Luxury cars are not what they used to be – except in terms of what they cost. Another way to put this is that ordinary cars have become hard to distinguish from luxury cars – except in terms of what they cost.
A case in point – the 2025 Kia K4 – showed up in my driveway yesterday. It could pass for a Mercedes – in every way except what it costs, which is just under $22k to start. But look what you get for that – and then look at what you get for Mercedes (and BMW and all the rest of them) money.
It was about 15 years ago that Mercedes and the rest of them began to replace dial-and-needle gauges (as well as buttons and knobs) with Stark Trek: The Next Generation-style flat screen displays. At first, it was – literally – like nothing else. Because only the most expensive luxury cars had them. Ordinary cars still had dial-and-needle gauges and buttons and knobs to control things like the fan speed and radio.
But – inevitably – the flatscreen displays and tap/swipe smartphone-way of controlling the various functions filtered down to mid-priced luxury models and then to everything else. Now – today – you can buy a new Kia K4 that has an entirely flatscreen dash display that looks almost exactly like what I first saw in a $100k Mercedes S-Class back circa 2015.
But it doesn’t cost $100k to get the Kia.
Meanwhile, the Mercedes costs more than $100k to start now – and what do you get for that? Put another way, is it not a little cheap to discover that what you get for $100k-plus is pretty the same as what the person who buys a Kia for not much more than $22k gets?
“Cheap” being precisely the right word – because these flatscreen displays are the one thing that has gotten cheaper to make – and so to sell – over the past ten years. A 50 inch flatscreen “smart” TV that cost $1,000 in 2015 can now be bought on sale for $299 at Wal Mart. The flatscreen displays embedded in cars are not much different in that everyone can afford one of them now, too. More finely, even Kia – and this not meant as an insult; far from it – can offer essentially the same thing in an entry-level sedan that just a few years ago you could only get in a top-of-the-line Mercedes, BMW or Audi (et al).
Consider the implications of this for Mercedes, BMW, Audi (et al).
Arguably, it was a huge mistake for these high-end brands to go all-in on flatscreens because now everyone has flatscreens – because everyone can afford to install and sell them. This takes away greatly from the exclusivity one used to get for the money when you spent Mercedes, BMW or Audi (et al) money. If anything, the flatscreens make those high-end cars look common, even cheap – despite their expense. There is nothing very exclusive about owning a big screen TV when there’s one inside every single-wide down at the trailer park.
It might be a smart idea for Mercedes, et al to get rid of the flatscreens and replace them with what cannot be cheaply manufactured and sold, such as jeweled, chronograph-style instruments – perhaps set in real machine-turned facings or surrounded by hand-cut wood fitted to each car by a craftsman rather than extruded by a machine and cheaply snapped into place.
That would justify the Mercedes, et al, money.
There is another, more serious aspect of the cheapening that has taken place over roughly the past 15 years. This Kia K4 comes with a four cylinder engine – which is what you’d expect to get in a car with a starting price just under $22k. But it is startling to discover that $50k luxury-brand cars sold by Mercedes, BMW, Audi (et al) also come standard with four cylinder engines. Cars in that price range used to always come with a six at the least – because that’s what was expected for that kind of money.
What happened?
Mercedes, BMW, Audi and the rest faced the same compliance pressure (to increase gas mileage and reduce the “emissions” of the gas that has nothing to do with pollution) as the rest but with the difference being that there’s a cheapening involved in going from a six to a four in a $50k-plus car. In the $20k cars, it’s expected. Put another way, it doesn’t feel like a rip-off. Especially when – as in the case of this Kia (and many others) the four is available with a turbo that boosts its output to as much or even more than V8s in Corvettes made as recently as the mid-1980s.
But a four can never be a V8 or even a six for that matter. No matter how powerful it is. In this regard it is interesting to mention that one of Mercedes’ highest-priced, high-performance models – the AMG C63 – that used to come with a V8 isn’t selling well because the V8 was replaced with a four. It’s a very potent four – 671 horsepower – but nonetheless a four. It is even more interesting that Mercedes still uses the “C63” designation, which used to refer to the size of the V8 you used to get for the $86k you spent. Why not just rebadge it honestly – and christen it the AMG C20 – to reflect the 2.0 liter four that’s under the hood?
