and stuff and then I think the the the pro trailer backup assist I want to Get the words, right? We'll help you because that's always the thing, right? When you're trying to back up a trailer and figure out which way to turn the wheel then make the back of the trailer go, did you end up boat crossed up? So they've harnessed the technology to help you with that. And, you know, it's a it's it's a, it's a lot of money, but it's not as much as I thought it would be. And when you're talking about buying something for a business, it really you know, the money becomes somewhat less of an issue because you can you can write it down a bit. So there's there's some of that accounting that you can help you out.

Sam Abuelsamid  51:36  
Well, I mean, that what they you know, typically these will be leased.

Dan Roth  51:40  
Yeah, well, so leasing, I mean, you've just basically fixed your costs and on, off you go, and then you lease another one and another one. But the capability is clearly there if you want to ride around and pretty comfortable environment and also need the thing to actually put its shoulder to the work. This is You know that class of truck COVID has this kind of stir crazy I'm like wait let's get it let's get a travel trailer. Let's go Let's get one of these things and this is like this is a lovely way to travel that way so again like you know, oh horse people have lots of dough and they pull horse trailers this would pull the hell out of horse trail.

Sam Abuelsamid  52:21  
So as you were talking, I looked it up the F 350 is available as a regular cab supercab or crew cab with two blocks legs six and three quarter feet and eight feet and the option of single rear wheel or dual rear wheel right so the single five different wheel base combinations

Dan Roth  52:41  
it's a lot you know Ford Ford does trucks really like they are they are the truck up and I'm I know I'm on record is like not being the hugest Ford truck fan. But most of that griping is the sort of materials and the design of the interior. The materials themselves are pretty good, but I just look at it and I'm like, even for $80,000 This is a $40,000 truck in interior, you know, they've dressed it up with some real metal and you know, little leather on top of the dash and stuff it just, again, you should go sit in one and see what you think. Because there's, it's open to debate about taste and sort of impressions, interior wise, but I just I feel like it's too expensive to feel so cheap. They've tried, and it's comfy and it's quiet, and it's a nice place to be, but I just, you know, that's really the only thing I can gripe about. It's the truck itself, for trucks are just as competitive i think is just about everything else. So it comes down to preference. So if you can, you know, it's

Sam Abuelsamid  53:45  
not unusual for truck owners to accumulate multiple hundreds of thousands of miles on these things.

Dan Roth  53:51  
Yeah, yeah. And look, if you want to do 300,000 miles that why don't you want to do it in comfort. And so that's that's a that's a pretty good argument and the cap is huge. So it's really like it's two thirds of an expedition.

Sam Abuelsamid  54:08  
Yeah. So Wow. I mean, if you want an expedition with a big bed and an eight foot bed on the back, you know, so you can bring bring your, you know, your four by eight sheets of plywood home without having to invade the, the passenger space. There you go.

Rebecca Lindland  54:24  
It's some of the compromise on the interior in the name of durability.

Dan Roth  54:29  
Maybe I think what it is, is either they've got a hard thing to do, right? They've got the F series interior goes from the, I don't know, 22,020 $4,000 x out f 150 x out all the way up to the platinum, you know, that's a or whatever's above it. You know, the King Ranch?

Sam Abuelsamid  54:50  
Yeah, the limp the limited is only available in the 450 and that's the top trim. So when it goes

Dan Roth  54:56  
up to 100 grand, they all start from the same basic stuff and that's where I think my my offense with the interior comes it's like you look at this interior and you see all the way down to the XML and and that's hard to do without making you know the the $80,000 truck have a unique dashboard or unique and unique you know materials and stuff just to get it gets blown steel so

Sam Abuelsamid  55:23  
to their credit you know ram does it better than anybody ram does great job.

Dan Roth  55:26  
Yeah, and the way they do it is and it may not even be more expensive materials. So this is perception versus you know, the actual like, hard costs, it just it looks and feels better. You trucks This is one of the most competitive segments and I think if you want if you want to really feel like a valued customer, and that the company is really listening to you go buy a truck because they Yes, they pay attention to those those folks and they they really offer you all All kinds of stuff to make your life easy if you have a job to do that involves a truck and I have a right

Sam Abuelsamid  56:04  
I remember a few years ago, yeah. Hearing that, for the F series, there were Ford had about roughly 14 million buildable combinations for the F series. If you if you add up all the permutations of the different variants, the different trim levels, the different colors, cabs, bed lengths, you know, single wheel, dual wheel, all all that different stuff is around 14 million. I think it might actually be more now because there's actually more engine options now. Yeah,

Dan Roth  56:36  
yeah. I mean, I even have like a PTO. Yeah, I mean, I will say this is a great segue because it seems like the bronco has broken the Ford building price site quite a bit. I keep getting like a splash screen. So you know what, let's let's just say like if you want a truck and you like Ford's the F F 350. Platinum is a really nice one. And it's not as expensive as I thought even with the diesel. It's a 10,000 Dollar option so this truck is about 70 grand without diesel, which is seems like a decent, you know, in terms of fancy pickups. That's not terrible.

