Tariffs Halt Imports! Ferrari Bringing Back the Manual and a NEW Mercedes AMG WAGON!

Summary

Podcast Summary: THIS CAR POD! with Doug DeMuro & Friends! Episode: Tariffs Halt Imports! Ferrari Bringing Back the Manual and a NEW Mercedes AMG WAGON! Release Date: April 11, 2025

Doug DeMuro, alongside co-hosts Kenan and Filippo, delves into the latest developments in the automotive industry in this engaging episode of THIS CAR POD!. Covering a range of topics from international trade policies to exciting new car releases, the trio offers expert insights and lively discussions that cater to both car enthusiasts and general listeners alike.

---

I. Tariffs and Their Impact on Automobile Imports

The episode kicks off with a deep dive into the ongoing tariff saga affecting the automotive industry. Filippo introduces the primary issue:

Filippo [00:09]: "Specifically tariffs, which is our leading story. For the third, fourth time in a row, Toyota Tacoma is coming over the border."

Doug elaborates on the complexities surrounding the tariffs:

Doug [00:36]: "A lot of tariff conversations this week. Now, just before we went live today or before we recorded this, they announced a 90-day pause on tariffs... however, that 90-day pause did not have any effect on the automobile industry tariffs, which are still going full speed ahead."

Filippo explains the specifics:

Filippo [00:46]: "Those are 25% tariffs on cars coming from anywhere. There are some exceptions for vehicles that are built within the USMCA zone, but honestly, those are still unclear."

The hosts discuss how various manufacturers are responding to these tariffs. They categorize the responses into three main strategies:

1. Ceasing Imports Temporarily:

   • Porsche: Reports suggest Porsche is halting imports, allowing their existing US inventory to compensate.

     Doug [01:24]: "The leaked thing that Porsche is going to do is not import any more cars to the United States... an unbelievable response considering that's kind of the whole business."

2. Passing Costs to Consumers:

   • Ineos Grenadier: Marking up prices by 5%.
   • Ferrari: Similarly increasing prices to offset tariff costs.

3. Leveraging Pricing Strategies to Gain Market Share:

   • Nissan: Lowering prices on models like the Rogue and Sentra.
   • Ford & Hyundai: Offering employee pricing discounts to stimulate sales despite increased costs.

Doug provides an analysis of these strategies, emphasizing the uncertainty manufacturers face:

Doug [02:20]: "Automakers who are not importing are taking a bet that the tariffs are going to go away quickly... they might be able to just avoid that."

Filippo adds context about inventory management:

Filippo [02:05]: "Audi has about 60 days of inventory in the US now... Dealers can keep selling cars. And clearly Audi is hoping if we don't import any cars right now, we won't owe any tariffs."

The discussion transitions to the market's reaction to recent news about tariffs:

Doug [06:08]: "The stock market responded tremendously well today to the news that some of the tariffs have been paused."

Filippo observes the market's optimism despite lingering uncertainties:

Filippo [09:28]: "Clearly the market is saying exactly what you're saying."

II. Ferrari Bringing Back Manual Transmissions

Ferrari makes headlines with its decision to potentially reintroduce manual transmissions, a move that excites automotive purists:

Kenan [10:07]: "Ferrari's head of product development has announced that they may bring the manual transmission back... particularly in the Icona series."

Doug expresses his enthusiasm and compares Ferrari's move to Porsche's successful adoption of manuals:

Doug [11:03]: "If I were a shareholder member of the board, I would be so mad about this... to give Porsche the upper hand with manual transmissions was a game-changer."

The hosts emphasize the significance of this move for Ferrari enthusiasts:

Filippo [11:05]: "I'm so happy about this news."

III. Introduction of the New Mercedes AMG E53 Wagon

A standout moment in the episode is the announcement of the new Mercedes AMG E53 Wagon, a model that promises to blend power with practicality:

Doug [16:34]: "Mercedes Benz, amidst all the tariffs, has announced that they are bringing the AMG E53 wagon to the United States."

Filippo and Doug discuss the specifications and market positioning of the AMG E53:

Filippo [17:14]: "It’s a plug-in hybrid... We want a wagon and I want a plug-in hybrid. And here we are."

Doug [17:08]: "It's 577 horsepower, and I'll never use that boost mode, but it's a fantastic blend of power and efficiency."

Kenan chimes in on the vehicle's design and potential appeal:

Kenan [18:46]: "They're putting good wheels on the 214, which are okay."

The trio highlights the AMG E53’s unique offerings, including its plug-in hybrid capabilities and horsepower:

Filippo [17:14]: "It’s a plug-in hybrid, which actually I really want."

IV. Sale of Willow Springs Racetrack

The podcast covers the significant acquisition of Willow Springs Racetrack, a beloved Southern California venue:

Kenan [23:37]: "Willow Springs recently has been up for sale and is now owned by Crossover Partners in collaboration with Singer Automotive Design."

Plans for the racetrack include enhancing safety features and adding modern facilities:

Kenan [24:21]: "They're looking to change safety standards and add a technology hub, car storage, and potentially a museum."

Doug speculates on the future enhancements and their impact on the racing community:

Doug [25:10]: "Here's what you do for Willow Springs... make it all together, one massive track."

V. Kia’s Ambitious Electric Pickup Goals

Kia announces its aim to sell 90,000 electric pickups annually in North America, a move met with skepticism:

Filippo [27:09]: "Kia is hoping to sell 90,000 electric pickups in North America a year. They said that today."

Doug assesses the feasibility amidst current market conditions:

Doug [27:14]: "There is absolutely no chance that that occurs. Maybe they will."

The discussion touches on the challenges Kia faces, including tariffs and market competition:

Filippo [28:13]: "90,000 is a lot. That means they're going more for maverick type territory."

VI. Talk Cars Segment

In the popular Talk Cars segment, the hosts examine unique and classic vehicles:

1. Bentley Dominator:

   • Filippo showcases a rare Bentley Dominator model, sparking nostalgic discussions about its design and legacy.

     Doug [30:23]: "I've always said that if I could have any car in the world, there would be one of the Sultan's Dominators."

2. Toyota Land Cruiser Heritage Edition:

   • Doug highlights a live listing of a 2021 Heritage Edition Land Cruiser, emphasizing its rarity and collectibility.

     Doug [32:04]: "This is a really, really, really special car in the Land Cruiser world. This is really, really cool."

VII. Market Report

The hosts provide insights into the current state of the car market, noting surprising trends despite economic downturns:

Doug [39:05]: "All the cars we sell are completely unaffected by the tariffs... but I also assumed the economy would take such a hit that there would be no consumer confidence to buy any car."

Filippo observes strong sales and rising values in the used car market:

Filippo [40:49]: "As new car prices go higher because of tariffs, as inventory decreases because of that, you get an increase in values in the used market."

Doug contemplates the future, acknowledging the uncertainty:

Doug [43:45]: "No rational person can read the future when it comes to the Trump administration... maybe you want to get in while you can."

VIII. Audience Questions

The episode concludes with an interactive Q&A segment, where listeners' questions are addressed:

1. Ranking Mercedes E-Class Models:

   • Doug shares his personal rankings, sparking debates among the hosts.

     Doug [45:00]: "I'm only going to do one per episode... rank the E classes. This is where the hate will flow."

2. Luxury Versions for Jeep and Ford:

   • Discussion on whether Jeep or Ford should offer luxury variants of their Wrangler and Bronco.

     Doug [58:28]: "Do you think there's a market for Jeep or Ford to sell a luxury version of their Wrangler and Bronco under the Chrysler and Lincoln brands, respectively?"

3. Chevrolet's Production Shift to the US:

   • Evaluation of Chevy's potential to create a competitive K5 Blazer in response to tariffs.

     Doug [66:44]: "If Chevy moves all of its production to the US because of these tariffs, should they make an actual competitive K5 Blazer to celebrate its heritage instead of basically four variations of the Equinox?"

Throughout the Q&A, the hosts provide candid opinions, often reflecting broader industry sentiments and personal preferences.

---

Notable Quotes

• Filippo [00:09]: "Tariffs, which is our leading story. For the third, fourth time in a row, Toyota Tacoma is coming over the border."

• Doug [02:20]: "Automakers who are not importing are taking a bet that the tariffs are going to go away quickly."

• Kenan [10:07]: "Ferrari's head of product development has announced that they may bring the manual transmission back... particularly in the Icona series."

• Doug [16:34]: "Mercedes Benz... has announced that they are bringing the AMG E53 wagon to the United States."

• Filippo [27:09]: "Kia is hoping to sell 90,000 electric pickups in North America a year. They said that today."

• Doug [40:49]: "As new car prices go higher because of tariffs, as inventory decreases because of that, you get an increase in values in the used market."

• Doug [58:28]: "Do you think there's a market for Jeep or Ford to sell a luxury version of their Wrangler and Bronco under the Chrysler and Lincoln brands, respectively?"

---

Conclusion

In this episode of THIS CAR POD!, Doug DeMuro and his co-hosts provide a comprehensive overview of significant events shaping the automotive landscape. From navigating the murky waters of international tariffs to celebrating Ferrari's nod to manual enthusiasts and Mercedes' strategic new release, the discussion is both informative and entertaining. The inclusion of listener questions adds an interactive layer, making the episode a must-listen for anyone passionate about cars and the industry’s evolving dynamics.