The answer is obvious. It sound like less – and who wants to call attention to that?
Much less pay top dollar for it?
. . .
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It’s nice to know the Kia K4 doesn’t look emasculating either.
Overpriced and out of reach cars that are super gay turn the youth away from cars, thus homosexualizing them and extincting the planet, then there will be no CO2 to save the planet from Bill Gates.
Amen, Steve –
The only sucky thing about this K4 that I can report so far is that there’s no manual option; you could get a six speed in the old Forte.
“This Kia K4 comes with a four cylinder engine – which is what you’d expect to get in a car with a starting price just under $22k.”
No, in this day and age you would expect a THREE cylinder engine, for fuck’s sake…
I am sorry (not sorry), Eric, but if I am going to shell out that much money for a BMW or a Mercedes, for one, I want at least a 6-cylinder engine, maybe even an eight. Manual transmission. And none of the monthly fee crap for the “privilege” of using the heated seats: Something I do NOT have to do with my Toyota. Just push the button, and the booty stays warm. And another button for the heated steering wheel, as well. Believe you me, both are nice features at -20 below. Who the hell wants to pay that much money for a high-end-sounding brand vehicle, when you end up with a crappy engine that I can pay tens of thousands of dollars less for in something just as reliable? If BMW and others are trying to sell their product, they are doing a lousy job of it.
Why not make the windshield a digital screen?
Cars will not let you drive, everybody but you is in control. You can take your chances just like normal.
The woman who was on the Romper Room TV show was in a torrid affair with the producer.
The rumor was out there.
Last week of winter and it is cold. No mercy from Old Man Winter, I’ll refrain from expletives.
Old Man Winter sees and hears it all.
There is a digital rear view mirror now, maybe a digital windshield isn’t far off.
Honestly I can’t fathom why anyone would buy a new Mercedes, ANY Mercedes, these days. They have too many crappy crossovers (all starting with the letter ‘G’) that are virtually the same. And they are terribly unreliable. Six figure pricetags for junk infotainment systems and underpowered, straining turbo four-cylinders? No thanks. And don’t get me started on the despicable safety trash – AEB, BSW, RCTW, and reverse auto emergency braking. All that makes for luxury??? To me, it makes for premature scrap.
There are two maybe three driving forces that make for this ugly cheap sameness in things and they all go back to government.
First is the regulatory system. The stronger it gets the fewer options there are to comply with it. Eventually it ends up with only one solution. It’s one of the reasons for the regulatory regime to be as it is, to narrow choice.
Second is inflation. There’s only one way to fight inflation with mature products where there isn’t much chance of finding new breakthrough ways of doing things, and that’s cheapening things.
Third, is corporate consolidation and the demands of Wall Street. They don’t care about products, only profits. With the government blocking new competition with regulations there’s little to no consequence for making products worse. The buyers have no recourse.
And on top of everything else, Toyotas, Hondas, Subarus, and Mazdas are more reliable than Mercedes Benzes, Beemers, Audis, and Porsches…what’s so prestigious about breaking down more often?
So true.
Just got a text message yesterday from a friend traveling on business.
The Mercedes rental car refused to start on the morning he was to be flying out. Message on the cheap-o’ LCD dash about 12v battery charge problem – find a safe place to stop.
I advised if it were me I’d uber to the airport, drop keys at Avis and tell them where their broken down POS was parked.
I haven’t heard back from him yet today – hoping he made the flight
Meanwhile my 92’ Mazda B2600 with 180k+ miles is still being worked like a rented mule.
Yesterday, while cruising south on the I-5, a beautiful late 1990s Toyota Tercel passed me by. It still had the black bumpers, maybe it was earlier model. It is one of my favorite small cars – and much more reliable than the Geo Metro, which was built so-so quality by GM. The late 90s Tercel became the Corolla I believe. The two are so similar, you have to know your Toyotas, while the Echo is more distiguishable.
