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I don’t expect Saab to rate that well in a survey like this, but I do expect them to rate a little better, especially in one particular area.
The Consumer Reports 2009 Brand Perception Survey relies on CR calling 2000 people and asking them various questions to do with cars. More to the point, it relies on those randomly chosen people actually knowing a thing or two about cars.
How many of those will have ever heard of Saab?
Over all, Saab rated in the bottom five of all brands mentioned by the people surveyed.
The top five brands were as follows:
Toyota – 193 points
Honda – 149 points
Ford – 109 points
Cadillac – 102 points
Mercedes Benz – 100 points
The bottom five were as follows:
Jeep – 21 points
Hummer – 19 points
Saab – 18 points
Mazda – 17 points
Suzuki – 7 points
I can (almost) live with that. Saab are so small that I’m not surprised they rate low in a survey like this, though I’d prefer them to rate about 10 points higher so that they’re in that middle ground that isn’t mentioned at all.
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Consumer Reports asked questions on seven different key areas to do with cars: safety, quality, value, performance, environmentally friendly, design/style and technology/innovation.
The bugbear here is the Safety category. I can’t see the full results table on the CR web page but the top five finishers were as follows:
Volvo: 71%
Ford: 19%
Honda: 18%
Toyota: 16%
Mercedes Benz: 15%
Obviously those numbers add up to more than 100%. I don’t know how many brands CR asked people to list in their group of top brands for safety, but Volvo were in the group of named brands for 71% of the respondents.
If Saab were mentioned by any respondents at all, then it was less than 15% of them. And that’s criminal.
I guess this all comes down to a lack of exposure. If Saab were quite rightly recognised in this group (how the heck did Honda get in there?) then they’d have had enough exposure to be recognised in a few other categories, too. They may not crack top five in those categories, but at least they may not end up being bottom five over all.
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The lesson:
Saab’s got legitimate claims for better appreciation amongst the motoring community. The fact that they’ve fared so poorly in this survey is reflection on how little recognition there is the US about Saab vehicles in general.
Saab don’t need to be known by everyone. They just need to be known by everyone that matters. But it’s frustrating to see a brand that’s manufactured just an hour down the road from Trollhattan get so much kudos for something that Saab should probably equally well known for.
The challenge for any future Saab management is make sure that Saab gets their due. They deserve better than this but they won’t get it, or more interest in some excellent vehicles, until people know more about them.
12 responses so far ↓
1 Rogan
// Jan 9, 2009 at 1:46 pm
GMC in the top 5 eco friendly!
Lexus is the most stylish?
Wow.
2 Kroum
// Jan 9, 2009 at 1:51 pm
Saab’s got no one but themselves to blame for faring poorly. How are people supposed to know Saabs are safer than Volvos if Saab never told them?
3 Bruce
// Jan 9, 2009 at 2:53 pm
I don’t think these numbers mean much at all. “Jeep” is a word known by anyone and applied to every brand of 4wdriver from Suzukis on up. And Mazda at the same level. I agree that Saab is not a widely recognized brand, but the sample is meaningless. I’d like to know how well it places in a sample of the demographic Saab is trying to sell to, such as folks who buy VW Passats or Audis or C-Series Mercs, even Volvos and sportier Japanese cars such as the G35, etc. The only Toyota owners who might be targets are in Celicas and their derivatives. Top 10s and Bottom 10s are pretty useless.
If there is anything positively interesting in the data it is that 18% of the people surveyed know that Saab is a car, and any slice of that 18% would be a great gain for Saab sales. Chevy needs 100% brand recognition; Saab does not. Saab marketing follks do want to know something about that 18% and probably have that info in hand. The challenge is getting a message to the new car buyers among them (us) relatively inexpensively.
Happy 2009 everyone.
B
4 brian griffin
// Jan 9, 2009 at 4:25 pm
reminds of having to call for a tow a couple years ago when my 9-5’s throttle body bit the dust.
the driver asked who made saabs. Saab, I told him. hmmm, he said, sizing it up, I don’t guess I’ve ever seen one of them before…
still, I must be a loser with CR, since the only other car I’ve had in the past 20 years besides saabs has been a mazda…
5 Karen
// Jan 9, 2009 at 5:33 pm
The GM era lost an entire generation of Saabistas in the U.S.
But Bruce makes a good point. Until recently, Saab was ’sponsoring’ PBS Nightly NewsHour.
Best kept secret are in those safety rankings.
6 Nigel
// Jan 9, 2009 at 5:56 pm
The statistics are indeed sad from a SAAB perspective but not surprising. SAAB have spent most of the past 15 years with one new model that is not “different” to the general car owner. It is just another car.
The current crisis has not helped but if SAAB are to survive in any form other than us sad people with fond memory of the glory days, they neeed to stop p*ss*** about with concepts and design exercises and put real cars, with real personalities on the road and shout from the hilltops about how great they are.
7 MikeT
// Jan 9, 2009 at 7:44 pm
I think the wheels rather fell off the safety thing when the SAAB name was bolted onto vehicles NOT engineered by SAAB. Also there is little safety innovation from SAAB these days. Volvo are still launching vehicles with safety “firsts,” e.g. City Safety on the new XC60.
8 saabyurk
// Jan 9, 2009 at 11:24 pm
My favorite response when someone asks me why I drive a Saab is “Because it’s the safest midsize car in the world.” (Actually not my no. 1 reason). I just like to look at their wrinkled expressions as they utter something like “But I thought Volvo…”. Then I tell them to check IIHS and they say “What’s that?”
9 Andy Rupert
// Jan 10, 2009 at 12:40 am
Swade and saabyurk,
Having worked at a Volvo dealership for only seven months, my comments are more impressions than facts. However, I have noticed that the current Volvos and SAABs(2006- ) seem to be different in their sturdiness. Volvo doors are thick and heavy while SAAB doors are thin and light. Both brands are noted for their safety, but there is a perception that Volvos are more safe because of things like that.
10 MikeT
// Jan 10, 2009 at 12:43 am
I thought IIHS gave Volvo Top Safety Pick for 3 models, S80, XC90, C70? Also Ford Taurus which is built on a Volvo platform. 9-7x got a big red P, which is the point I was making.
11 Ying
// Jan 10, 2009 at 4:50 am
Please allow me to say this:
“Consumers” are idiots. At least the majority, 90% of them out there, that rely on other people ‘telling’ them what they want, instead of investigating and thinking about what they themselves really want.
12 Rune (the other one)
// Jan 10, 2009 at 11:52 pm
Andy, your comment is a bit surprising as SAAB’s doors are usually considered heavy. Wasn’t it 9000 that could swap doors with Fiat, but the SAAB’s version of those doors were much heavier?
I also think you need to compare the A and B pillars. The door is relatively small. If there is a collision, I would think that the B pillar (which should run all the way to the bottom of the car, no?) would take most of the impact.
SAAB, I am told, uses solid steel, wheras Volvo usually press steel plates together?
Have you weighed both sets of doors? What is the difference in weight?
folksam.se gives SAAB’s older models (MY03) top rating, whereas Volvos do not quite manage to reach the same rating. folksam.se does not comment on more recent models since it takes time before a significant number of a given model has been involved in serious accidents. Maybe Volvo has changed the mix somewhat since then, but…