---

Disclaimer: This summary is based on the provided transcript of the podcast episode and aims to encapsulate the key discussions and insights shared by the hosts.

Transcript

[Filippo]

Foreign.

[Doug]

Hello and welcome to this car pod.

[Kenan]

I am Kenan.

[Filippo]

I'm Filippo.

[Doug]

And we start with the news and specifically tariffs, which is our leading story. For the third, fourth time in a row, Toyota Tacoma is coming over the border. Yep, a lot of tariff conversations this week. Now, just before we went live today or before we recorded this, they announced a 90 day pause on tariffs, some tariff. However, that 90 day pause did not have any effect on the automobile industry tariffs, which are still going full speed ahead. Yep.

[Filippo]

And those are 25% tariffs on cars coming from anywhere. There are some exceptions for vehicles that are built within the USMCA zone, but honestly, those are still unclear.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

On exactly how those.

[Doug]

I don't want to rehash a lot of the stuff we've talked about over the last couple of weeks, but the interesting stories this week has been how manufacturers have responded to these tariffs. And there have been some varied responses.

[Filippo]

Yeah, two real categories. Categories of responses. Response one is we just aren't going to bring cars into the US for a while. So Audi has. Which has about 60 days of inventory.

[Doug]

Which by the way is insane. Well, not from the manufacturer perspective, but like I worked for an automaker that imported cars. That is insane.

[Filippo]

Let's start with Porsche. Porsche said last week, or at least there were reports last week that they're not importing anything and if it's on a shib right now, it's not coming.

[Doug]

I don't know that Porsche has made a official statement on this topic yet.

[Kenan]

But it was discussed in a boardroom situation, correct?

[Doug]

Yes, it was. No, it was a dealer call. And. And it leaked out that they are going to. Not so Porsche's. Porsche. The leaked thing that Porsche is going to do is not import any more cars to the United States, which was the first of these companies that this came out. And I thought at the time, this was a week ago, that it was an unbelievable response to this considering that's kind of the whole business.

[Filippo]

But then Audi and Jaguar Land Rover have also said they're not importing any cars. And it makes some sense. Right. They, Porsche excluded. They have some real inventory on the ground already.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

So audi has about 60 days of inventory in the US now. Is that a dealer? Like, is that appropriately distributed? Probably not. But nevertheless they have a little bit of inventory. Dealers can keep selling cars. And clearly Audi is hoping if we don't import any cars right now, we won't owe any tariffs.

[Doug]

Right.

[Filippo]

And we hope that tariffs will go away. The next 30.

[Doug]

The automakers who are not importing are taking a bet that the tariffs are going to go away quickly. My assumption is that the fear for the automakers, automakers is if they do import some cars and then the tariffs do go away quickly, there will be a, a tranche of cars that was imported from April 5 through May 10 or whenever the tariffs go away that were have a 25% tariff on them and then those cars will never be sellable or they'll have to eat the car or they'll have to simply eat.

[Filippo]

That and they think that they won't need to.

[Doug]

They will think, they think that by sitting they might be able to just avoid that and by using on the ground inventory they might be able to avoid that. Now Jaguar Land Rover, that's probably easy to do. There's a lot of inventory, especially for Jaguar Land Rover, less so, yeah. Audi, the Q5 is built in Mexico so this is their leading product, probably globally, certainly in the United States.

[Filippo]

That's a tough that they have all new lineup. The Q6 is a brand new vehicle which should also be one of their big.

[Doug]

It's also built in Mexico, I believe.

[Filippo]

It'S built in Germany.

[Doug]

They got a lot of day supply on that though.

[Filippo]

It just came out. Yeah, it could be a deal.

[Doug]

There's already big discounts. Not anymore, of course.

[Filippo]

The second, there's actually three categories. Second category is manufacturers that have said, yep, we're going to be adding the tariff really clearly we're going to be marking it as a transportation fee basically.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

And prices will go up. Ineos is the clearest example of this. Yeah, Grenadiers are 5% more expensive for any vehicle. Ferrari, etc. And then there's a third category which is manufacturers that are clearly trying to take advantage of this to sell some more cars and get some market share, even if it costs them substantial profit. So Nissan has lowered the price of the Rogue and I believe the Sentra. Ford is offering employee pricing to everybody through May or into early June. Hyundai is also doing a similar program. They're clearly hoping that if we keep price, if we discount pricing, people are going to flock to us right now. Will it cost us because some of our vehicles are built outside of the U.S. sure, but we have a lot of vehicles built in the US and we might be protected.

[Doug]

Are these brands doing this across their line, including on cars that are export or imported? So like Mach E which is built in Mexico, they're really, you know, they.

[Filippo]

Want to bring people in, they want to get the sales and they think here's our opportunity to get some market share up. And here's our opportunity probably to help our dealers a little bit.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

If we do a sale right now, then you get warranty claims, you get service going in through the service department. Even if we then contract later, we've maybe.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

Built enough.

[Doug]

I, I have a suspicion that it also sends a sign to the president. Yeah, hey, we're committed to this, like you know, et cetera. Like we, these are the, it's mostly the American companies doing this. You said Nissan also, but they have an enormous amount of manufacturing in the United States.

[Filippo]

They do. Hyundai certainly does.

[Doug]

Hyundai does too. Yeah.

[Filippo]

And I will say some others, Toyota is up here on the image. They have said that they're not. That they don't expect any increased pricing. Some other manufacturers, BMW on some lines of models have said that they're not going to increase pricing until at least June. They're all kind of trying to figure out like either we don't bring any inventory in, we price protect or we discount. And that seems to be the Toyota.

[Doug]

But Toyota has it. They've just said we're not going to see.

[Filippo]

They said they don't. That they're not expecting any immediate price increases.

[Doug]

I mean Toyota is an unusual case because they committed a lot of production in Mexico for the Tacoma a few years ago before the new one came out. It's, it's a, it's a high volume seller. It's a, it's a brand new product. It'll be interesting how long they can hold the line on no increased pricing.

[Filippo]

Yeah, I don't think it'll be long if the tariffs remain in place. But they're, I think they're all trying to play it a little bit day by day. Mercedes Benz is another example, has said that they're not going to roll out any price increases for at least a month or maybe two months. When the news came out a couple of weeks ago. They're all trying to figure it out but there are some that are passing along costs immediately.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

Volkswagen has also said they'll do that and then no importing at all is going to have repercussions later regardless of whether or not tariffs continue or not. If they don't, they'll just be out of inventory, which is actually fine if you're a Porsche dealer maybe.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

If they do continue well then they'll need to bring it in and they gain nothing.

[Doug]

I will say it's anxiety provoking if you work. I worked for Porsche, which is an importer, not A manufacturer here in the U.S. but Porsche cars North America, and I text my friends there, they're all terrified. These are Americans working for an American company in America. It's, it's. If you're on the ground at a dealership, you're especially anxious. You gotta be in, you know, are the cars gonna not come here? If they do come here, are they gonna be affordable by anybody? I. The stock market responded tremendously well today to the news that some of the, that a large portion of the tariffs have been paused.

[Filippo]

Reciprocal. Yeah.

[Doug]

Which seems like it was probably a pretty good idea. But the auto industry tariff still lingers and still will have like enormously damaging effects including significant unintended consequences, I presume. Unless the intent is also to hurt the American auto industry.

[Filippo]

On the industry, there's no way around. I mean Stellantis, which has factories in the US and a lot in Canada, a lot in Windsor, Ontario, has done a bunch of layoffs at factories in both places because they ship parts back and forth if they don't yet know how that will impact. Right. The large impacts there. And obviously every manufacturer is certainly worried both about their specific vehicles if prices go up because they will need to eventually or about the economy as a whole and whether they will have buyers that are in market.

[Doug]

Yeah, yeah. Now on the subject of tariffs, another interesting thing came up about these 25 year personal import vehicles. Yeah. There's been a lot of talk about whether they're going to be cars that.

[Filippo]

Are not sold in the US that are legal to import after 25 years after under the current.

[Doug]

So if you import a car you pay a 3% duty. That's what it has been. And now the question is, is it going to increase? There was initially talk that 25 year imports were carved out of this. Now there was this fellow on Instagram who went to the customs office in Long beach, one of the big ports and they told him they're not carved out. I have no idea.

[Kenan]

Fleet sounds like your dreams of importing a multiple might have to wait a little bit.

[Doug]

Well, he's okay paying 25% more on a multiple grams.

[Filippo]

It's worth nothing.

[Kenan]

$200. That's a whole lot.

[Filippo]

Thankfully that the cars at Mitchell center are worthless. It becomes. There was a. The language as we're in had kind of a session saying for the cards that are coming in under the 25 year law, these sections don't apply. But clearly implementation is everything there and guys, everything. So the port of Long beach said no, we'll see if that's consistent. We'll see if they will be consistent.

[Doug]

Hard to know. That is a major port where an enormous number of these cards are shipped.

[Filippo]

Japanese cards are coming.

[Doug]

Yeah, absolutely. So tariffs do remain big. I am, I am encouraged by the, by dropping the reciprocal tariffs tonight days. I think that's a, that's a big positive sign. It is a sign that the administration does bow to market demands, does bow to consumer sentiment which has been almost entirely negative, including from significant supporters of the President and the Republican Party in general. They have, they have been almost entirely pushed back on this. And I think that it's a good sign that we're seeing a pause. I think that the auto industry tariffs are still a horrible thing for the industry, for car enthusiasts, for employees. But I think that we're seeing a good sign that maybe we come out of the tariff situation in a better place. We'll see.