According to Wikipedia, the 4th generation Tercel, was called Toyota Corolla II (Japan, 1982–1999).
The Metro first year was the Sprint-Metro, the Suzuki designed Sprint had a carb, while all Metros were fuel injected – Throttle Body Injection – just one injector sitting where the carb used to be. That is a great design, only on injector means it either works or doesn’t – and you can visually check it’s operation with a timing light. I did find out something interesting, the first year Geo Metro was made in Japan and did NOT have the EGR pipe external or through the head. A buddy of mine still has one, a 1989, I checked the door label, it said made in Japan while all later Metros were built in Canada at the CAMI plant and have EGR system. Well, his non-EGR system is better because he has 350,000 miles and still has not replaced the head from a burned exhaust valve #3.
Anyways back to the great Tercel – extremely reliable, light, and high fuel economy, which was only beat by some Civic models then crushed by the Geo Metro which could get over 50 mpg. We owned a early one which got over 40, in the low 40 mpg just like the early Civic – the two looked very similar especially the front end. The Tercel got lower than the Metro because the Tercel had 4 cylinders 1.5 liter vs. the Geo Metro with the tiny 3 banger 1.0 liter. The Geo was lighter, so a smaller engine worked, the 1999 Tercel was about 2100 lbs and the Metro 300 lbs lighter.
Long live the mighty Toyota Tercel, a quality small car at an affordable price. If you bought a new one and took care of it, it should still be running fine.
I had one, but I wrecked it — probably would still be running (if not completely salted out) if I hadn’t done that.
Mine had been Ziebarted by the previous owner though so maybe relatively ok on salt
All this stuff makes me wonder what is wrong with so many of my countrymen? Basically, spending 3 to 4 times the money for essentially the same thing makes me shake me head. How far we’ve fallen as a nation that we’ve become so susceptible to advertising. I’m fully expecting the great garbage avalanche of 25O5 about 48O years early.
They sell us the President, the same way
They sell us our clothes and our cars
They sell us everything from youth to religion
The same time they sell us our wars.
I want to know who the men in the shadows are
I want hear somebody asking them why
They can be counted on to tell us who are enemies are
But they’re never the ones to fight or to die
Lives in the balance, by Jackson Brown
of course, those of us around here mostly know and understand who the men in the shadows are. One doesn’t have to look very far outside a tiny region in the Middle East. Sadly, any hope of Orange Cesar returning some freedom of choice to the auto buying public is evaporating daily. like CO2 from the tailpipe of the Tesla he is busy performing fellatio on.
It seems to me that the Mercedes Benz company should split into two parts, kind of like Toyoda does with LEXUS and Nissan does with Infinity. The Mercedes would be the low end and Benz would be the high end. Mercedes Benz wants to sell more cars and increase market share. Obviously you cannot do that without cheapening the brand. You can’t be everything to everybody and remain exclusive. The low end would feature 4 cylinder autos while the high end would of course have the 6 and 8 cylinder with analog gauges and expensive and exclusive craftsmanship.
Ever heard of Maybach?
>> Mercedes-Benz should split into two
>
> Ever heard of Maybach?
…or Smart? They own that one, too.
With automobile manufacturers having replaced analog gauges in their vehicles with digital ones over the past several years, plus many electric companies having replaced analog meters at homes & businesses with digital SMART METERS around that same time, and this desire from technocrats and others to gather as much data on us as possible, I can’t help but wonder if these digital gauges in vehicles have capabilities similar to what electric smart meters have. Could they report information such as how fast you’re driving or other information to the insurance mafia, the manufacturer of the vehicle, or perhaps even the government?
They can and they do. They also scrutinize it to deny warranty claims.
Absolutely, John. It records how fast/slow I drive, whether I am driving the speed limit or not, accelerating too fast, etc. I saw that the camera (that reads the miles-per-hour signs) is situated right in front of the rear view mirror. So, my smart ass thought about sticking a small piece of duct tape over the camera, just to see what would happen. However, the camera is not always reliable when out in the sticks, which I find kind of funny. I am sure this computer-on-wheels is monitoring everything, and knows all of my driving habits. Any more I talk to the damned thing, because I simply do not care. If they are watching me, they must be pretty damned bored. Unlike most Americans, I grew up with Big Brother, so I throw their crap right back at them, even in a car. When the computer does not accept my password on a website, I tell them to get someone who knows what the hell is going on, or ask if someone new is working, because they do not make ’em like they used to.