Rebecca Lindland  57:08  
Yeah, it's super duty. Yeah, that's that's not bad.

Dan Roth  57:11  
So the bronco has finally broken cover. And there's a lot to the bronco and the bronco sport and so there's two doors four doors compact, more soft rotor than offered or although I'm sure the bronco sport can hold its own. I mean, you guys were in the in the presentation that seemed like it had just like high point after high point after high point my Twitter was like on fire with with all the bronco news. It seems like it was it's kind of worth the weight. It seems like they've done a really comprehensive job.

Sam Abuelsamid  57:52  
Yeah, you know the thing I wrote in my write up on Forbes about the particularly the bronco The bigger Bronco the midsize Bronco is, you know what Ford has done? It's interesting, you know, in the past year, they've done this twice now, they were they're going into a segment where they don't currently have a product. And they've looked around, it's like, who is the leader in this segment? Okay, what are they doing? Let's do exactly the same thing. You know, they did this with a Maki they, you know, they copied, you know, the Tesla playbook for the Maki in almost every way, you know, and then add, you know, a few few details of their own, you know, the things that you know, they're supposedly good at. And now they've done it with the bronco where they have looked at Jeep and basically completely replicated what Jeep does, particularly what the Wrangler and then for the bronco sport, you know, with the compass, or at least the Trailhawk version of the compass. And you know that now they obviously they have to ask execute on that plan but you know in terms of picking all the things you know what are all the things that people love about Wrangler let's do all of that. Yeah. And and you know they've done that you know that and they've you know they've added on top of that you know built in some really neat details that you know Wrangler doesn't do right now things like you know on a Wrangler you can remove all the doors or move the roof you know you get soft top and hardtop versions is two door and four door. You know, on the bronco you have all that plus, with a Wrangler when you take off the doors, there's nowhere to stash them inside the vehicle. You either have to leave them at home or you know one of these they mentioned, you know, people do you know during the presentation was, you know, Wrangler drivers will drive up to the trailhead. They'll take off the doors, and they'll chain them to a tree near the trailhead, you know, and then pick them up on the way up, you know, with the bronco. You can There's actually space in the back to the doors are frameless the windows are frameless unlike on the Wrangler where you've got a full metal frame around the windows. So, you know, the doors are much smaller, you know, half the size. And you can actually stash them in the back, you know, in the cargo area, the bronco and they even have sleeves that you can stick the doors in so you don't scratch them. As he slips stick them in the sleeve, stash them in the back and you take them with you, you don't have to leave anything behind little details like that. And the the handles that are on the the court, the front corners of the fenders, you know, there's these little loops that you know, are both that serve multiple purposes. You know, they talked about the design, you know, and it draws on the original brocco but doesn't it's not a you know, like a really retro design. And so you've got the raised ridges along the edge of the front fenders, which helps with being able to see where are the corners of the vehicle which you know, when maneuvering in tight places that's really important. And then they have these, these handles on right on the front corners, which are kind of your spotter guides, you know, but they're also they can be used, you know, when you've got a canoe or a kayak tied to the roof. You can, that's your tie down point for those. So instead of wrapping the chords of the rope, you know, around, you know, over the edge and tying it to the bumper like you would with a Wrangler, you tie it right to that, you know, so you're not you don't have the, the tie downs or the you know, the restraints, you know, rubbing against the pain. You know, so just a lot of little details like that which I thought were really cool.

Rebecca Lindland  1:01:40  
They did a lot of emotional solutions. You know, there's a lot of those like you get, you are like, Oh, this is really great. This makes me feel good because I can just take care of my doors or things like that quickly. I you know, with with just a it was very, very thoughtful. There's a lot of thoughtful details in it. And I love the fact that It just it looks like it's supposed to look, you know, like when you unveiled it, you're like, Oh, good. That's what it's supposed to look like. There was that sense of that of meticulous attention to history without repeating it, you know, it moved the design forward. I mean, it's it's almost cartoonish, but not in that f j, you know, in the Toyota, fJ, those are sort of look, it just was restrained enough. You know, they often talk about like in the studio in the design studio, where you go over a clay model, you kind of go over it one more time. You smooth out, maybe you just, you know, you take one thing away, and I think that there was a lot of very thoughtful restraint in the design of this to just pull it back from being cartoonish.