[Filippo]

Yeah, we're filming this on Wednesday and the market today has been up. Notably including auto manufacturer stock. Ford is up 9% today. Clearly the market is saying exactly what you're saying.

[Doug]

My read on this is that the market is thinking even though Ford is up and they'll be negatively affected because the auto industry tariffs won't remove. My thinking is that the market is looking at this and saying, okay, it's pretty clear that the president did, will be bowing to public demand for, for the last week and he went golfing and it looked like he was just going to be like nope, we're doing this. And the market was very scared by that. Now it has become clear to the market that hey, maybe this guy is going to be willing to be reasoned with about this issue. And so we will go down that.

[Filippo]

And maybe Audi, Porsche, JLR are correct.

[Doug]

Yeah, maybe they are. Okay, next up, moving on to our next news story. Aha. Gated manual Ferrari. How could this be a news story? They haven't sold one since 09.

[Kenan]

Thirteen years since the last manual transition. What was the last manual gated Ferrari California first generation.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

12. Wow.

[Doug]

Which was yeah, that era 10, 11.

[Kenan]

12 and didn't sell many of them. But Ferrari's head of product development has announced that they there's a potential to bring in the manual transmission back but it's not going to be for the cars we might expect. I thought maybe they would do it for like the 296 and make an enthusiasty sort of car. It's going to be something with the Icona series which makes sense. That's their ultra high end, very rare, very collectible Cars and we have been saying that this is what they need to be doing and it seems that they're starting to take that to heart. Especially because Lewis Hamilton said he wants to be involved with the project that will implement a manual transmission car back into line. A Successor to the F40 is.

[Doug]

This is a public company. The concept that they haven't already done this is embarrassing. If I were a shareholder member of the board, I would be so mad about this that this.

[Filippo]

You look at Porsche. I'm so happy about this news.

[Doug]

Yeah. Happy that this possibly coming back. But you look at Porsche and you look at what they've basically been able to run with this manual transmission game and run far. And run with dollars, Euros as it were flying out the back of their running wagon. Right.

[Kenan]

Well, well said.

[Filippo]

Well done, well done.

[Doug]

You get my point though. Like, I mean look crazy that Ferrari, it's taken them this long. Given that the clear demand. And it's not just demand from idiots in the used car market like a lot of the people who want BMW to change their grill. This is from people who are paying a million dollars for, you know, manual 599s. Like these are people who could be buying cars today new.

[Kenan]

Precisely. And, and so it's encouraging to see that it seems that Ferrari actually does kind of listen to their customers. It's taken them a while admittedly. But again the 911R proved that there was a case for this and Porsche capitalized on it and it's just been raking.

[Doug]

And that was seven to eight years ago.

[Kenan]

I know that was well, almost as long as the last trans. Manual transmission.

[Doug]

Yeah, those were 12 maybe those were like 10 plus years ago. What they.

[Kenan]

Well, the 990. Yeah, yeah. It was a little later than that. Regardless, a long time ago. Coming up on a decade. So I'm happy to see.

[Doug]

I know that you're sad that there's no 296 etc however this makes sense. They're going to come out with an F40 like they're going to come out with an Icona manual. Like the SP3 was better than any Ferrari that's been made since the end zone. We agree.

[Kenan]

Wow. Absolutely agree.

[Doug]

I don't know.

[Filippo]

I don't know.

[Kenan]

Since the end.

[Doug]

Okay, so. So since the F50 if the S. But the SP3 basically was better than the LaFerrari. Like it used the LaFerrari motor without the hybrid BS. It looked better, it was cooler and it was lower production. Right. And it was a convertible which most of the Laferraris weren't. And now imagine throwing a gated in it and I'm.

[Kenan]

I pray. I hope, I know, I hope it gets made into a V12. I would love for them to do one of those.

[Doug]

You got it. They're still doing it in the 12 cylinder. You got to assume they do it.

[Filippo]

Yep.

[Kenan]

Man. Oh, please, please, please, please let that happen. I mean, I'll never be able to afford one. No one will, you know, no one will.

[Doug]

No one will. You think SP3s are expensive?

[Kenan]

Yeah.

[Doug]

This is going to go nuts.

[Kenan]

Totally. And. But what I hope is that that is the case and it further underscores to Ferrari. Oh, maybe we should continue doing this.

[Doug]

I wouldn't be surprised because remember, that's exactly what the 911R did for Porsche.

[Kenan]

Precisely.

[Doug]

And I'm thinking there was a time when Porsche was getting ready to phase out the manual transmission completely. And then the 911R happened. They realized there was still demand. The 991.1 GT3 had all those tips. Now it's coming back. Now it's a staple of the Porsche product lineup. And not just on the high end stuff, but like the manual ones sell for more on the used market. They have more desirability, etc.

[Kenan]

And maybe, just maybe that means that they might bring it to some of the lower tier models, some of which are hybrids.

[Doug]

Now I just reviewed a CRZ today.

[Filippo]

Which is a hybrid manual.

[Doug]

Hybrid manual. It's possible folks.

[Kenan]

Doing it for a while just like the. Actually just like the new V12 with the, the oval.

[Doug]

I'm just gonna.

[Filippo]

Can't imagine it going to any other models because they've been so focused on performance and I know it's not.

[Doug]

But what should be focused on is making money.

[Filippo]

How much money Ferrari makes. They make a lot. Their profit is $137,000 per car.

[Doug]

They can afford some tariffs.

[Filippo]

Did you know what? Okay. There was a great list from car industry analysis. The was like a great. I'm going to do it. Okay. How many cars do you think other manufacturers need to sell to make as much profit as Ferrari makes in a single car?

[Doug]

Well, I understand, but they do sell that many cars like Hyundai probably makes more money than Ferrari.

[Filippo]

Ferrari memory serves as the most profitable, second most profitable of their Hyundai cars to make as much money as Ferrari does it. They do sell that many cars. But Ferrari is making enough money.

[Doug]

I know, I know. But again, they're a public company trying to maximize every last dollar and they've been ruthless about this for as long as we've been sentient. I mean, there was a time they weren't ruthless about it, but now they're ruthless about it and like, why not throw a stick in there? Stick it up.

[Filippo]

Agreed. I'm glad they're doing.

[Doug]

If you've been watching my videos for a long time, you'll remember I used to take my cars to CarMax to see what they'd offer me as a trade in value. These videos were fun and popular as they would often give me a wild, inaccurate number for the cars. Submit your cool car to Cars and Bids in just a few minutes and you'll be connected with an auction manager from my team who will help your car go live on cars and Bids where you'll get way more money for your car than trading it in to a big box dealer. Look at how much these cars sold for on cars and bids compared to their trade in value. Here's a trade in offer and this is the cars and bids result. Here's a trade in value and the cars and bids result. And this was a trade in value and this was the cars and bids result. Gets get started now and sell your car on carsandbids.com okay, move on to the next news story, which is the best news story of the whole week. Mercedes Benz, amidst all the tariffs, has announced that they are bringing the AMG E53 wagon to the United States. This is a massive deal because the current Mercedes station wagon product lineup for the last, I don't know, 20 years has been limited to an E350 or an E450 is what it's called now. So like a mid tier six cylinder and the amg, the top performing amg. And this is almost designed directly for me. I went to buy a Mercedes station wagon, I've had many and I just realized that the E63 wagon has lost me. It's gotten too harsh, too powerful and too expensive. I don't need any of that crap anymore. It's just simply too much. And there's a market for those cars.

[Filippo]

I imagine there will be.

[Doug]

But as a guy who's owned two AMG wagons before, I am not that market anymore. It's just too much. This is going to be right in the sweet spot of perfection. It's 577 horsepower, horsepower, two with boost. With the boost mode. Yeah. It's. Which I'll never use. Yeah, it's not, it's not a low amount of power to be clear, but if they're doing 577 in this then the next E63 is going to have 750 horsepower. Underscoring my point. And this is going to have like 100 and some thousand dollar price tag. It's going to be a great pickup for me as a CPO car in about four years.

[Kenan]

That's exactly right.

[Filippo]

It also straddles the line between cars that you want and cars that I want because it's a plug in hybrid.

[Doug]

It's a plug in hybrid.

[Filippo]

We'll be the only plug in hybrid E class wagon.

[Doug]

It's a plug in hybrid, which actually I really want. I put an electric car charger at my house specifically hoping that there would be a plug in Mercedes station wagon. And here we are. I'm so happy about this. Seriously. My wife will drive this thing around on electric only. I'm so pumped about this. I'm so glad they're doing this. I think a mid tier model is what they should be called. I will say my All Terrain.

[Filippo]

Yeah. Is fast enough. Fast enough.

[Doug]

Like I'll buy this to placate them because I'm glad they did it. But the All Terrain is really. Okay, guys.

[Filippo]

Yep.

[Kenan]

You dragged race it against an F40.

[Doug]

Drag. Dragged it on an F40. I lost.

[Filippo]

To be clear, you won one.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Kenan]

The owner was careful shifting the F40. You were not. You were not careful.

[Filippo]

I'm excited about. This is the. Presumably there's no rear facing third row though.

[Doug]

I don't know. There hasn't been a lot of details. I'm curious about that because the All Terrain still has the rear facing third row. Yeah. But the hybrid is going to be a six cylinder based on the one that's in my car. So I assume that it's possible to get a rear facing third row.

