Just found this list from Road & Track, 13 Great Cars That Nobody Bought in 2015. Probably just illustrates the slow death of the 2 seat sports car.

Dodge Viper - 676
Nissan GT-R - 1105
Chevrolet SS - 2895
Porsche Boxster - 3102
Porsche Cayman - 3561
Jaguar F-Type - 4629
Subaru BR-Z
Volkswagen CC
Scion FR-S
BMW 2-Series
Buick Regal
Ford Flex
Nissan Juke

 

kind of a silly article, actually. The number of F-Types bought would really only have meaning if we knew how many were imported...

 

...Nissan Juke.

 

Seem to me to be quite a lot of boxsters, caymans and BRZs around here, not that many f-types, but I do see them.

 

I have owned 3 cars on the list

 

The first six on the list were intended to be low volume, somewhat exclusive vehicles. As a Supra owner, I had high hopes for Toyota's re-entry into the sports car scene, but recently, they announced they were ditching the whole Scion brand as it didn't ever hit the target market. Scion was supposed to appeal to the youth market, but the average buyer age was 49.

I work in the transit industry and so sort of follow the theories about changes in driving behavior. Don't believe much of it. Kids want to drive as much as ever, but cars keep getting more and more expensive in relation to disposable income. Its actually misleading that the consumer price index is adjusted to consider the added value of all the safety equipment in modern cars. Its not as if you can opt to buy a base model without airbags. Plus kids are making less money today and have expenses that we never dreamed of 25+ years ago, like cell phone, internet, satellite tv, netflix, etc. Most young people are only going to be able to keep ONE car which has to serve every need, thus the four-door sport sedan was born. And very few young people can afford a brand new one. Most buy used and can't justify the added expense of all the performance upgrades.

I liked the recent Mazda Miata commercial that showed a teenager buying a 25 year old beater Miata, later a minivan and even much later in life as grey hair sets in, another Miata. If his own kids don't wind up living at home well into their 30s, he might buy a NEW sports car when he retires, but the economics don't look good for large volume sports car sales. There will still be some around in 30 years from now, just probably pricey ones like at the top of the list.

 

Second only to the Pontiac Aztec on ugliness.

 

expensive, low production 2 seat sportscars are low volume sellers compared to civics and F150's, who woulda thought?? LOL


Dave

 

The limited market for 2 seaters is nothing new. They've always been limited sellers going back to the end of WWII. Actually, I suspect they're selling better today than they were 50-60 years ago.

One need to look no further than the introduction of 1964.5 Ford Mustang. With no competition to speak of, it sold 1 million or so cars during the first MY because it tapped into an explosive and pent-up demand for a sporty car w/ 4 seats. It created an entirely new market, which is still going strong.

 

I'm pretty surprised by this list. My office is OBSESSED with BR-Zs. Probably 20% of people have them. There's at least one in every color they offer. There's also at least a couple BMW 2-series.

 

The Toyota 86 version of the BRZ is everywhere, Ther will be one in 7/10 of every set of cars waiting at traffic lights I reckon.

 

I bought my XKR-S new at 35... 4 yrs ago.... i had no kids, no wife, and disposable income. Thats the only reason I could buy a new 2 door sports coupe... and it was a stretch at that!!!

 

I know it's already been pointed out, but these are everywhere. I find it hard to believe they'd be in the top 13 of lowest sales. Not to get off topic, but I can't at all understand why they don't offer a 2.5 liter turbo engine option. I had one in my WRX and it beats the snot out of a 2.0 liter non-turbo.

The feds have to hide the true regulatory costs of all the additions they force upon us. Sure, the additional value it there. But people are left with less money to buy other things.

 

Apparently the data suggests less ownership, more sharing services where you pick up a car and borrow it, but I agree with you... there's a certain freedom allowed, and I believe there is still enough of a car culture in *certain* parts of the US that it's not going away anytime soon. As less ownership happens in urban areas, and driverless rises (later than sooner), it will be fascinating to see the people like you and me who love driving and want to be on the road with these automotons. It will be weird. I wonder if there will be a point where people are regulated out of driving privileges because of safety reasons, etc. Soon, insurance will be far, FAR too expensive for only but the most affluent.

Quick ramble on how driverless will be a pretty significant economic shift:
https://plus.google.com/+MichaelHraba/posts/P35d2JnjPEE

At least scroll to the article to read about insurance....

But your other point about the cost of cars is why I own an F-Type. I know it can be specious reasoning, but I started out looking for a new car about 10 years ago, thinking of fuel efficiency and safety. As I saved up (wanted to pay cash), it became fairly obvious that the price range of cars from the 1990's, that had cars from $9K, was long gone. I can only assume this has to do with the computers, safety measures, and cost of materials? What else?

I was thinking of a range of cars, but a 4 door Wrangler got into the high 50's. A WRX Forester got somewhere near there. It's insane how expensive cars are. I never would have considered BMW, Audi, Lexus, or Infiniti... they are everywhere and indistinguishable, much of their product and service suffering in recent years. But that's when the F-Type had come along, and it's the only car in modern time that would catch my attention, every single time.

