I feel old;

[Steve Sears]

Dan,
The UA debacle is a faded memory for most people.  Following side saddle gas
tank rigging, The Insider movie, and the numerous "infotainment"
open-mouth-insert-foot reports, it seems like the UA piece is seen as the BS
that it was.  There are tons of 5k's still on the roads - most people I talk
to are quite impressed with how good my car looks for an 18 year old car.
Most of the competing products at the time are either rust buckets and/or
look quite dated.  Look at how welcome Edsel owners are at Ford events,
Corvair owners are at GM events - the domestics are not hiding their
history - far from it.  Possibly ACI will address the lack of support for
the "Oldtimers" - time will tell.
Auto Union - the four rings - were selling cars in the US and Canada in the
late 50's - then owned by Mercedes Benz and used as an entry into the
smaller/less expensive vehicle market.  The cars were imported to North
America by Studebaker.  The four rings had somewhat a following at the time,
as one of the founders of Mosport International Raceway was the DKW Owners
Club (now the Toronto Autosport Club) founded in 1956.
Cheers!
Steve Sears
1987 Audi 5kTQ
1980 Audi 5k
1962 and '64 Auto Union DKW Junior deLuxes

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Dan DiBiase" <d_dibiase at yahoo.com>
To: "c dyer" <cdyer_2000 at yahoo.com>; <steve.sears at soil-mat.on.ca>; "audi
fans" <quattro at audifans.com>
Sent: Friday, June 17, 2005 10:26 AM
Subject: Re: I feel old;


> --- c dyer <cdyer_2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > I think Audi, indeed most manufacturers, are missing
> > the boat on heritage. Of course looking forward is
> > important, but part of building a brand is reinforcing
> > your brand's history. This also displays to the
> > potential customer that you're proud, that you're
> > important, etc etc. M-B does a fairly good job of
> > this, as does Jag. Audi not at all really. Toyota
> > would measure in negative numbers.
> >
> > I learned all about branding and the importance of
> > company history at B&O...heritage was a great tool to
> > educate customers who had never heard of us.
>
> Perhaps - but I don't think Audi will be featuring any 5000's in it's
> advertising any time soon! The UA fiasco may be keeping them from going
> too far back. No sense in reminding people about that, even though most
> everyone agrees now that it wasn't as it was reported (surprise!)... It's
> also hard for Audi to do a heritage campaign like Mercedes has done
> recently, mainly because most of the car companies that eventually became
> the Audi brand were never really sold their cars here before the late
> '60's.
>
> Dan D
> '04 A4 1.8Tq MT-6
> Central NJ USA
>
>