[Filippo]

All of them are like whatever they call them. My goodness.

[Doug]

Hurricane. Six cylinder.

[Filippo]

Yeah. No, all them are mild hybrids. So they have like a larger set of. This is like a real problem.

[Doug]

I know. It's a real hybrid with a plug in.

[Filippo]

We gotta put a battery somewhere.

[Doug]

They're not gonna take up my third row. I need my third row. We'll see what happens. We'll see what happens.

[Filippo]

There also hasn't been an AMG third row in a while.

[Doug]

There hasn't been since the 2009 model year. There hasn't been a third row in AMG. But this is a mild AMG. Okay.

[Filippo]

Mild AMG. E53, not E6.

[Kenan]

By the way.

[Doug]

These are the first good wheels in the 214.

[Filippo]

These are okay wheels.

[Doug]

Okay. I'm really excited about this. This is not a big news story for most people but to me, to a guy who wants power but wants a calm car like this is. This is the combination of everything I've ever wanted in my life and I.

[Filippo]

Want a wagon and I want a plug in hybrid. And here we are.

[Doug]

It's a shame that Donald Trump took all of my money from me in the stock market. I can't afford this anymore. Will they bring me a C180D with a cloth seats? That's what I can afford now.

[Filippo]

If you will, I'll buy one too.

[Doug]

You won't.

[Kenan]

Staying on the topic of Mercedes. So. So this. So if you can't Quite afford the E53 wagon there is a Mercedes for. So of course the C60.

[Filippo]

There's a few but if performance is.

[Doug]

Your thing cla there's.

[Kenan]

I mentioned the C53 specific which I'll come back to in a second. Now this is the C63 which we knew and loved and the current one we don't love. So it's a four cylinder. You said specifically how much it and Mercedes Benz agrees with you that it was the wrong call. They're rolling that back quickly and they're going to be putting in a plug in hybrid 6 cylinder engine from the E53.

[Doug]

Can I make a quick point here? Can I make a quick point? The first three news stories and by the way, we're not tailoring these the first three news stories except for the tariffs One, Ferrari is going to do a gated. I've been saying, praise the Lord. I've been saying it for years. Mercedes should do a plug in wagon. I've been saying it for years.

[Filippo]

You've been hoping for years and Mercedes.

[Doug]

Is pulling the four cylinder out of the C63. I've been saying it for years.

[Kenan]

For a year.

[Doug]

But you get my point. Being correct about that is like predicting. I want you quickly to go to the next news story and I want you to introduce it. Okay, we'll get back to this quickly go to the next news story. Tell us about this.

[Filippo]

There was a news report this week that Alpha has taken a consultant and found a consultant to figure out what.

[Doug]

To do with Maserati. See where I'm going with this?

[Kenan]

Put two and two together and one.

[Filippo]

Of the options is that they will maybe get rid of Maserati. They'll spin it off.

[Doug]

Alfa Romeo has. Stellantis has hired McKinsey and they're gonna pay him millions of dollars to figure out what to do with Alfa and Maserati, two disastrous brands that are in horrible situations. I have predicted, in fact dictated to the auto industry. The last three news stories before Alfa call me. I'll do it for a lot less.

[Filippo]

That's certainly true. McKinsey should be in fear of your consultant.

[Doug]

I'll do it for two things. Oh, the new Icona manual.

[Kenan]

Oh, yup.

[Doug]

Done at an F40.

[Filippo]

We are probably at the right price point. Yeah.

[Doug]

No way. I'm way under. But McKinsey's going to charge me $20 million and it's still going to fail. There is no question it's still going to fail because they don't understand the car. Consultants don't understand car industry. They've tried so long for so many years but they all live in New York and they just graduated from college and the only car they've ever had is parents. Hand me down LR3. That's every consultant if they're lucky.

[Kenan]

This is how you end up with the advertising campaign that Jaguar used recently. That's exactly.

[Doug]

So go back to the previous news story. C63 they're going to put in. What is it?

[Kenan]

Yeah, so it's a twin turbo 3 liter straight 6. Same one using the E53. They haven't released power figures, but you have to imagine going to be the same as that car. Which means they'll be slightly less powerful in the current.

[Doug]

It can't be the same. There's no way they can go that far down because the new C63 has like 2 million horsepower.

[Kenan]

Well, they're saying that it was going to be less.

[Doug]

The new C3 has 670 horsepower. They can't go down to 500.

[Filippo]

But they can't go three with. They could.

[Kenan]

We'll see. I'm not exactly sure. They have been very cagey about how much power.

[Doug]

I will tell you, if you gave me the choice, I've driven that six cylinder because I drove the new E53 sedan. I've driven that six cylinder. I've driven this. I would take 70 less horsepower that six cylinder.

[Filippo]

I think what they're betting.

[Kenan]

Dang long. I totally agree with that. And a lot of publications have been saying this isn't the engine we want. We want a V8. Yeah, I get that. But like I'd way rather have a straight six than a four and it kind of moves it in line with like BMW currently has straight six power. Audi also using straight six power.

[Doug]

Also this is a great. Anybody saying that has never driven the straight six. I've been driving it daily for the last couple years. Plus now there's the plug in with even more power. It's a fantastic engine powertrain. Fantastic. One of the great six cylinder powertrains that has ever existed in our society.

[Filippo]

You have quite the set of six cylinder powertrains that the Sequoia man.

[Doug]

That's also a good six cylinder but it ain't nothing on the Mercedes.

[Kenan]

Just need to get a 993 Turbo. You'll be good to go. But like I think, but nonetheless it is telling that that fast Mercedes, like if we made a mistake we'll put six cylinders back in the car.

[Filippo]

The worst part, like it had all the power in the world but it was not a good power trend by all accounts.

[Doug]

And this is proven, especially if they go down in power. This is proven. Like horsepower is not the ultimate metric. The Charger EV Daytona proves that. Also, horsepower is not the only thing we want. Proves a lot. We want good. You want power and we want good. And they don't have to be mutually exclusive.

[Kenan]

Often when we make orders for lunch, Doug just says give me good. That's exactly, that's exactly what we're doing here. They're giving us good.

[Filippo]

Good.

[Doug]

All right, move on to the. We can go past the alpha news story. Ok.

[Kenan]

Yes, Willow Springs. So we got some very good news. Willow Springs recently has been up for sale. The facility itself. This is a racetrack this summer racetrack in Southern California. Very famous. Has not changed much since the 1960s which is why it was used in the Ford versus Ferrari movie. But it is recently sold to a private equity firm called Crossover Partners. They joined up with Singer Automotive Design. Oh, really want to make the Porsches.

[Doug]

Yes.

[Kenan]

To purchase Willow Springs. Now this, this is a really big deal today. This is again enthusiast. It's enthusiast based in sports car based. No.

[Doug]

I've got a news story. But he's sitting here like he's shocked. We talked about that.

[Kenan]

We went through your slides on demand.

[Filippo]

I also added this story to today's podcast, but I didn't read it.

[Kenan]

You're a great actor. And the Academy Award goes to Felip.

[Doug]

Importantly, what's going on?

[Kenan]

So they're really focused on making a lot of changes at Willow Springs now again, like I said, Willow Springs, not a lot in the way of safety. They're looking to change that. So they brought in, they're bringing in two ton. Alex W is going to be like doing a whole thing going over the safety, like safety of the track and improving stuff there. But they're also going to be adding quite a few facilities. One is going to be a technology hub for manufacturers to come and test stuff. They're also doing a car storage place, potentially doing a museum. Like, they have a lot of ideas.

[Doug]

I got an idea.

[Kenan]

We'll see if it comes to fruition, to be honest.

[Doug]

But I got an idea.

[Kenan]

They want it to be more like Sonoma and other racetracks like that.

[Doug]

I got an idea. Sure. Since I gave all the other news stories their ideas today, here's my idea. You know how the Nurburgring is this giant racetrack where everybody tests all their stuff because it's so giant.

[Kenan]

It is giant.

[Filippo]

Make it bigger.

[Doug]

Here's what you do for Willow Springs. You know how there's three tracks. Make them all. Put them all together. One massive track. Massive. So you got like a track, a track and a track. You connect those mofos, you got crack. You put this track goes to this track. Streets of Willow. Big Willow. Now there's. Now there's.

[Kenan]

There's just Willows everywhere.

[Doug]

You've heard of Big Willow. Now there's gonna be gigantic Willow.

[Kenan]

Titanic Willow.

[Doug]

Titanic Willow.

[Kenan]

Well, it's gonna go all the way.

[Doug]

To Santa Cruz, I think. I don't know where Willow Springs is. I went there once. I still don't know where it is.

[Kenan]

I think much like Thermal, there will. They say they're going to still remain open to the public. So, like Thermal, I think there will be like, a track that is like that they track for members. And I suspect that's how they will split things up. But of course, there are some concerns with this one, is that it's going to lose kind of the charm, like you're saying that it has of it being, like, very 60s. But I think it's. I think on the flip side of that, it's going to bring a lot of amenities that people actually want to go and drive cars on a racetrack want. Let's be honest, you had a spin recently. You want safety to be there, like track experience. You've recovered it very well, and it was very admirable job. They're going to bring more of a modern experience to it. I think if they balance it carefully and retain some of that, it can.