Dan Roth  1:02:56  
Yeah, and it's they I like that they've done their own spin on things, too. You know, the Ford solution for the half doors with the actually thought like the hole in the middle? I think it's really clever and it makes you sort of look twice. And yeah, it's hard to argue that the styling is anything other than eye catching and in the styling has some of the features that are gonna continue to sort of remind you that like, hey, they were they really thought about this, like the peaks on the fenders. So you know where the, the edges of the car are. That's that's pretty smart thinking. So I wonder, though, like, is this? Is this another product like the Wrangler? Like you talked about Busboys and billionaires? Yes. Is this going to expand the market or is it only going to just consume some of the Wranglers sales? Huh,

Rebecca Lindland  1:03:56  
that's just really, really good question. I don't know. I mean, it's it. I think I think we could see some some incremental growth. We certainly will see some, potentially some cannibalization. But, you know, there may be people who for whatever reason, you know, Jeep I, whether I don't think it's entirely fair, but sometimes people are concerned about the reliability, right, I have Jeep and so maybe that was a barrier to purchase for people. I think we really have to look at rejecter data for people who chose not to buy a Jeep to understand where the the market could be for this. And and, you know, like we've talked about a lot with pickup truck loyalty. There is some element of loyalty here that Jeep owners may have as well. I do think I mean, just looking at it right now. I just I think that there's definitely a lot of potential my My only concern is that this sport is a completely different vehicle in in that way that the the compass Trailhawk is, but there's no indication or minimal indication that that's the case and that the sport is not the same as appeal to the same factory. It's a completely different animal. I think

Dan Roth  1:05:23  
that that may be a calculated decision.

Rebecca Lindland  1:05:27  
Oh, absolutely. No, I realized that it is, by it's a little bit of a bait and switch sort of thing. I think that it could turn some people off though. I that. You know, you go in thinking, Oh, I'm gonna get that and then you're like, wait, this is not what I thought it was. So I think that's a I think they're going to have to manage expectations. I in terms of better defining that the sport is really a completely different vehicle.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:05:57  
Yeah, I'm less worried about that. You know, it's a smaller vehicle, you know, it's got some of the same similar styling cues. But it's enough different that in you know, the overall layout, you know, the fact that first of all, you know, it's there's no removable top no removable doors. You know, I think, you know, people that want that kind of modularity from a bronco and that want, you know, the the really hardcore off road capability. I don't think they're going to be confused. You know, I think I think they'll you know, they'll be fine. You know, I think that in the you know, while the the bronco sport has, you know, offroad capability like, you know, like you and I have seen with the compass Trailhawk Well, it's

Dan Roth  1:06:49  
it's four wheel drive only right? That was

Sam Abuelsamid  1:06:50  
Yes, it's four wheel drive only. And so it's it's not all wheel drive, like the Escape is. Yeah, and I think this this is actually one of the interesting things that Ford's done over the past. Last year, this splitting of the escape, you know where previously the escape was tied to be all things to all people but it was never really an off roader. Even though they kind of alluded to that in some of the marketing, it was never really an off road vehicle. And they, they distinctly moved the current generation escape towards more of the urban suburban commuter vehicle. And, you know, split that platform now. So you've got the sport, which in order to escape is all wheel drive, you know, which is part time you know, automatic This is a four wheel drive vehicle, it's full time four wheel drive it unlike the the Jeep, it doesn't have a two speed transfer case. But, you know, I think most people probably never use that in a compass anyway. Yeah. So I think I think that there's enough differentiation there that people are going to be less confused by Well,

Rebecca Lindland  1:07:55  
yeah. I mean, I I was on a panel and and was Somebody who had been who had seen she, she'd been able to go to the all of the the event that they had it down in Maryland. And she said, I, she didn't actually, and this is somebody in the field, you know, a journalist in the field, she said, I have to tell you that I have access to all the marketing materials. And I didn't realize that it wasn't built at the same plant that it wasn't, it really was not related at all. So you know, and other and so I don't know, I just I feel like they're, I'm a it's not going to be a barrier per se. But I do you think that there, I would have liked to have seen more depth, more differentiation between the two models, like cheap has done with the compass and the Wrangler?

Sam Abuelsamid  1:08:47  
Yes. It's a reason it's reasonable. Yeah. We won't know for sure until they actually start selling them and see people respond to it. For sure.

Dan Roth  1:08:56  
Yeah. And I think too. Wow. I mean, she was she was there and she sort of lumped them all together I was just gonna say like seeing them all together size wise and stuff that the differences may may stand out a little more so if you see that showroom environment

Rebecca Lindland  1:09:12  
Yeah, but I don't think that it's clear from this word. This was her words from a marketing that all the marketing materials it's not clear that this is a different platform, a different plant different animal altogether.

