Jeep First American Brand To Enter Japan COTY Top 10
October 18th, 2014 9:36 AM
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While the new Mazda2 — Demio to its friends in Japan — took home the overall gold in this year’s Japanese Car of the Year awards, Jeep took home a JCOTY, too, the first time an American brand has ever accomplished the feat.
AutoGuide reports the Cherokee took eighth place among the top 10 list, the third Fiat Chrysler Japan product in a row to do so after the Fiat Panda and Alfa Romeo Giulietta. The crossover went on sale in Japan in May 2014.
Among the transplants, the Mercedes C-Class took a close second behind the Demio, the BMW i3 won the bronze, and the Peugeot 308 came in sixth place. Subaru’s Levorg wagon was the next highest-placing home model.
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Built in Ohio exported to Japan
I do think the title of this article is verging on spin or deceit. Is the author a politician? The Jeep isn't the COTY in Japan the Mazda Demio is. This would be more apt for a title - "Jeep has made it into Japan's COTY top 10". But, it good to see the Jeep there, even though it is a global product.
Jeep survived as an American icon after WW2, and even survived the merger of equal’s disaster. However, it did not survive the Fiat takeover. The Japanese auto press is really celebrating the end of jeep as an American icon. If they gave the award to a real American vehicle like the ATS that would be a different story. Didn't Consumer Report just put three Jeeps on its not recommended list?
To be honest average Japanese are not interested to COTY event at all. Result tends to be an effort of bribing the journalist,which eventually brought up another RJC award as antitheses. as the influence of the award declined, less budget seems to be allocated here. It's now a days euro imported biased car magazine editor's internal event of picking up own favorite car.