[Filippo]

Be really still be very fun, I think.

[Doug]

So. Cool.

[Kenan]

And I think. And let's be honest, like, Willow Springs has just been out there floundering for a little while. So, like, I'm glad to see, like, this specific racetrack being preserved and, like, the love of the Southern California car culture sticking around. And it Also means that interesting racing can come to this. NASCAR could come to this. Could be a lot more interesting stuff that like race series that end up on this track.

[Doug]

NASCAR doesn't only do ovals now. They got a lot of horses.

[Kenan]

The reason I want to say this, Sonoma Raceway is going to be managing day to day operations and the company that manages them is involved with nascar. So I have a suspicion they'll connect the dots.

[Doug]

Okay.

[Filippo]

I'm glad somebody bought it. It's a big deal.

[Doug]

I want to talk. This is. It is a good news story or it could be bad. We'll see. No, I want to talk about the final news story very quickly. I want you to say it and then we move on to it because we got a lot to cover. Say it. Move on.

[Filippo]

Kia is going. Is hoping to sell 90,000 electric pickups in North America a year. They said that today. Move on.

[Doug]

There is absolutely no chance that that occurs. Maybe they will. Okay.

[Filippo]

Now.

[Doug]

No, actually that's an interesting story also with the tariffs because they sell this truck here which is called. You call Tasman.

[Filippo]

They don't call that.

[Doug]

Sell that here, but it's called the Tasman and. No, it's here on the screen. North America screen. The screen. We're set.

[Kenan]

Digital projections.

[Filippo]

I'm going to be honest. Where somewhere that's probably built.

[Doug]

So. So but they'll have. But 104% can't be the Tasman. It'll have to be something else.

[Filippo]

Because I don't agree with the pronunciation.

[Doug]

You.

[Filippo]

You said I don't agree with your pronunciation.

[Doug]

You think it's Tasman? You think it's not Tasman?

[Filippo]

No, I don't remember what I said.

[Doug]

Tasman. It's from Tasmania. Tasman. That's like what you say. That's the word. It's. It's like me saying Akira and you being like I don't agree. But that's what it is.

[Filippo]

All right, all right.

[Doug]

The point is it's going to have to be a different truck or this truck but built in the US it.

[Filippo]

Is a different truck. It's based on a chassis that they're also going to hope to build some like people mover type vans and other pickups on. That is like an electric thing. This is not the Tasman. Tasman. It's not an electric pickup. Yeah, it's like on a different chassis. We just don't have designs.

[Doug]

Interesting. I mean this could be interesting. You know, I've been thinking about this a lot. The only EVs that are like really desirable and have retained value are the Rivians. Yeah, the truck, suv, EV world is probably where it is. The scouts are going to be hot.

[Filippo]

Incredibly hot in pre order land.

[Doug]

Yeah. So It'll be interesting.

[Filippo]

90,000 is.

[Doug]

90,000 is a lot. That means they're going more for like maverick type territory, which will be interesting. I mean, that's not an electric, but they do do a hybrid and like, that's probably. I imagine that's the size area they're thinking about.

[Filippo]

Or like Nissan and Toyota have tried to do they want to compete with.

[Doug]

They're not full size. And Ford Kia will not be making a full size electric truck. Are you out of your mind?

[Filippo]

They compete. Ford can sell plenty of F150s.

[Doug]

Not lightning.

[Filippo]

Not Lightnings.

[Doug]

Well, if Ford can't sell them, then Kia ain't. Kia ain't gonna show up with their first truck and it's gonna be an electric full size.

[Filippo]

You know, you would have said the same thing in 1998 when the tundra came out.

[Doug]

Oh, I would have said the same thing in 2005 when the Titan came out. You know what? I'd be right.

[Filippo]

They had two very successful generations.

[Doug]

They had one mildly successful generation.

[Filippo]

I wouldn't call that one.

[Doug]

2Nd gen was only sold to Nissan employees in Nashville so they could tow their boats to the lake.

[Kenan]

I hate when mom and dad fight.

[Doug]

Okay, next up is the talk Cars segment where we talk about cars. We have been talking about cars, now we do it more. There's a couple of important things to talk about with the talk cars. And the most important is the Bentley Dominator. Now, for those of you who don't know, I'm obsessed with the Sultan of Brunei and his cars, not necessarily with his. It's actually his brother, Prince Jeffrey, and he commissioned all these cars in the 90s. And one of the cars he commissioned was a Bentley suv, which was called Aptley, in my mind, the Dominator. And they had about 11 of them. They all were sold to Brunei. And somebody sent us this one from a model car retailer in Italy, and here it is. And I didn't even know they made a model car of it, otherwise I would have bought it years ago. And Sean, our producer, he said, hey, let's put it on the set. And I said, no, I'm taking this home. This is the greatest gift that anybody has ever given me. The single greatest Bentley Dominator. It's blue. Blue. And you know what? Now that I'm looking at the model, it's quite ugly.

[Kenan]

It's Heinous. It's a really ugly.

[Doug]

I've always said that if I could have any car in the world, there would be one of the Sultan's Dominators.

[Filippo]

Stand by it.

[Doug]

And now that I'm sitting here today looking at this wonderful gift that someone has given me, I completely disavow what I've said before.

[Kenan]

I disagree. I think you should lean into it. I think you absolutely.

[Doug]

Why is the rear overhang so dramatically large?

[Filippo]

It's going to impact your off roading.

[Doug]

You can't off road with this at all anyway. Right.

[Kenan]

Because that's exactly how you would use it is to take your Dominator off road.

[Doug]

I. I would take mine. It's called the Dominator. You don't think I'm just going to dominate pavement, I'm going to dominate the dirt.

[Kenan]

And him whipping a Bentley. I suspect mineral oil might be what dominates you. That's true.

[Doug]

You know, I didn't think about that. That's a mineral oil though, wasn't it? Based on the P38. Imagine adding the mineral oil to a P38.

[Kenan]

There's no. You think you couldn't make it any less reliable.

[Filippo]

Wow.

[Kenan]

Luckily there are only 13 of them.

[Doug]

So, man, you put a. Thank you so much. You put an S54 in there and you really have your work cut out for you.

[Kenan]

It is fascinating to me that Bentley at all thought that when they did the Bentayga that they needed to go back to this to like look at.

[Doug]

The report was that when the. When they were. When they were coming out with the Bentayga in order to conceptualize it, they had Brunei ship them the Dominators back so they could take a look at it and see what they did last time.

[Kenan]

I have to give.

[Doug]

And there were pictures of the cars on airplane tarmac. So it. Apparently that did happen.

[Kenan]

So cool. Presumably they came in to fix some leaks too.

[Doug]

Probably they were like, listen, if you send these to us walls or make.

[Kenan]

Them warp again, credit where it's due. This model is actually very nice, which.

[Doug]

Is especially hard to do because they didn't make the car. How do you make a model of something that we've seen seven photos of, man?

[Kenan]

Those designers took their time, but they invested it well because it's beautiful. And now it's here on our.

[Filippo]

Can we talk about one other suv?

[Doug]

Can you pull up the Land Cruiser? You're talking about the Land Cruiser?

[Filippo]

I think it's important.

[Doug]

Okay. Pull up the Land Cruiser, folks. The one of the greatest cars in cars and bids history. Is live right now. Now he's just going to scroll. Strategy.

[Filippo]

This is.

[Doug]

I'm going to tell you what this is. I'm going to tell you why it's special. So the 200 Series Toyota Land Cruiser, which is one of the better Land Cruisers, it was sold from 2008-21.

[Filippo]

Because the best is one of the four.

[Doug]

No, the best is the 300 Series LX700H, which I won.

[Filippo]

It's one of the four.

[Doug]

Yes. Overtrail.

[Kenan]

Filippo's leaving. Doug Vegas.

[Filippo]

I prefer Nori.

[Doug]

The point is he's tired of hearing me talk about the LX700. A rep back.

[Kenan]

Aren't we all? But continues, right?

[Doug]

Yeah, we are. Including my wife. So this is a Land Cruiser and the land Cruiser, the 200 series Land Cruiser sold from 08 to 21. For the final two model years of the Land, the Land Cruiser, the 200, they made a Heritage edition that was a special edition model. It was not the only one they made. There was a. You could get a regular or you could get the heritage. And in 20, the heritage was only offered with two row seating, but for 21 the final year, they offered it with an optional third row. And so the in, in, in the minds of a lot of the Land Cruiser community, a 21 heritage, which was like the special model, final model year with the optional third row, which really added a lot to the capability. I don't know why they didn't do it with the third row and the other ones. Because everybody wanted. It is like the Dream Land Cruise. And we have one live right now that is in magnetic gray, I think they called it. Yeah, Magnetic gray way a three row magnetic gray heritage. There's maybe a hundred of these, maybe 50 on the planet.

[Filippo]

They were expensive when new and hard to get.

[Doug]

This is a really, really, really, really, really, really, really special car in the Land Cruiser world. This is really, really cool. And so it's live on the site right now and you should buy it or not or you should leave it for me. I don't know.

[Kenan]

I'm done with car. I'm off cars.

[Doug]

I just wanted to bring it to people's attention. No, I want an LX700. I think that 300 is better, but there's a good chunk of the community. 99.6% of the community.

[Filippo]

Are you giving 0.4 to the 300? Wow.