Dan Roth  1:09:28  
Well, I mean, I think like as a marketer I wouldn't want that to be clear. Because Yeah, you're watching the bronco Yeah, consumer

Rebecca Lindland  1:09:39  
I would

Dan Roth  1:09:40  
well so what you're trying to do though as a marketer is you're trying to get the bronco brand launched and say look, we have a bronco for you if you if you want to do the Jeep thing. Look, there's the bronco for door to door cool. Oh, you're you'd like a little bit more of this or that or you don't care so much about the removable door. Something a little bit more manageable or less burly, check out the bronco sport. You know, it's still a has the bronco so I can I can see it I totally understand that it is confusing and that may be off putting. So I like like any other launch right? It comes down to how good the dealers do.

Rebecca Lindland  1:10:20  
Yes, it does. Yes, it will say, oh, but yeah, I think they did a great job of we're all though.

Dan Roth  1:10:27  
Yeah, I agree. I agree. And it's really interesting to hear the feedback that that it's not, not necessarily clear like that because we get so focused on details. It's so easy for us sometimes to lose sight of like what it appears like out in the

Sam Abuelsamid  1:10:39  
world, and to the average consumer. I don't think they in general really care where it's built or what platform it's on. It's it's like, what am I going to use this thing for? which one has the capabilities that?

Rebecca Lindland  1:10:53  
No, and that's not what I'm saying that that's not the priority. The priority to me is that the consumer on Understand what they're really buying that these are two, these are two very, very different products. Yeah, called called the same thing, you know, with that same headline, then there's a significant divergence that needs to be clarified, I think and as you say, agenda that is, in large part, the dealer responsibility. But even, you know, I know that I don't know exactly how many reservations they had. But, you know, again, it's, it's not when you're on the site, you can reserve one or the other. And, you know, reading the bronco sport definition. It's not at all clear that this is car based. And not, you know, it is all wheel drive, four by four. But, again, I just I think that people may get something that they're not expecting. Yeah, they may reserve something that doesn't have that level of capability. They cuz people may say, Oh, I don't need the doors come off, I'll just get the bronco sport not realizing that it is a completely different I mean,

Dan Roth  1:12:06  
yeah, and I really I can't wait to drive them to see what the character differences are to Yes. So for sure, for sure absolutely see how for does with these, um, they've clearly invested a lot in it and there's a lot riding on on this. So hopefully it does expand the market there is some pent up demand for something that's not a jeep.

Rebecca Lindland  1:12:29  
I hope it I hope it does really

Sam Abuelsamid  1:12:31  
well. Did you? Well, yeah. I think you know, what, I think for you know, unlike Jeep, you know, where Jeep you know, predominantly sells those vehicles is particularly the Wrangler in North America. You know, Ford does have more of a presence, especially in Middle East and Africa. You know, they sell a lot of explorers and F 150s and, and other trucks in Middle East and Africa and I suspect There's probably going to be a fair amount of demand from that region for particularly for the bigger Bronco much more so, and so, you know, there we may see if you look at total global sales, you know, I think there may be less cannibalization there, you know, when you factor in the global market as opposed to North America where I think you'll see more of this more of the cannibalization of Jeep by the bronco and speaking of Jeep, you know, they they didn't sit back either. They did a couple of responses of their own, you know, the morning before the reveal, you know, they they dropped you know, the Wrangler 392 concept,

Dan Roth  1:13:45  
which had a had to been one of the Eastern Safari jeeps that didn't

Sam Abuelsamid  1:13:50  
Yeah, yeah, so they're, you know, they're gonna they're going to drop a VA into the Wrangler 6.4 liter Hemi into the Wrangler, which could be a lot Have fun and then a couple of days later you know after Ford for for some reason opted not to talk about the hybrid during the launch of the bronco you know Jeep put up a teaser video of the Wrangler for XC which is the plug in hybrid that's launching this year you know and you just see this Wrangler going through his off road terrain completely silently on battery power alone

Unknown Speaker  1:14:28  
crazy.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:14:29  
Yeah. And they have a diesel version as well too. They do have a diesel as well which you currently cannot get from Ford would Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised to see you know, four maybe drop the diesel offer the diesel in the four door big Bronco. But they're you know, they certainly will be doing hybrids and probably plug in hybrids. Wouldn't you know wouldn't surprise me to see them put the plug in hybrid with that 2.7 liter V six you know for high performance brocco you know, similar to what they've done with the The Aviator Grand Touring, dual high performance version of that.

Dan Roth  1:15:07  
So we did have a question about the the bronco two from a listener. Jared Henshaw asked if it's on a new platform or if it's based on the Ranger, and I think it is a new platform that's going to be shared with the Ranger, is that correct?

