transcript

This text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI's THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI's THE WORLD is the program audio.

MARCO WERMAN: We turn now to Robert Cumberford. He's an automotive designer and design critic who writes for car magazines in the United States and Italy. Mr. Cumberford joins us from the south of France. Welcome to the program.

ROBERT CUMBERFORD: Thank you very much.

WERMAN: Now, the new Fiat Cinquecento, the 500, was voted Design Car of the Year 2009. And to a great degree, it's been fundamental in revitalizing Fiat. What's so great about the Fiat 500?

CUMBERFORD: It's charming. It's – for the Italians, it has the value of a symbol, like the revived pint-sized Mini that BMW builds that evokes the 1958 Mini Miner. It evokes the past. It makes people smile.

WERMAN: And the fact that the new 500 has a sticker, base sticker price of $12,000 dollars will probably be a really good thing for Chrysler, now that it looks like Fiat will take an initial 20 percent stake in the American company, don't you think?

CUMBERFORD: No, I don't think so. It's a mistake to think that very many people will want to buy that car to use in the United States. It's basically too small to appeal to Americans who don't have any real need for small cars. They have a need for efficient cars, for fuel economy; they have a need for style, but not really for small cars.

WERMAN: But I thought the redesigned Mini Cooper, which you mentioned earlier had been – is very popular here in the US.

CUMBERFORD: It is very popular, but the point is the Fiat is simply too small to be of great appeal. If you put more overweight Americans, about 60 percent of the population, into a Fiat 500, it's barely going to move. I think everybody will say, “Oh, that Fiat 500 is really cute. I'd like to buy it for the kids. I'd like for you to buy one, but I don't want it.” If it's $12,000 dollars they might sell 20 or 30,000. But that's not very many cars in a market which at its worst in many, many years is going to be around 10 million.

WERMAN: Well, as we heard in Katy Clark's piece just a moment ago, the head of Fiat, Sergio Marchionne, was educated in North America and seen by some as a smart, fast, and adaptable manager. What else does he and Fiat offer the American market for the kind of cars that they want, but also the kind of cars that, you know, we need? I mean, we're being told “fuel efficient, efficient, and light”.

CUMBERFORD: Light is good. Henry Ford embraced lightness as one of his operating principles, and Ford cars were light and quick during his entire lifetime. So when Marchionne, who is a very smart man, says that it's necessary to have more efficient cars, that's true. But I don't think they need to be small to be efficient. What is really necessary in Chrysler is better quality of manufacture. Chrysler cars have, in recent times, when Tom Gail was in charge of design, they were very attractive but they were not very reliable. The Chrysler 300 is a powerful styling statement, quite a good car with mediocre build quality. It's a car which could be revived with some of the efficient engines – Chrysler engineering being very good right through all of the crises they've been through. But I don't see how Fiat could help them with that. It's a question of having money. The biggest thing Fiat could do for Chrysler, I suppose, is to have Marchionne come and run it. But I don't think he can run Chrysler and Fiat sensibly. I don't think Carlos Gone has proven he can run Nissan and Renault, and he has had to seek out very strong lieutenants to run each company.

WERMAN: Chrysler does have some new models coming out, some with hybrid technology, and Fiat has its own hybrid technology. I'm wondering if you think that's a good combination?

CUMBERFORD: I don't see why not. But again, there's no magic bullet. In a meeting I attended in Portugal last year, Carlos Gone said they had commissioned a study which had investigated mergers in the automobile industry. And he said every single one without exception had resulted in a loss of value. Ford took on Volvo, Land Rover, Jaguar. General Motors took over Opel, over Oxel, over Saab. All of those things lost value, so I don't quite see how Fiat and Chrysler, two wounded companies in difficulty, are going to prop each other up. It would be nice if they can hold each other up, but I don't see how.

WERMAN: Robert Cumberford, automotive design editor for Automobile Magazine. Thanks very much for your time.

CUMBERFORD: You're most welcome.

Copyright ©2008 PRI's THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI's THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World's Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.