[Doug]

Those 0.4 think that the 100 is better. No one thinks that the 300 is better except for me, sadly. Unfortunately, the 300 has been tariffed out of existence. Anyway, this thing is live right now and. And it's the coolest car ever to grace the website.

[Filippo]

It's up there.

[Doug]

It's up there. Magnetic Heritage 3 row. When these were new, I was like, I gotta buy one of these because I know they're gonna hold their value like this.

[Filippo]

I remember this. And I shouldn't, I didn't.

[Doug]

Because it still doesn't have self driving.

[Filippo]

No, it does. It has self driving as long as you don't go to zero.

[Doug]

Yeah. It has adaptive cruise.

[Filippo]

Maybe it doesn't have.

[Doug]

But it cuts off 20 miles an hour.

[Kenan]

20.

[Doug]

Yeah. So you can't use it in traffic.

[Kenan]

Which is the whole point. The whole point.

[Filippo]

But when you're driving across Africa, Right.

[Kenan]

You've not.

[Doug]

And this one has. These are great photos too.

[Filippo]

The heritage wheels, the heritage bags are really commons. Went deep on it immediately, by the way. Like apparently the stitching looks a little bit different than it does some other photos. This is.

[Doug]

Everything about this car is perfect except it was in a light front end accident. And so the grill was replaced with the non heritage grill. Now two things about this, I went on ebay. The grills are available and it's actually the grill and the fog light surrounds. They're available and they're cheap. You can get the whole set for like 800 bucks. Some which is relatively affordable considering the value of the car. Yeah, you can see it here. It's. It's very slightly different. It's. It's like a slightly different color, different bars. It's very minimal.

[Filippo]

I can see how the body shop would have ordered the wrong one.

[Doug]

Yeah. Or some people might think it looks better, to be honest with you. There's folks out there who might say, okay, anyway, I want to talk also. Give me, give us your talk car segment, please.

[Filippo]

Okay. I was in Mexico City for just a little weekend trip.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

Shout out to the one person that from Detroit that was visiting the same coffee shop and said hi. Hi. By the way, I, I did recognize. I love Mexico City cars. Yeah, there are non exotic cars. No, I saw like a huracan and a McLaren.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

That once.

[Doug]

There is a lot of money in Mexico City, but there are no nice cars.

[Filippo]

It's a fascinating blend of. It's a very European feeling city. It is a fascinating blend of big American cars. Lots of Suburbans, especially the nice areas. Lots of every big SUV, lots of old like 90s Chrysler products. And then there's European car.

[Doug]

Yep.

[Filippo]

Peugeot, Peugeot, Citroen, whatever. Renault. And then there's also Chinese cars now.

[Doug]

Yep.

[Kenan]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

I, I had an Uber that was a BYD D1 which is like a purpose built just for ride sharing apps. Chinese little taxi cab thing. And I love the combination.

[Doug]

Pull this up. BYD D1. I, I had the same thought when I was in Mexico City. I was astonished by this. Unbelievable. Probably nowhere else on the planet gives you that level of combination of American and European in one place. Deep American, Suburban and now Chinese.

[Filippo]

There are BYDs everywhere. There's Chinese brands that I've never heard of.

[Doug]

Yeah. But MG is all over the place.

[Filippo]

Passenger side, sliding rear door, driver's side.

[Doug]

You can see it.

[Filippo]

Regular opening rear door.

[Doug]

There's the driver's side, regular door handle in the regular place. There's the passenger side slide for safety.

[Filippo]

When you get out.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

Wow. I just love that like mix of things in the market.

[Doug]

One thing I will say the reason for the mix is because the market is not particularly powerful. And so like the US market can make an enormous amount of regulations and automakers build cars for the US market. The Mexican market has to kind of take what's available. However, the countries that have to take what's available often have the coolest car markets. I noticed the same thing when I was in New Zealand. It's the same thing in Malta. You end up with just, just weird crap all the way.

[Filippo]

All the way.

[Doug]

Because it's like Chinese. Yeah. Like we don't want to regulate out anybody. We want to have as much choice as we can. Peugeot. Yeah. Bring it in.

[Filippo]

Yep.

[Doug]

But this, it. Mexico City is really where the Latin American market and the American market like collide.

[Filippo]

Because if you're at the richest cities in Latin America and yeah, so you do get like the large American cars and a lot of like Mercedes GLS's.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

For some reason. And like, but low stuff like that.

[Doug]

You saw low wheels.

[Filippo]

I also saw Maybach gls.

[Doug]

The, the. If you're at the border, you, you don't see a lot of the Latin America spec cars. It's not the same. It's more American type stuff. There's a lot of American influence on the border cities. But you get fur enough south, you get some.

[Filippo]

You get some interesting.

[Doug]

It is weird.

[Filippo]

Loved it. Love just walking around and looking at all the cars.

[Doug]

Feels European. Okay, we gotta tell you, take one. We gotta talk market report. We gotta do a market report. Market report is brought to you by Sean, our producer.

[Filippo]

The market report is brought to you by Cars and Bids. Go check out carsandbits.com if you have a cool car, sell it on Cars and Bids by clicking the Sell a car [e-mail] or by using the Cars and Bids app, or by using the cars on iOS.

[Doug]

Our producer Sean has a heinous G wagon. Okay, he does. There's a lot of stuff I want to cover. Market report. However, the questions this week were the best we've ever had. Whoa, we got to get to the questions. But Market report, there's two things I want to talk about. One is I wanted to give a quick discussion of the car market in general and I'm curious what you guys think. We haven't talked about this before, been surprised at our sales.

[Filippo]

They've been strong. They've been strong results on a lot of cars, which when the market is down 3% day after day after day after day, it's surprising.

[Doug]

Stock market's down almost 20% now. After today it's less. And maybe by the time this goes live it'll be even better. But in the last few days it was down almost 20%.

[Filippo]

Look at that 992 GTX.

[Doug]

Well, one of the things I specifically wanted to talk about was yesterday we had a lot of recent Euro cars. Bring all the money. Go back back. That 992 GTS got all the money. That X3M competition got all the money. That Audi E Tron GT which has been a tough sell if we're being totally honest, got all the money.

[Filippo]

And we sold a 992 Turbo today.

[Doug]

One more. This Volvo, this V60 Polestar, got all the money.

[Filippo]

Okay, V60 Pulsar has been getting all the money, period.

[Doug]

But yeah, but this is the new body. And yeah, we sold the 992 Turbo for big money today.

[Filippo]

We sold it for ten grand above sticker.

[Doug]

My assumption is two year old car, three year old car. It's a two year old car with no miles, to be clear. I know, but still my assumption is that there are people who are seeing what's on the horizon. We just lived through Covid and are realizing if I want to get into a car, I'm going to buy you.

[Filippo]

And they're not wrong. Porsche's not. If you ordered a 992turbo now, who knows when you'll get it?

[Doug]

You won't.

[Filippo]

It might be a year, might be three. They might stop importing them. Who knows? They have stopped importing them.

[Kenan]

They might tell you no for now.

[Doug]

Yeah, probably take your order, but.

[Kenan]

But it might.

[Doug]

I don't know if it goes much further. Than that.

[Filippo]

I think this is what we expected would happen eventually, right? As new car prices go higher because of tariffs, as inventory decreases because of that, you get an increase in values in the used market. What I'm surprised by is that it's happened already and it's happened when the market is as tumultuous as it is right now.

[Doug]

You know, there's a theory among people who are less informed that the stock market is entirely for rich people. But the truth is because significant losses in the stock market points to a non healthy economy which eventually will affect your job and your ability to purchase things. So I've been a little surprised at the health of. Yeah, this car brought 113,500. It was a lot more than I was expecting, to be honest.

[Kenan]

It's a 2022 GT4.

[Doug]

I think we're already seeing. Either people are hedging against a supply reduction or they already think it's here or I'm not really sure. I've been. It's a little surprising my assumption. Everybody, everybody's come to me and been like cars and bids is going to do so well with the tariffs because 95% of the cars we sell are completely unaffected. That was a possibility, but I also assumed the economy would take such a hit that there would be no consumer confidence to buy any car new or used.

[Kenan]

That was exactly what I was far.

[Filippo]

That may still happen.

[Kenan]

Seems like it's better than we maybe were expecting.

[Doug]

So far.

[Kenan]

So far. But I mean like you were saying, let's see, what does tomorrow bring? Yeah, don't really know. So I think, I think, yeah, some people who, some people who still can't afford it are jumping in and going for it. And I don't think that's a bad move necessarily. We'll just, we'll see.

[Doug]

What. No, it might not be. Especially if they can afford it. Like if they're sitting here, their job is good or they're retired or they have a lot of cash on the sidelines. Honestly, a car might be a smarter place. I've been thinking a lot about how my cars are probably my most stable asset at the moment.

[Filippo]

Let's use that 992 Turbo S as an example. 230 grand right now, if a new one becomes 25% more expensive, right. Suddenly your resale, your value of that car stays flat or increases. And if inflation is higher as it may well be with tariffs. Okay, well you just parked something in an asset that's not, that's not devalued, declining Which.

[Doug]

Which, honestly, right now is a pretty okay place. With bonds declining, that's a pretty okay place. I'm not, by the way, I'm not trying to shill for the company. I would prefer there to be no tariffs at all and have that affect the company negatively. If it is the case, I think that the tariffs are a horrible idea and incredibly stupid. It. However, it does seem to me like, at least in the. From the early days of looking at this, some of these, especially some of these Euro cars are doing better than I was expecting.