Sam Abuelsamid  1:15:23  
Yes, the next generation body on frame platform that they, the next gen Ranger is going to is going to share that platform with this. So it's an evolution of what they have in the broth and a ranger today.

Dan Roth  1:15:37  
Okay, is that Eevee or hybrid capable?

Sam Abuelsamid  1:15:42  
Ford has said, first said a couple of years ago and they repeated it since that all of their new utilities and trucks will have electrified powertrain options available. It's not clear exactly which combination they'll put in which brocco but there will be at the least a hybrid version. And each of these vehicles, they have that modular hybrid system that they're putting in the F 150. And the Explorer and The Aviator and everything else, you know, and eventually in the Mustang as well, it's based on the 10 speed automatic, they put an electric motor in between the engine and torque converter, you know, that gives them the power boost that they need. Oh, we forgot to mention the drain plugs. Oh, that's right. Yeah. In the in the big Broncos you can get you know, one of the options is a rubberized floor, and it's got removable drain plugs. So you can go in, you know, pull the drain plugs out going and hose it up and hose up the mud, you know, and it just drains down through the floor instead of collecting in there, which is which is really nice. And also the Sasquatch package.

Dan Roth  1:16:45  
Why and the goat modes

Sam Abuelsamid  1:16:47  
that go modes but the Sasquatch, you know. So you can you can get the sasp near the Sasquatch packages, the hardcore off road package. So that includes things like the disc, the disconnectable stabilizer bars You know, the big 35 inch tires and a bunch of other things in there. And you can order that as a separate package on any of the seven trim levels. So, you know, from the face all the way up to, you know, the the wild track, or the overland or badland whichever one yeah, I think is the top one. So you can get that on any of them, but not on the bronco sport so you can't get a bronco sport with the Sasquatch package but you can get it with the with any of the big Bronco

Dan Roth  1:17:30  
Yeah, and this is why I say like there's just a lot of depth here. And you almost need like a bulletin board with like a you know, string charts. Like, even with like so manual transmission is something that us over here in auto writer world love to talk about. And so you can get it on the Bronco, you can get a seven speed manual, but you can only get it without the Sasquatch, right? And you can unmute, I only get it with the 2.3 liter EcoBoost which is a fine engine. Don't get me wrong. I think that's a good powerful Little power plant. And that's so it's available. But for serious offroading really the automatic is better anyway, I'll you know, that's not hurt anybody's pride so that and they know that so not only for the use case the equipment level is matched properly. So you've got the 10 speed auto, which is fantastic transmission with the larger engine but also you know, they they know what most people are going to buy Anyway, you need to if you're interested in the Bronco, you need to go and play with the website

Sam Abuelsamid  1:18:33  
and bring it just with these, you know, fancy aluminum wheels, you can get the bronco with there's two different steel wheel options. There's the base 16 inch steel wheel, and then there's a 17 inch steel wheel as well. You know and the the base Bronco the way they describe the base Bronco is you know this is if you know they're they're gonna have launched something like 200 different accessories that you can get, you know, both from factory accessories and from They're aftermarket partners. And if what you want is not on the menu, you can build whatever you want, you know, you can take the base Bronco and build it any way you want. and customize it to your heart's content burger and that thing starts at 30 grand,

Dan Roth  1:19:17  
I mean, and all the body panels are removable and easily swappable because like they they really whether or not you you like Ford or you're you're a big fan of the bronco or whatever like you have to give them respect they they really they thought this thing through

Rebecca Lindland  1:19:35  
and I love how similar the two and four door look you know you're not compromising a lot on looks if you go to the four door you know or keep it a two door but now I they did. They did a lot of things incredibly well here and those those different small details, those emotional solutions, lots of different drive modes. You know, they they did a lot of things really, really Well here I hope I I hope they succeed so there's I was just playing with it a little bit and it looks like the wild track high speed off road is the most expensive

Dan Roth  1:20:10  
Yeah. That's got like that's kind of like the Raptor version of the bronco Ray.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:20:14  
Yeah. More more directly comparable to the the Mojave the Jeep Mojave. Right. Yeah.

Rebecca Lindland  1:20:20  
150 1000 Yeah. For us to start with by the Ford are starting at Yeah. 48 for the for the two door. Yeah, but it looks awesome.

