...He says Acura's oft-maligned grille may have gone too far in the past. But the look is growing on people, he says, and the basic design language will stay, albeit toned down a bit.
"We concede that we went a little overboard at some points," Minami said in a recent interview. "We actually had pretty bad feedback on this initially from different directions. But we are not going to buckle under that pressure."...
..."There hasn't been that great of a change, but maybe people have gotten used to it," Minami said of the grille. "There may be small evolutions here or there in details."
Minami says he wants to make the Honda brand sportier and more active, closer to Acura's traditional territory. In turn, Acura will be "going further out, maybe pursuing premium."...
Minami, who penned the NSX concept, worked in the early 2000s as lead exterior designer on the Acura TL and second-generation Acura RL, neither of which had the keen-edge grille.
...In May of 2009, Jim Collins, an author who contributes to the Harvard Business Review and other business journals, published How the Mighty Fall. In the book, Collins describes the five stages of demise in the world of modern business. They are:
Stage 1: Hubris Born of Success
Stage 2: Undisciplined Pursuit of More
Stage 3: Denial of Risk and Peril
Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation
Stage 5: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death
...Let there be no doubt, Honda still is a viable business. But every new product that doesn’t match up to its predecessor siphons off a bit of the company’s strength. Each wrong move places the firm one step farther down the same path walked by GM from January 1981 until June 2009.
^ IMHO I think the previous version looks even better, a friend of mine had one for a few years and the whole proportions of that car just looked right
...Its design gets much of the blame for its lack of acceptance, said Dave Sargent, vice president of global automotive for J.D. Power.
“The Crosstour has unusual styling, shall we say, and it’s not to everyone’s taste,” he said. “I think people who are in the market for that kind of vehicle may lean toward a more-traditional model...”
He cites the infamous example of a vehicle done in by a bold design, the Pontiac Aztek, sold from 2001 to 2005. In the auto industry, these are fighting words, so he made sure to specify that the Aztek was the “most-extreme example” of what he’s seeing with the Crosstour.
“It has a very polarizing design,” said Jessica Caldwell, senior analyst for Edmunds.com. “ People either really like it or really don’t like it.”
She notes that her hairdresser is among the people who love the car...
...sales have continued to fall. From January through May, dealers sold 7,137 of the model, down 17 percent from the same period last year. And last year’s sales were down 38 percent from 2010.
Honda introduced the vehicle in 2009, initially calling it the Accord Crosstour. The company’s goal was to reach about one-tenth of the sales level of its flagship sedan, the Accord. To hit that target, the model would need to have sold about 5,000 more units so far this year...
Well, Acura, congratulations on your attitude, because your cars ARE ugly! My gawd, what an admission! That they tinkered with their grille did not really help too much. That said, I am pleased that spy shots/guesses about the new Lincoln grille show that they are on their way to ditching the "baleen whale" grille, which has to be one of the ugliest in all of auto-dom.
slow day & didn't find a recent (post-NAIAS) NSX thread...
...tho the thread Title *might* apply
via Austin.Cooper @ MTforum"When I first saw pics of the new NSX, I can't say I was blown away by it...
...I concur with Mr Cumberford regarding the NSX's looks, or to put it in plain English "it's just too busy!"..."
By Design: 2016 Acura NSX - AutomobileMag
January 26, 2015
By: Robert Cumberford
...see Alfa Romeo for proof that you can do a mid-engine sports coupe bearing visual links to a brand’s past and strong marks of identity, neither of which are present in the new NSX. Who has ever asked for a fat chrome bar across the nose of a sports car? Why in the world would you stick three grilles and a chin scoop on the nose of a sports car, especially if the biggest, shiniest, and most prominent one is a complete fake, a solid barrier shield with merely a few tiny holes on the bottom row that air can pass through? Why injection-mold plastic to simulate a woven-wire grille texture like a ’20s Bentley? And if glossy black is the right finish for a simulated stone guard, why not use that finish on the other two grilles defacing the front surface of the car?...
...FRONT
1. This clumsy chunk might be an Acura brand-identity cue, but it’s vulgar and overdone on every Acura, even SUVs, and completely inappropriate on a car of this nature...
10. Twelve headlamps seem a bit too show-car fussy for a production vehicle. One hopes they light the road well. ..
...REAR
18. Is this very racy-looking diffuser actually wind-tunnel-developed for downforce or just a clever cosmetic styling effect? It looks convincingly real.
19. Multiple exhaust pipes have two shapes: round outers and rounded-rectangle inners. One wonders why. And why frame them in a rounded trapezoid?...
...INTERIOR
24. More of the excessive dulled-metal finish with a tortured shape. I expect something with more clarity of purpose in a sports car...
It's expected to see the MKZ sales to decline when the Fusion is better looking and cheaper. The MKZ is an Azera/Sonata with Pontiac/Oldsmobile grille. It needs to redesigned asap.
Actually, I like the MKT. And, I agree with Wings, that the MKT is an excellent vehicle. But, it has a face only a mother could love. The current split wing grille looks weird and the mustache in the lower bumper kills the front end.
The hideous split wing grille needs to go. It works fine on CUVs but not on cars. The oldsmobile/Pontiac grille needs to go. And, the MKZ needs to be refreshed asap. It looks like a fancy Sonata.
Instead of ranting for at least the fourth time to you specifically about your comments about current Lincoln grilles (which seem to be some of the only comments you bother to make lately on this forum, which I'd like to point out is a waste of your own time, not to mention others') and why your comments are ridiculous, I'm just going to say two things:
1: It is the design direction they have taken to establish a brand identity.
2: GET OVER IT AND FIND SOMETHING NEW TO TALK ABOUT
Haha definitely not hurting my feelings, just getting OLD is all.
Also this is a discussion about Acura in a thread about Acura in the "Asian Competition" section! Sure Lincoln is relevant, hence the term "competition", but I think by now WE GET HOW YOU FEEL about the grilles!! No need to (routinely) hijack threads NOT about Lincolns and mention Lincoln grilles!
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