Are American car companies having a hard time figuring out names for their cars?

I know there are nameplates they don't want to use anymore, but all the sub brands of the Big 3 seem to be having to resort to grade school naming for thier cars.

GM:

Most of Chevy's models have always started with a "C" since the 60's, so it hasn't really changed any.

Example: Corvette, Colorado, Cruze, Caprice, Camaro, etc.

Buick is seems to have some more original names on their newer models along with bringing back the Regal name.

GMC seems to have a geographical theme. Which isn't bad.

Cadillac gave up on naming altogether. Gone are all the names we were brought up with. Now it's 3 letter names. Ugh. CTS, STS, DTS. Escalade is still there, but it will probably turn into an ETS in a couple years.

Ford:

Ford isn't bad, but part of the lineup sounds like the Gilette razor section at the store, i.e. Fusion, Flex, Edge

Lincoln went the way of Cadillac. MKS, MKZ, MKX, and Navigator.

Chrysler:

Dodge keeps resurrecting old nameplates. Which isn't a bad thing as long as they go on the right cars.

Chrysler looks like they are going to go to 3 number names for future vehicles after the Sebring name was dropped for 200.

Ram brand was just a dumb idea. It's still a Dodge Ram and Dakota to me.

Jeep lost their way in the early 2000's. They dropped he Cherokee name for Liberty. Then came the Commander, Compass, and Patriot. Thank god the Wrangler and Grand Cherokee is still around.

Either way, I don't think the newer names are as good as the old ones. The old nameplates seemed like they took thought. Even the ones that were named after animals and cities seem like they were thought out before they were put on the back of a car.

At least they are still bothering with names. Most of the Japanese & Euro makes have gone to meaningless numbers and letters (CS290i-X etc.) Think up something interesting you lazy slobs!

Jay wrote: Think up something interesting you lazy slobs!

Like Porsche's design studio

Glad D3 skipped Juke and Kizashi

Dodge has Eminem doing commercials, why not have him pick some names? Like him or not, he is a talented wordsmith.

SyntheticBlinkerFluid wrote: Cadillac gave up on naming altogether. Gone are all the names we were brought up with. Now it's 3 letter names. Ugh. CTS, STS, DTS. Escalade is still there, but it will probably turn into an ETS in a couple years.

Aren't those versions of the original names? STS was Seville (I seem to recall it stood for "Seville Touring Sedan"), DTS is a Deville. I guess the CTS was a Calais. Maybe the acronyms seem more technical, the Seville still sounds like a big fat Grandpa car to me.

The Lincoln names grew out of the Continental Mark (insert number here). It got shortened to Mk7 (etc), then they got hip and had to stretch the convention to fit the whole fleet.

BMW used to make sense, but now the badges aren't driven by the displacement any more. Heck, Ferrari used to do that back in the 60's. I never could keep track of the MB suffix system.

I ordered an intake for my truck the other day. I called it a "2010 Cummins", because that's what it is to me

Keith wrote:

SyntheticBlinkerFluid wrote: Cadillac gave up on naming altogether. Gone are all the names we were brought up with. Now it's 3 letter names. Ugh. CTS, STS, DTS. Escalade is still there, but it will probably turn into an ETS in a couple years.

Aren't those versions of the original names? STS was Seville (I seem to recall it stood for "Seville Touring Sedan"), DTS is a Deville. I guess the CTS was a Calais. Maybe the acronyms seem more technical, the Seville still sounds like a big fat Grandpa car to me.

The Seville STS was the first to start. Then it went from there.

SyntheticBlinkerFluid wrote: Dodge keeps resurrecting old nameplates. Which isn't a bad thing as long as they go on the right cars.

Dear Dodge,

Resurect the neon, and don't berkeley it up.

I believe that they are planning to, although they are calling it the "500" for some reason.

Cause it's as cool as a 200 and 300 put together.

The now extinct Cadillac ETC used to be called the Eldorado, which became the Eldorado Touring Coupe.

The CTS is more likely to be the Catera Touring Sedan. The Calais has not been made in MANY years.

Maroon92 wrote: The CTS is more likely to be the Catera Touring Sedan. The Calais has not been made in MANY years.

And, more obviously, was never a Cadillac.

Cimarron Touring Sedan? HaHa.

Josh wrote:

Maroon92 wrote: The CTS is more likely to be the Catera Touring Sedan. The Calais has not been made in MANY years.

And, more obviously, was never a Cadillac.