If one three-pointed star is good, a HUNDRED of them glowing with LEDs must be even more bettahhhhhh!
2026 Mercedes CLA: This Is It
‘There are more illuminated stars than we can count [in the front grille].
‘An upright dashboard hosts up to three screens surrounded by a sea of glossy black plastic. The instrument cluster measures 10.25 inches and sits next to a 14-inch infotainment screen, both offered as standard across the range. The new CLA can be configured with a 14-inch passenger screen at an additional cost.
‘Dubbed MBUX Superscreen, the triple-display setup features a large glass surface, mimicking [sic] the more expensive models with their screen-heavy dashboards. Separate climate controls have been deleted, so you’ll have to use the touchscreen to adjust the temperature and other settings.
‘As for power, the base CLA features a 1.5-liter, four-cylinder engine.’ [Vroom, vroom!]
https://www.motor1.com/news/753392/2026-mercedes-cla-debut-specs/
Plastic dreck for aspirational proles. *lifts hind leg to anoint a tire*
“This isn’t just plain terrible, this is fancy terrible. This is terrible with raisins in it.” — Dorothy Parker
Redditors rip this p.o.s.:
dlrax
Needs more MB stars, I’d say they should just paint every car with a MB star camo pattern.
BAQ717
The car for those whose ego demands a Mercedes but their wallet says otherwise. Such a cringe car IMO.
5tudent_Loans
Did a Kia and Cadillac designer sleep together and shit this out 9 months later?
rg787
chopped ass car did they not learn anything from the flop ass eqs wtf
smackythefrog
This makes sense when you think of the typical CLA owner the past decade. Someone who thinks they’re too good for a Kia Optima.
kimbabs
An egg with a light up unibrow
ggtsu_00
Rising egg prices make this look more classy I guess.
https://tinyurl.com/3e5ucnyy
“It serves me right for putting all my eggs in one bastard.” — Dorothy Parker
With it’s minimal use of technology I’m willing to bet Yugo’s will outlast Tesla’s.
With the styling of a cheap car looking the same as an expensive car you can always remove the KIA’s emblems or just put BMW emblems on it. If they do stuff like that in China so can we.
Hi Landru,
You make a great point. There are still Yugos on the road. I see one every now and then. 40 years hence, will anyone ever see a Tesla again?
Hi Eric,
According to a spoof that I occasionally heard on the late Rush Limbaugh’s talk radio show called “In a Yugo”, so-called “environmentalists” LOVED the Yugo in the same way they LOVED Teslas until its CEO, Elon Musk, supported Trump’s 2024 presidential run.
https://youtu.be/MqTKZgEW8pM?si=DU9UjXo9IIkkjr98
God I miss Rush.
Ernie,
Yeah. I can only imagine what Rush Limbaugh would have had to say about the 4 years of the Biden-Harris regime plus the blatant fear mongering over bird flu & measles, the sinister plans from the global elites, the fact that regulatory capture of government agencies like the CDC & FDA actually exists, the fact that the Democratic Party has gone f-ing insane, the clearing of a section of the Amazon rainforest to build a highway for, ironically, a climate summit, the nonsensical Ukraine War, etc.
On recent foray to Prague, I managed to spend a day with the Trabant club. Definitely a cult vehicle now. I wish I could post photos here, some were pretty cool looking.
Maybe upload a couple of photos to https://imgbb.com ?
I drove a hot pink communist-built Trabant around Berlin … and the girls couldn’t keep their hands off me.
https://tinyurl.com/4uvremrt
Working on it
https://x.com/ThraceAlex/status/1901336138163331128?s=19
https://x.com/ThraceAlex/status/1901336272087761046?s=19
I rode in one of those once. It had a gear shifter on the steering column.