Dan Roth  1:20:32  
Yeah, no. Look if Ford needs to bring this kind of comprehensive, thoughtful approach to station wagons.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:20:41  
Yes. Like the flex

Rebecca Lindland  1:20:43  
because that worked out well. Well, no, I mean,

Dan Roth  1:20:47  
I want a real like a country Squire. The wood on the sides, like wood. mean we can switch patterns. Yeah, I'm sure they'll get What else do we have? All right, let's, uh, let's wrap up with the Nissan Aria, just briefly, the Nissan LEAF has quietly been plugging away for for a decade. And so Nissan really knows even a lot more than some of the other larger manufacturers in the RV is their second product. It's a little bit larger than the leaf it's a it's a crossover. And they unveiled it this week. And there's a lot to like here. It's not quite the sporty approach like Ford took with the the Mach E, it's a little bit more mainstream. But it's it's a nice design piece and it's a good complement to the leaf. The way they've made it a sort of Design Show piece inside with the interiors still bugs me with the screens and the minimal controls and stuff. I'm sure that I'm gonna get cranky about that, but that's probably just me.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:21:55  
No, I'll probably be cranky about it too. It's beautiful to me.

Rebecca Lindland  1:21:59  
Yeah, but I I just give me a good volume and tuning knob please

Dan Roth  1:22:05  
does have a volume not from what I can see. Fine tuning you might be on your own.

Rebecca Lindland  1:22:10  
Yeah, I mean, I think it's beautiful looking. I you know it is appealing to the market. I like that. As you know, we talked about earlier. Evie adoption has been a struggle. And so you know, maybe getting more people into getting getting ease into a size of vehicle that people are buying. And you know, may be a good thing for them.

Dan Roth  1:22:32  
Yeah. Well, Sam, you did a great write up on it for Forbes that kind of went through the high points.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:22:37  
Well, yeah, it's funny. You mentioned the Maki. And back in late 2017. You know, Ford did a complete pivot with their Evie program before the Maki. They were working on a front wheel drive, electric crossover. That was very much like what this is. I mean, this is basically what the path that Ford was on, before they pivoted to the Maki Yeah, it was, you know, this this this vehicle, the ARIA is almost exactly the same length as the rogue. So that puts about the same size as a escape. And that's what Ford was was working on, you know, was a more conventional mainstream crossover You know, this the, the single motor version of the ARIA is front wheel drive rather than rear wheel drive. You know, Ford went the opposite direction, they follow the Tesla path. You know, this in dual motor configuration, this should actually have you know, pretty probably pretty similar performance capability to, to what the Maki and the the model y are doing. You know, it's going to 388 horsepower from the dual motor. And this will be the first North American model for Nissan that has their propilot 2.0 system on it, which is their, their hands free, partially automated system, you know, similar to gm supercruise, and Ford's active drive, assist and We'll be seeing a lot more from other manufacturers in the next year or two as well. One thing to keep in mind is that even though they show this now, it doesn't go on sale in Japan until about a year from now, and it won't be here in the US until late next year. So it's, it's a good 16 months away from launch. Before we actually see these things on the road here, and it's also going to start at about $40,000. So it's not inexpensive.

Dan Roth  1:24:25  
That's before incentives and rebates, which I guess they need to sort of relying on this to bring the price down. 40 grand

Rebecca Lindland  1:24:34  
is the sun running out of federal,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:24:37  
as of as of the end of June, they were at about 145,000.

Rebecca Lindland  1:24:43  
So Oh, so they're halfway through? Is it 300? Or is it 200

Sam Abuelsamid  1:24:47  
to $200 200,000? The pace that they're selling leaves? Yeah, they probably won't hit 200,000 before early 2022. Right. But he's also at least through the end of 2022. You'll be able to get if not the full 7500 at least a partial rebate,

Rebecca Lindland  1:25:04  
right? Because it starts trailing off when the new manufacturer hits 200,000. Yep. It's they start trailing off that 70 $500 rebate.

Dan Roth  1:25:13  
Yeah. At least for now. I mean, who knows what's gonna happen? Maybe we can. We can. rebates. Perhaps,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:25:20  
maybe see is the are you gonna get here before the month? Well, I guess the model was kind of already the model was here. Yeah, you can buy them now there's there's plenty amatory

Rebecca Lindland  1:25:29  
but there's those are very different buyers. So

Dan Roth  1:25:31  
you think so?

Rebecca Lindland  1:25:33  
Yeah, because the work that we did in Saudi showed a very different profile for somebody bus buys a Tesla versus somebody who buys a Nissan.

Dan Roth  1:25:41  
I guess that makes sense. Yeah, I'm just trying to think like, if you want an Eevee in this sort of size and form factor, it doesn't matter brand doesn't matter as much as sort of like what's available, but I guess brand matters.

Rebecca Lindland  1:25:53  
Brand still matters.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:25:54  
Yeah. I certainly I think it probably matters a lot when you're talking about Nissan. versus Tesla, you know, I think, I think people that really want a Tesla are gonna buy a Tesla, they're not even gonna consider a Nissan. But, you know, when you start looking at the broader audience, I think, you know, people that, you know, want to move to an Eevee, you know, you know, people that buy robes or rapporteurs or escapes today, and they want to move to an Eevee. And they're going to look at that, you know, maybe see some of the issues that Tesla's had, you know, the fact that there's no dealers and it's tough to get service. And, you know, maybe they'll say, Okay, well, you know, let's, let's give this Nissan a shot.