The Cadillac Calais was the lowest trim level Cadillac in the '60's/'70's
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadillac_Calais
In the '80's, Olsmobile used the same name for it's Grand Am twin.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oldsmobile_Cutlass_Calais.

I agree, CTS is more likely a derivative of Catera than it is Calais.

jrw1621 wrote: I agree, CTS is more likely a derivative of Catera than it is Calais.

I agree as well. I'd say that they'd been using a "C" name for their past compact cars (Cimmaron, Catera) and when the new one came along, everything was already into the xTS nomenclature. The obvious choice for their new "compact" would be CTS.

If someone can logically explain Volvo's moronic model numbering system, I'd be grateful.

Those other Swedes at Saab took a logical system and made it stupid. I can't even type 9-3 the correct way like it appears on the car. They should have just gone to algebra; 9x=y or something, it would make as much sense.

Lexus, get off your high horse. You're not a German car company so RX-350 is not the same as ML320. We put up with it from the Germans, we don't need to tolerate it from you.

Hyundai hopefully learned their lesson from the XG350. They sold about eight of those. Genesis, much more successful.

I do wish Ford would find other letters of the alphabet though. Focus, Flex, Freestyle, Fusion, Edge, Explorer, Expedition, Excursion...Mustang is the only sign of sanity over there.

Suzuki motorcycles went to numbers, threw me right off.

T.J. wrote: Cimarron Touring Sedan? HaHa.

I was gonna say it if you didn't.

ddavidv wrote: I do wish Ford would find other letters of the alphabet though. Focus, Flex, Freestyle, Fusion, Edge, Explorer, Expedition, Excursion...Mustang is the only sign of sanity over there.

I always expected them to release something even larger and call it the "Expenditure".

Lincoln is the stupidest one. The names are so similar that even auto journalists have a hard time remembering which is which. Not to mention they look the same anyways (car, truck, bigger truck). Stupid.

I'm actually glad companies go with names, even if they are ridiculous (like Kizashi, sounds like a cereal in the hippie section of the grocery store). Porsche did good by switching to names (Carrera, Boxster, Cayman) and Ferrari as well, though they do still stick with the numbers too.

Few cars have good names. But the worst have to be from Jeep and Hyundai. Jeep names cause the Team America theme to play in my head, and Hyundai's names are like Harry Potter - a manifestation of the concentrated essence of unoriginality.

jrw1621 wrote:

Josh wrote:

Maroon92 wrote: The CTS is more likely to be the Catera Touring Sedan. The Calais has not been made in MANY years.

And, more obviously, was never a Cadillac.

The Cadillac Calais was the lowest trim level Cadillac in the '60's/'70's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadillac_Calais In the '80's, Olsmobile used the same name for it's Grand Am twin. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oldsmobile_Cutlass_Calais. I agree, CTS is more likely a derivative of Catera than it is Calais.

The Cadillac in my driveway is from 1966, of course I'm going to think of the 60's names I thought about the Catera (and the Cimarron!) but it wasn't a great success for the brand. I suppose you can take it either way since Caddy ain't sayin'.

I completely lost track of all the Acura models when they went from Integra and Legend to TL and EL and Idontknowwhatelse.

The Catera was not much more than a re-badged Opel, Vectra I believe.

ddavidv wrote: If someone can logically explain Volvo's moronic model numbering system, I'd be grateful. Those other Swedes at Saab took a logical system and made it stupid. I can't even type 9-3 the correct way like it appears on the car. They should have just gone to algebra; 9x=y or something, it would make as much sense. Lexus, get off your high horse. You're not a German car company so RX-350 is not the same as ML320. We put up with it from the Germans, we don't need to tolerate it from you. Hyundai hopefully learned their lesson from the XG350. They sold about eight of those. Genesis, much more successful. I do wish Ford would find other letters of the alphabet though. Focus, Flex, Freestyle, Fusion, Edge, Explorer, Expedition, Excursion...Mustang is the only sign of sanity over there.

Volvo - the only one's that matter:

242 - two door 240

244 - four door 240

245 - five door (wagon) 240

Same pattern applies for most other's 740, 940, 850, but I don't know the newer ones.

GM/Chevy were naming some of their stuff after natural disasters. Avalanche,Typhoon,Syclone. Three were probably others. GM did have a sort of clever scheme for naming it's line of small cars back in the 80s or threabouts. Nova,Omega,Ventura & Apollo were all pretty much the same cars with different trim but the 1st letter of each name strung together spelled NOVA.