The $300 50″ TV at Walmart is subsidized through sale of the statistics gathered about the viewer by the device’s — and it is a device — “smart” operating system, often provided to the manufacurer for free, by Google, Amazon, and others.
What’s that you say? You never hooked your “smart” TV up to your home internet?
Sweet Summer Child, that hasn’t mattered for a long time, particularly in the case of “Amazon enabled” devices.
And the car manufacturer’s are way ahead of the TV vendors in finding ways to get their devices to “phone home”.
This comment is exactly on topic, most electronic hone devices are indistinguishable from each other. Go into a Costco in the US and look at the TV section. Google on everything. No matter the brand it’s all a Google device ( so we all know what the real purpose of it is).
Even Sony which used to be a prestige brand. I looked at the 77″ OLED. $2500, but its a Google device. The Samsung or others are half that. I. The past I wouldn’t have hesitated to get the Sony, but today what am I really buying?
I recently ordered a new very premium, very expensive Walkman. Started it up and the first thing it demanded was to accept Google T&C!!!
Back to the store.
Why would a company like Sony just turn their products over to another company with totally different goals than their own?!!
I can’t figure out what Google adds to the experience except spying on me and making the product into another generic copy?
Google adds nothing but a layer of annoyance.
Anyway I wonder how long before these new transportation devices start flooding the touchscreens and flat dashes with ads for toenail fungus cream or miracle weight loss concoctions?
All industry has done this. Even mine.
You buy Rockwell Automation and you are actually getting Microsoft.
‘a smart idea for Mercedes, et al to get rid of the flatscreens and replace them with what cannot be cheaply manufactured and sold, such as jeweled, chronograph-style instruments’ — eric
Luxury is exclusivity. We can posit a kind of inverse Moore’s Law: jeweled, chronograph-style instruments will tend to rise in price over time, since no sweeping breakthrough is on the horizon to manufacture and assemble precision mechanical movements at lower cost.
This is demonstrated by the market for collectible watches and clocks, nearly all of which have analog hands that physically move.
So-called luxury auto makers that fail to perceive this fact have failed basic tests of taste and value. A Mercedes is just an overpriced Swatch on wheels. They’d make more money selling three-pointed-star souvenir T-shirts at the Jersey shore.
To quote an anecdote that applies richly to Mercedes: ‘Mr. Trump claimed that Graydon Carter’s wife had called him “a major loser.” Pausing for effect, Mr. Carter said, “She never used the word ‘major.’” AH HA HA HA …
Volkswagen did announce that they are returning to buttons for basic controls.
Of course, they’re nearly broke at this point so the patents from touchscreen software controls are a secondary concern to actually selling cars.
Lol, yeah, in years from now VW will be a common topic covered in business schools as what not to do.
I guess if you cannot do anything else you can always serve as a bad example
A small touchscreen is kind of nice. Caddy and Pininfarina got it just about right in my 88 Allante. Of course, 37 years later I worry about the electronics every time I take her out, and when they fail it’s a huge problem.
As far as the mechanical instruments, I can most assuredly manufacture and assemble them robotically, though never as cheaply as LED touch screens.
If they wanted to be high end, why wouldn’t they combine them with say a nice chrome bezeled gage with an LED face that could show more info when wanted?
The problem is they are marketing to the majority, and that means shiny trinkets. And the majority don’t give a tinker’s damn about the conditions in their engine, they are fine with using it up and throwing it out. Enthusiasts can add aftermarket gages. The problem is placing them artistically in an over-engineered interior. Stacking gages on the already too-thick pillar is common.
Aston Martin does a pretty nice job of that. Unfortunately its an Aston Martin.$$$
This reminds me of my life 50 years ago. I sold a unique product (among other things) that was vastly superior to anything else for storing/filing magazines. Librarians loved it and in order to make sure they’d get it we would write the specs on the request for bids that made sure only one product could meet the specs. Worked like a charm and I made some decent money off it.
Now GovCo does it for cars and most everything else. If you want just One Thing, that’s how you write the specs…or Regulations.
BTW, I still use that same product, 50 years old now, for filing and it still works good as new.