Dan Roth  1:26:35  
Yeah, well, and this is also like, it's just gonna be shared with the other Alliance members.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:26:40  
Yeah, the platform is a new, dedicated Evie platform that was developed by the Alliance, and it will be used for other vehicles from Nissan Renault and Mitsubishi.

Dan Roth  1:26:51  
Okay, let's see. So Mitsubishi, it has some of the sort of oldest most antique kind of PHP stuff on the market now, like with Outlander, PHP, which I think is it's probably their their best, most saleable product. This could be a shopping arm for them where they're just less suffering in the market. So,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:27:14  
yeah. All right, it would be cool to see one other thing that that's changing with this, right today. Nissan and Mitsubishi are the only two brands that sell plug in vehicles in North America with chademo charging connectors for DC fans, right? The the ARIA is at least for North America and Europe is switching to CCS. They apparently will continue with Chatham o for now, although it sounds like what the call that you were on Rebecca, it sounds like they said that they're going to keep chademo in Japan. I was on a call with the sounds new chief operating officer. And the implication there. From what he said was that sound like there might be going CCS across the board.

Rebecca Lindland  1:28:00  
So I was on a later call, and I think they may have corrected him because he very distinctly said that Chatham was continuing in Japan, CCS in Europe in the US. Yeah, I remembered, I remembered reading you that that chademo for CCS charging and then somebody asked him about it.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:28:19  
Yeah. So, you know, chademo is more established in the Japanese market. You know, they acknowledge that, you know, CCS is you know, la chademo had an earlier headstart in North America with with the leaf. The you know, CCS has been taken over everyone else is using CCS and the the network of CCS DC fast charging is growing much faster than chademo. And and it also supports higher charging speeds. So this is going to have support for up to 130 kilowatts charging, the leaf plus can do 100 kilowatts. Now, although it's the cars capable of 100 kilowatts, but the fastest Pretty much the fastest chademo charges you'll find in the US are 50 kilowatts, I think

Dan Roth  1:29:05  
it's gonna be really, really pleasant to, to, to drive to own to operate because I was really impressed with the leaf Plus, I just thought it was just really, really well done. And it was just so normal. You know, it's like we were talking about before, like, just you got to drive an Eevee to experience like have that experience. It was just it didn't matter, that it was an Eevee it just did everything I needed to do and there was no compromise. You know, it's just right, other than having to fill it up with electricity.

Rebecca Lindland  1:29:37  
Sure, do we really want to mention still that the new the new drug that's on the market still anxious? That's right.

Dan Roth  1:29:43  
Yes.

Rebecca Lindland  1:29:46  
So Fiat Chrysler and Peugeot or PSA have combined and of course, they're, they're in the process of combining the end there's always been a lot of discussion as to what name they would come up with with all this essays and FCS and all these different things. And so the other day I was actually at the eye doctor with my mother. When Jeff Gilbert from WWE right now WWE, it's gonna be

Dan Roth  1:30:12  
every j it's a little different than the top rope.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:30:20  
Can't imagine Jeff sanding on the top right?

Rebecca Lindland  1:30:24  
debbie debbie j, it sends me a text that says, Hey, can I call you in five minutes to get your reaction and if you haven't seen the name of don't look. Alright, this is interesting. So after they kicked me out of the doctor's office for being on my cell phone, I went outside the parking lot and he said it and I was like my first thought and I couldn't say this for a wider spread audience because I didn't want to offend but it sounded like the stuttering sort of version of Atlantis. And I immediately called up the, the hotels that they have and I'd actually stayed near one in Dubai that has, you know, that very classic sort of etiquette. Hotel look, but that's what I my first thought was it sounds like a weird version of an undersea world. Later on, I saw people talking about how it sounds like a prescription medicine which I thought was absolutely

Dan Roth  1:31:13  
hilarious. Yeah, it does. It sounds odd like it sounds like the thing you'd see like you know, the two tubs on a hillside? Yes.

Rebecca Lindland  1:31:24  
With some appropriately aged couple there, right. You know, holding hands lightly with this with the champagne or the wine glass you have

Dan Roth  1:31:31  
those Boomer deficiencies

Sam Abuelsamid  1:31:33  
and it lasts for more than four hours

Dan Roth  1:31:37  
so yeah, I don't know where they where did they come up with still anticip they explained like what the

Sam Abuelsamid  1:31:43  
lat Yeah, yeah, there's there's a meaning to it.

Dan Roth  1:31:46  
It's Latin. What is it supposed to mean? bad name?