When the manual was announced, it was all over. The base price is **absurd**. The value here vs the market? There is no conversation - F-Type is the best value on the market. They slashed the prices this year, 2017: http://www.carscoops.com/2016/02/jag...ry-2017-f.html

Of course, I made it wildly more expensive with all the options, etc... but I have never had a more enjoyable experience in my life (save my actual life and wife and such)

Yes. too much coffee today. pardon

 

I do believe the paradigm of two or more cars in every suburban garage is in jeopardy with the coming of driverless cars. I'm probably the only one who has thought about it but the first casualty will likely be public transit. That freedom you mentioned becomes more available to young people who can't afford a car and insurance. It will seriously lower the income threshold for transit dependency and give all commuters another very appealing choice.
If you really stop and think about it, owning a car that remains parked for 22 hours a day isn't very efficient use of your money. Jaguars aside, mostly what you're paying for is that convenience that it's ready to go whenever you are. When an autonomous car can be summoned in five minutes, that advantage of the personal automobile is gone.
But all is not doom and gloom. When the average family no longer needs cars for both spouses and two teenagers, garage space and disposable income will be available for something cool like an F-type or a classic or antique car just for fun.

 

While driverless cars may be widely available in the not-to-distant future, autonomous driverless cars that can be summoned by anyone wanting transportation will be a much longer time in coming. For probably decades to come, regulators will insist upon human monitors to intervene in "driverless" vehicles if necessary.

 

The Gif below (please please work NB: IT DID NOT: https://imgur.com/gallery/guTGTMx) shows what a big intersection of driverless cars would look like... no stoplights, no signals. Nothing. Could you imagine sitting in one of those cars? Anyway, that's a legitimate study done for how the algorithms will sort through that much information.

Okay... I am going to copy and paste that ramble of just some destabilizing and impacting parts of the new autonomous car culture....


As to your comment, I don't disagree. It's just too much fun to speculate. This is my happy-dork-economist place I think it *becomes* the new public transportation (alongside metro rail stuff, hyperloop lol).

I personally (uninformed as I am) think it will be the auto manufacturers who take the hit, not public trasnpo. Probably only 3-5 auto manufacturers will survive, aside from luxury production houses. Low to mid range cars will finally complete their march towards becoming a commodity, and no one will care what they are in, Toyota, Hyundai, etc. No one who likes Uber cares, unless they specify a black car.

So in that, I think cities will run this commodity, because it doesn't really make sense to have some sort of competitive playing field, because then you will have a crush of cars at unnecessary times, etc or a glut when it's dead. There's no reason to have capitalistic even-playing-field competitive landscape here? I think this becomes a new segment of public transportation??

Below are just a few things I was musing about:
---------------------------------------------

I think most disruption is myth, and agree the marketing of the “sharing economy” sounds better as “disaster capitalism”, but it applies here, for sure. Sharing simply means a more European rental based economy. I am not sure why that's hard to understand but we're still calling networked servers "the cloud".

Ownership has declined. Ownership continues to decline.

Car companies face massive decrease in production levels

Car companies invest everything in driverless cars to compete, regardless of known outcome.

Combine a reduction of ownership and increased efficiency of on demand, driverless cars devastates majority of automotive industry. 30-40% manufacturers out of business in 15 years.

Surviving companies pitted in battle of 3 markets: low, mid range, and luxury.

Low and mid range driverless cars become a utility and commodity.
urban and residential parking collapses.
…..States / Cities / communities run on demand fleets residential and commercial
… to make up for the lost revenues from parking enforcement and parking lots.

Parking lots become charging hubs for fleets. Less need for them frees up real estate. Property prices drop, as a result… Urban real estate takes a hit when garages don't add a premium.

Cars abide laws and go the speed limit... so a reduction of traffic policing and law, reduction of courts and legal bureaucracy (all associated revenues and costs), reduction of prison sentences due to less drunk convictions.

Reduction of revenues of gas taxes.

Reduction of auto service, utter destruction of body shop and car repair business. …. if cars end up electric, even further dismantling of auto infrastructure and service

Car washes go away because they become internally corporatized.

Fuel industry alters drastically. Non convenient gas stations all close.

All commercial and private driving jobs disappear, as it will be too expensive to employ humans from a liability perspective. Trucking, limos, cabs, auto dealers, etc

Many stop lights, street lights, and other city utilities are pointless as cars can see in the dark.

Luxury market of driverless owned cars flourishes. They become luxury apartments on wheels, altering the need to live in one place, own/rent city property.

Driving becomes too expensive for "normal" humans, resultingly making it ann elite activity as insurance premiums are far, far too expensive to own and drive a car as a human being. I wonder when able bodied humans will be restricted / denied driving as a privilege.
------------------------------

 

I get the excitement and furor, for sure, and I get that the news has to sensationalize everything.... the impact will be very, very real. Sea change moment. But it is so far off.

Also... a quick analogy to your "human monitors" comment. My friend works as one of those drivers for google, and he reminded me of something....

One of my first jobs at a historic hotel was an elevator operator. An old Otis... human operators used to be required, and demanded.

When elevators started becoming automatic, there was massive skepticism, to the point that modern push button elevators had to provide staff to push the buttons and operate the elevator because people were scared and didn't trust them. =^D

I am sure there are other analogies out there, but that's fairly apt!


Conan O'Brien made a joke about it... he doesn't know when driverless cars are coming, but when they're here, there's one thing for sure... wherever we're going, we'll be drunk when we get there.

 

I read another interesting article this morning about another unresolved issue w/ driverless technology: how to deal with problems associated with malicious, "hacking." And by hacking, they weren't necessarily referring to attacks on the computer systems (although that will be a safety issue as well), but simple things like tossing or waving things in front of these vehicles freaking out the sensors and triggering instant gridlock.

And yes, the laws of unintended consequences almost always present myriad unforeseen surprises.