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Spot The Shark-Jumper
by
Edward Niedermeyer
(IC: employee)
Published: October 15th, 2009
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Is it Motor Trend for giving the Outback an “SUV of the Year” award, or is it “the original SUV alternative” for being in contention at all?
Edward Niedermeyer
More by Edward Niedermeyer
Published October 15th, 2009 11:43 AM
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Motor Trend? Ha. I read Peter Egan's column and occasional articles while standing next to the magazine rack in the grocery store. The COTY dealie is really nothing more than a perk tossed to the manufacturer who spent most on MT ads last year. But buy a copy of that rag? Never. And Car & Driver? Same thing, except now that Bedard has been canned and Phillips is getting older it takes
The only thing that's going to keep Motor Trend magazine alive is their licensing agreements with car dealers, along with the stuff that's sold at Pep Boys and AutoZone with the Motor Trend label on it. Cycle World can't be too far behind.
At the beginning of the car award process, MT sits down with manufacturers with a new or refreshed car that "qualifies" for consideration(advertisers) and discusses the parameters of the "award." As in, if you win, here's how much advertising we'd like you to put in our magazine. And if you win, here's how much it'll cost you to license our COTY award (or SUVOTY or TOTY or whatever other category of the year they're peddling). And we get paid for those mentions in any media in which you say it. BTW, there's a minimum figure for licensing...and it just goes up from there. Then we'll need a few "long term testers" to add to our fleet so our editors can drive for free. Then MT sits back and lets the bidding begin. Highest bidder = award! (Oh, and Subaru will be giving MT an -- wait for it, spoiler alert -- exclusive on the debut of their new Toyoburu sports car as part of this Outback deal.) MT may be a dinosaur, but they're still riding this scam straight to the tar pit.
re: DweezilSFV - I dunno. Chyrsler did offer a 10 yr/100K mile on their powertrains in the late 80s. However, this was far before the internet so I have very little proof other than the anecdotal. I remember clearly my mother purchasing an '89 Dodge Shadow ES Turbo and her big claim on it was the 10 yr/100K mile powertrain warranty. Which we used when I blew up the turbo at 49K miles. The bumper to bumper was only good for 7/7.