Rebecca Lindland  1:31:50  
No, Jeff said that press release was so flowery. He couldn't even really read it.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:31:54  
Okay. In the Latin verb Stella its stars right. That's

Dan Roth  1:31:59  
what I Thought about is like Stella is the star. So, Chrysler the penta star, so that makes some

Sam Abuelsamid  1:32:07  
okay. The d s brand uses kind of a star kind of logo. Okay, so the the best thing I saw you know somebody posted is like, just call it Jeep Incorporated. Yeah

Unknown Speaker  1:32:22  
right?

Dan Roth  1:32:24  
Well no then there'll be no parents organization for Jeep to kill

Sam Abuelsamid  1:32:30  
Jeep Jeep is the parasite that kills whatever organization it's embedded. Yeah.

Dan Roth  1:32:36  
Chief. You Yeah, I I don't know. I think we should we should get the wish to dramatic reading with music of the press.

Rebecca Lindland  1:32:47  
Exactly.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:32:50  
That to you to do. Okay.

Dan Roth  1:32:51  
I'll do it that I'm making a note now. Because I just like I mean, some some names like make sense. Like oh, Although you gotta admit like Daimler Chrysler was sort of blunt and Fiat Chrysler also sort of blunt like a Yeah, right, we know what you are but so I think that now they're they're trying to bring them both together maybe versus the amount

Rebecca Lindland  1:33:15  
of money that was spent because you know that they hired some schmancy fancy Miranda name branding name your branding company, the amount of money that was spent and that went everyone in the room went Oh, yes, please. This is like when the as check got approved for production somebody must have been paid off like

Dan Roth  1:33:39  
I would see as sick so

Rebecca Lindland  1:33:41  
yeah, I didn't mean to open up all

Dan Roth  1:33:43  
No, no, I just like I think that was one of those cars. Like it was a great idea. It was clearly it was a really good idea cuz like that's what the whole market is now. Their execution sucked on that. And

Rebecca Lindland  1:33:53  
well, and I'm rebranding from PSA, FCA or FCA PSA is a good idea, the execution on this site Yeah,

Dan Roth  1:34:00  
that's tricky. It's fine. You just

Sam Abuelsamid  1:34:02  
don't want to have just a string of random letters.

Rebecca Lindland  1:34:06  
When somebody pointed out you know, it's better than alphabet, and I'm like, Okay, I get that but alphabet was like it is sort of like just whatever this still lantis it does it does make it sound like something that should come with warning. Well,

Dan Roth  1:34:20  
so you know what our job as journalists is to use still lantis as little as possible if we hate it. We can talk about it. I certainly when they report sales, or, you know, profits and stuff at the corporate level, still lantis it is but then when we're talking about brands, the brands are what makes the company anyway So

Sam Abuelsamid  1:34:41  
the reality is, you know, most people don't talk about PSA. Either they talk about Cujo or Citroen or d s. Yeah.

Dan Roth  1:34:47  
Yeah. So maybe we can maybe we can just sort of bury the name.

Rebecca Lindland  1:34:52  
I like it.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:34:54  
Well, I mean, the the the parent company of FCA has a name to that. Nobody knows. what's what's the aniela family's holding company name? So yeah, exactly. So we'll we'll forget about Stella lantis. Anyway, what was that once the actual merger closes sometime next year? You know, we'll all forget about it except for the quarterly reports.

Rebecca Lindland  1:35:18  
And and we don't know what they're going to be on the stock exchange. Right. What they'll be What does

Sam Abuelsamid  1:35:27  
as well, they really that's what they should do. They should absolutely.

Dan Roth  1:35:32  
They could have just called it Stella. Stella.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:35:36  
I mean, probably you probably couldn't get a trademark on that though. Yeah, this is one of the problems Yeah, they have to have something that they can actually get a trademark on. So that's why they have to come up with these stupid names or, or weird spellings for existing words like entity with an AI Yes,

Rebecca Lindland  1:35:50  
but they right think

Dan Roth  1:35:52  
about the brand campaign you could run for that. Like you could introduce the whole company. You could just license that clip from on the waterfront. I mean,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:35:59  
so Haha. Perfect.

Rebecca Lindland  1:36:03  
Exactly.

Dan Roth  1:36:05  
All right. I'm done giving away free ideas. I have to pay me for more.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:36:11  
You can reach them at Dan at wheel bearings dot media.

Dan Roth  1:36:14  
Right, exactly. And we'll split it three ways because it's a collaborative here. All right, well, good. I think that is podcast 155. And if there's anything you guys want to talk about, feel free to hit us up, you know where to find us. And in the meantime, we'll keep an eye on things and we'll come back with our own things to chat about. Thanks. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai