DETROIT—Concept cars at the North American International Auto Show are testing the adage that you can sell a young man's car to an old man, but not the other way around. (I attended the press preview; the show opens to the public on January 13 and runs through January 21). Some prototypes here target baby boomers and empty nesters, with retro styling and plenty of room inside for things but not for children.
The prototypes include the boomer-specific Nissan Bevel and Ford Airstream, which are smaller than SUVs (or minivans), hold a lot of stuff, but may target the members of the Vietnam War-and-disco generation that don't need to haul around kids. Other prototypes are tributes to 1960s muscle cars such as the Ford Interceptor sedan and recreations of muscle cars such as the Chevrolet Camaro and Dodge Charger, which hope to follow the success path of the reinvigorated Ford Mustang (already out with 167,000 sales in 2006).
The "heritage" campaign is mostly American, because Japanese cars of a generation ago (other than the Datsun 240Z) were downright homely, and European cars other than high-end BMW, Mercedes, and Porsche weren't such visual feasts either. Anyway, the retro/heritage approach is not a guaranteed success. Ford's resurrected Thunderbird was a flop; but then, it was pretty funny-looking.
Fuel efficiency and technology also keyed the 100th edition of the Detroit show. General Motors unveiled its anticipated Chevrolt Volt hybrid that can run 40 miles on battery power and another 600 on a small gasoline or diesel engine. And Ford showed off its phone and music linking alliance with Microsoft, called Sync.
Check out our slideshow of NAIAS highlights.
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