[Filippo]

You expect when there's a very tumultuous stock market that people are cautious.

[Doug]

Cautious.

[Filippo]

Seems like people are actually taking a little bit different approach.

[Doug]

People who live through Covid. That market recovered very quickly and led to extreme shortages. I see some parallels here.

[Filippo]

08 didn't.

[Doug]

Oh, it didn't. And so it's hard to know which is which. But this feels more like Covid than 08 because it was kind of created and thus could be uncreated relatively quickly.

[Filippo]

Today shows it.

[Doug]

Today proves that. And so maybe you want to get in while you can. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know exactly what's going on, but it's an interesting situation.

[Filippo]

32 grand for that.

[Doug]

Our sale rate is. Our sale rate has been high.

[Filippo]

Yeah.

[Doug]

Our. The value on the cars has been strong. Maybe this doesn't last. Maybe what happens is the tariffs do significantly impact the economy and people do lose their jobs. Confidence goes off, and then we can't sell anything. That's also possible.

[Filippo]

We're like two weeks in.

[Doug]

We're two weeks in, we don't know what's gonna happen. But for the first two weeks, I am surprised how it's gonna agree.

[Kenan]

Yeah. I don't disagree. Of course, you've proclaimed that you can read the future based on those past cards that have come through. Do you wanna make any proclamations about what's going on?

[Doug]

Yeah, I'll make a proclamation. No rational person can read the future when it comes to the Trump administration. Anything could happen at any moment, at any time. I can't predict what's gonna happen in six minutes, let alone in six days. I went to shoot the CRZ intros. I went to shoot the CRZ intros. I look at my stock portfolio, it's up 9%. I the hell happened? I mean, the zoo parking lot. What the hell happened?

[Kenan]

That sums up 2025 in a nutshell.

[Filippo]

Zoo parking.

[Doug]

All right, we got to move on. We got to move on to questions. Questions. Now, remember, you Too can ask a question. You go to carsandbids.com you click on the Community tab and there will be a poster that says, ask us your questions. And I will select the best questions. Not the most upvoted, but the best questions.

[Filippo]

There were 247 questions left.

[Kenan]

Yeah, a lot.

[Doug]

Yeah. But dude, there are some good questions. That's why I wanted to make sure we have time for it. We got decent time this time. So we're going to do questions legitly. Okay. And the first question, people keep asking us to rank stuff. I've decided I'm only going to do one per episode.

[Filippo]

Okay.

[Doug]

But the best question, the best rank. There were a lot of suggestions. The best rank is rank the E classes. This is where the hate will flow.

[Kenan]

Because it has all the other things.

[Doug]

Bring us the hate.

[Filippo]

There's a question that says rank all the Priuses models.

[Doug]

I'll do the Priuses later. I want to rank the E classes.

[Filippo]

Where are we starting from?

[Doug]

The 124.

[Filippo]

We're starting the 124.

[Doug]

Yeah. Okay, now I want to be clear here. I have owned. Owned. Not just driven as press cars like my little, like, little auto industry compatriots. I have personally owned every generation of E class. So people are going to be like, you're wrong. And I'm going to be like, no, no.

[Filippo]

All right, so it's one. It's 124. You had a 1, 210, 211, 212.

[Doug]

I had a 500. I had a 93. 124, 500. By the way, that's the other thing. I didn't just have one of each E class class. I've had the best of each E class. So let's do this.

[Filippo]

All right.

[Kenan]

Wait, what?

[Filippo]

Six generations. I'm going to blow everybody's general or like AMG.

[Doug]

No, general. Including the AMGs. I'm going to blow everybody's mind. I already have my ranking.

[Filippo]

Please.

[Doug]

It's going to hurt. Car enthusiasts.

[Filippo]

Do you want to be part of this or is it just Doug and I. I'll.

[Kenan]

I'll chime in.

[Doug]

This is going to hurt. Car enthusiasts are not going to like this. But this is the truth. And I have. I have for years. I have only. I've had an E class in my garage. Gosh. Some of them I only had for six, eight months. I've had some of them I had for many years. Best 214. Yeah. Second best 213. Third best 210.

[Kenan]

Really? Over 211.

[Filippo]

Just for 100%.

[Doug]

Yeah. If you want to hear me say 211, you better wait a little while.

[Kenan]

I love the 211.

[Filippo]

I'm gonna. The. I put the 124 after the 210 over the 212.

[Doug]

Yeah, people are gonna, people are gonna get.

[Filippo]

For the record, I. I own a212.

[Doug]

People on Instagram. People on Instagram who love the older stuff and the cheap stuff are gonna get mad that we didn't put the 124 first. But I've owned a 124. I know about a biodegradable warning harness, wiring harness or two.

[Filippo]

I.

[Doug]

The car is. Was a good start. You. You.

[Filippo]

You agreed that it was 2142-132102-14213, 210, 124, 212, 211. Yeah, we're stunningly agreed. The best ones, the newest ones are simply the best ones. But there was a period of time that was like 03 to.

[Doug]

Well, it was 03 to 17. I mean, I mean as it were. And those were.

[Filippo]

And I love my 212s. To be clear, the 212.

[Doug]

And honestly the 03E55, the 21155 would maybe be one of my top three if I was to rank individual models.

[Filippo]

Don't Forget about the ECC3 wagon with the refreshment.09.

[Doug]

Yeah, I had one of those. It wouldn't be near the top. So cool. The head bolt motor.

[Filippo]

The market agrees by the way, that it's M156.

[Kenan]

But yeah, I see what you mean in totality about the 211 because in my opinion of all the fast AMG, I still put the 211 E55.

[Doug]

If someone said to me rank the AMGs, the 211 E55 would be really close to the top of this line.

[Kenan]

I agree.

[Doug]

In fact, I actually think that the more recent AMGs are less desirable. It's just that the overall car has gotten to be such an unbelievably good complete package in the 213 and 214 generations. They're the best. And people who are going to comment have never driven one because they drive a lot. The people who comment on Instagram and write should of they drive older stuff. But this is the real.

[Filippo]

I want to be really clear. I like I said, I own a 212. I own a 24 post facelift 212 wagon. I love it. I Think it's an incredibly good car. I've driven it 50,000 miles.

[Doug]

Especially the post facelift. Especially the non amp.

[Filippo]

It's great. But every E class is great, right? I agree with the ranking.

[Doug]

The 213 was an unbelievable step up over the 212. I would argue that probably the greatest step up of all of them was from the 12 to the 13.

[Filippo]

The tech was a massive jump, proven.

[Doug]

By the fact that the jump from the 13 to the 14 has been. It looks like a facelift, to be honest.

[Filippo]

Are you okay with 1, 2, 4 being the thing that breaks down? I think it's just so iconic as like a classic Mercedes.

[Doug]

Well.

[Kenan]

And it's good. It's just. It's the classic bank vault.

[Filippo]

Yeah.

[Kenan]

Built quality Mercedes is known for at the time. And it's a small, usable, handsome Bruno sac.

[Doug]

Okay, here's the question then. Would you rather have a 212E350 wagon or a 124E320 wagon? 212.

[Filippo]

Kind of rather have the 124.

[Doug]

Oh for Craig.

[Filippo]

Not as a daily driver. But I'm not an old car.

[Doug]

Regardless, as long as we agree that it goes 214, 213, 210.

[Filippo]

I do.

[Doug]

I'll take that. Okay, next question. Here's a good one. From Ryder 17 to Kenan and Filippo, if you were given a choice between one of Doug's previous cars, which would you pick? Previous. Got to be previous. I've never sold a good car that I have had.

[Kenan]

Let's see. Sold. True.

[Filippo]

There's. There's like a lot of truth to this about the 360.

[Doug]

And I sold the G wagon. What do you got?

[Filippo]

You own. Do your company cars count?

[Doug]

No.

[Kenan]

I love.

[Doug]

I mean 05 Elise 6.

[Filippo]

Yeah.

[Kenan]

With no air conditioning.

[Doug]

Tough. I fix the AC eventually, actually.

[Kenan]

Oh, I thought it just didn't have it.

[Doug]

No, no, it had it. It was broken.

[Filippo]

Oh.

[Doug]

And I went through the whole summer and for some reason in like November, I was like, I can't take it anymore. And I fixed it. Then I pulled it. I don't know. I was.

[Kenan]

That sound like something I would do.

[Doug]

It was an idiot.

[Filippo]

You've owned a lot of cars. If your CTSV wagon were the good one, manual one, then that would have been a choice.

[Doug]

But it's a good daily.

[Filippo]

But it wasn't.

[Kenan]

The Viper GTS was a great one.

[Filippo]

The Viper GS was.

[Doug]

Was great.

[Kenan]

I mean, I have a soft. I know it's not a good car, but I have a soft I very much have a soft spot for the defender. Like, I really love. Yeah.

[Doug]

The only good car I ever saw.

[Filippo]

I'm surprised you're not saying vantage.

[Kenan]

The vantage was a good car.

[Filippo]

I'm not surprised. A stick360. Yeah.

[Doug]

Don't forget that.

[Filippo]

The answer for me is clear. By the way, there was a clear car that I love.

[Doug]

210E55.

[Filippo]

No to Nissan Escargot. I legitimately love that Escargot.

[Doug]

Well, you know. Know you for, like, five grand, you can get one.

[Filippo]

Well, it's not six grand now.

[Doug]

It's not, like, unavailable for.

[Filippo]

Yeah.

[Doug]

For $5,000.

[Filippo]

I'm not going to pay money for the experience.

[Doug]

Purchase one.

[Filippo]

No. But, like, if I were given one.

[Doug]

What do you got? Stick360.

[Kenan]

I kind of want to remove that one from the list because that's obviously what I would choose, but I think if. If not that one, I think. I think it's the Viper gt. That car was. And the GTS got so many upgrades. And you got the double bubble. Yours was the right blue with white stripes. It was like. It was.

[Doug]

And it forged internals. 96.97, right?

[Kenan]

Yep, exactly. And so that was like. That's, like the one. And those cars are. I mean, what did you sell yours for?

[Doug]

I bought it for 35, sold it for 34.

[Kenan]

Now they're like 100. So, I mean, they're like 70. No good GTSs are.

[Filippo]

That was.

[Doug]

Mine was not a good GTS. It was. It was a driver. It was a very nice car. Like, it didn't have issues, but it was a. It wasn't like a show car. I agree with you. But.

[Kenan]

Yeah. So even so, I mean, you own that car at the right time. I've always thought they were cool. So if I couldn't have the 360, which is what I would de facto choose would be the gts.

[Doug]

I bought that car in North Carolina. Fuquay, Varina.

[Filippo]

I'm very familiar.

[Doug]

Yeah. And very close to where I live, back to Philly. And it was so cool. And it had little seat belt covers that. That said Viper on them.

[Filippo]

And every time we would go film a video, Doug would refuse to drive it because he hated driving it.

[Doug]

You know what's funny? Money. I deeply regret now getting rid of that car. I wish I had spent more time with that car. I lived in Center City, Philly. It wasn't the car for Philly. If I had that car now, I would really appreciate it a lot more. Yeah, it was cool. It was really Cool.

[Kenan]

They're really cool.

[Filippo]

There were a lot of cars pre my knowing you and therefore I don't think about those cars because there were 255. That would have been a good car. There were other good options, but that's car goes lives in my memory.

[Doug]

Okay, next question from Rose 76. What is your craziest car press launch story? You. I, I don't go to press launches often because I don't care. And I really hate it. Honestly, I hate the whole thing. I, I really think that press lunches are totally inappropriate, to be perfectly frank. That they fly the journalists out there first class to Hawaii and, and put them in the nicest hotel and give them the nicest meals and they say, please write an objective piece about our Subaru legacy. It's like laughably stupid, right? But I did back in the day when I was starting out, you kind of have to go to them. You don't have any leverage. And, and, and when you're a young guy, the old guys don't want to go to him anymore. They got families. They don't want to be on the road going to the press launch for the facelifted Chevy Colorado, short wheelbase. Oh, so can I go? The very first press launch I ever went to was for the Lexus IS, which came out in 2012, 2011, something like that. It was the redesign.

[Filippo]

The redesign came out in 08.

[Doug]

Really? No, it was 06 that the, it competed against.

[Kenan]

I mean the ISF competed against.

[Doug]

It was the next gen. It wasn't the ISF. Okay, okay.

[Filippo]

Oh, it wasn't the ISF, John. Then 13.

[Doug]

Thirteen. So probably in spring of 12, which makes sense. That was right when I was starting out.

[Filippo]

Oh, wait, with a face left.

[Doug]

Or summer of 12. I went to the first press launch I ever went to, which was the Lexus is. And I don't remember where it was, but it was in the west somewhere. Anyway, I went out there and the fellow who ran marketing for Lexus, he gets up on the stage and I'm nervous. Like I'm young. Everyone in this industry is very collegiate. They all know each other. And I'm there for my first press launch ever. I don't know anybody. I'm just a little baby child. I'm like 24. I'm like, just. I'm like sitting there with like the little notebook, like, I better take notes on this car. I don't know what to do. And the guy gets in up there, the marketing guy for Lexus gets up there and he says the first thing he says to the room of journalists before the presentation, he says, the new Lexus is, is the car for people who want to stop blending in and start blending out. And I thought to myself, I've chosen the wrong industry. I can't believe I quit my job. This is the worst thing I've ever done in my life. And anyway, we got better from there.

[Filippo]

Not that launch widely panned that car, by the way, for the styling.

[Doug]

You know where it was? It was in Austin actually, because they took us to a racetrack, but not the Formula One track. Some like Little Go Karting track and.

[Filippo]

An IS350 exciting F3 Sport.

[Kenan]

F Sport.

[Doug]

The big selling point of that car, do you remember what it was?

[Filippo]

The. Was it the mouse? No, it was that the, the running lights were underneath the headlights and like a little.

[Doug]

That was one of the big things that had helped you blend out. Yeah, but the big selling point was that the gauge cluster would move like, like the lfa.

[Kenan]

I forgot about.

[Doug]

That was like the coolest part of the. The 2012.

[Filippo]

Not a bad car, I guess.

[Doug]

But no, it was fine.

[Filippo]

You never see those.

[Doug]

Okay. Anyway, so I don't really have any other crazy press on stories. I really, really, really, really don't go to them often. And when I do, I'm kind of annoying about it. I tell the automaker, look, I'm going to be in and out. Give me a car or don't. I don't if you don't want me to. I'm just not going to come. I just hate it. Okay, next question for Kenan from British car driver. Hey guys. This question is directed at Kenan as a Ferrari purist. Do you think the hate on the Roma is deserved to.

[Kenan]

Not, not necessarily. I think that it, it's like the entry level Ferrari generally gets a lot of hate. California got a lot of hate. Was it a bad car? It wasn't the best Ferrari, but it didn't make it a bad car. I actually quite like the way the first gen drive and the same thing kind of says applies to the Roma. Like when it came out I like, I wasn't sure about the styling necessarily. Like the integrated grill thing is kind of weird, but they do drive very well. Yeah, I think they look very elegant. It's a very simple looking for. It's very pretty looking car and honestly it's something you can use every day.

[Doug]

And it's not a zillion dollars like all the other Ferrari. I mean it's very expensive.

[Kenan]

It's very expensive and lord Knows if you're going to buy one for Ferrari, you want to be on the list. You gotta play the game and add a hundred thousand dollars in options and that's where they make their money. But I think that it actually is a pretty good car. I don't love the screens instead of buttons. I hate that. But I hate that on all modern Ferraris. So actually, no, I, I don't think it deserves the. The hate that it.

[Doug]

I will also say entry level car enthusiast brand will always get hate. Like the Boxer. We know how good the Boxer Cayman are, but they still are viewed as not a real, etc. Etc. Like, you could take this list down. Base model Mustang, base model challenger, the V6, the four cylinders, they're not, they're not real, you know, Totally.

[Kenan]

And so, so no, I, as a, as a purist, I recognize it's placed in the lineup. I think it's a very good car. And yeah, I don't really have any issues.

[Doug]

I agree. I think it's great.

[Filippo]

Ken's gonna go out and buy a Roma.

[Doug]

It's not the dream car.

[Kenan]

I'm not saying that it's not the.

[Doug]

Dream car, but it's. But it's got a place in the lineup for a public company that wants to make money. And honestly, it drives well.

[Kenan]

Did the Roma, Spider and Portofino need to exist at the same time?

[Doug]

Well, they don't anymore.

[Kenan]

They know. But they did for a time, and that was not the case then. I felt differently about it.

[Doug]

Here's a question that's coming from a user with the username Buick. This is the best question we've ever been asked on cartoon. Don't read the question. Let me tell you it and surprise you because it's so good. Good. The G Wagon sells so well. Do you think there's a market for Jeep or Ford to sell a luxury version of their Wrangler and Bronco under the Chrysler and Lincoln brands, respectively? You know, on its face, this question sounds like the stupid ramblings of someone who doesn't understand life. But when you think about it, the name is Buick. What about a Lincoln Bronco?

[Filippo]

So here's the thing. My answer is mixed on this because the answer is yes, I think they could sell a luxury version. Yeah, I think that those are not the correct brands and they should keep it under the Jeep and Ford Spectrum.

[Doug]

Jeep, Chrysler. That would be a big. There's no luxury brand. I don't think that's a good idea generally. But what about a Lincoln Bronco?

[Filippo]

I think that Ford could go for a luxury version of the Bronco the same way that the Ford F150 has the Platinum or the King Ranch or whatnot trims. I think there's room for a luxury trim of every off road.

[Doug]

Isn't that the wrapper Raptor?

[Filippo]

No, the Raptor is a high performance version.

[Doug]

Yeah but it's also loaded with steering wheel.

[Filippo]

The King Ranch or whatever the Texas edition, whatever the top it exists existed King Ranch etc there could be a King Ranch Bronco. Certainly. I don't think moving it to the Lincoln umbrella is the right call.

[Doug]

Maybe. But I think his point is it would do a lot for Lincoln as a brand if they had a G Wagon competitor.

[Filippo]

You're going to get somebody in there and they're also going to look at the Corsair there.

[Doug]

Well why don't you sell the Lincoln G Wagon to them? The Mercedes Benz sells a lot of G Wagon styling. Why isn't the answer to that question yes, Mercedes Benz sells a lot of G wagons and then they sell a lot of clas to people in Newport beach who look at G wagons and they're like I wish I could be that someday fair.

[Filippo]

I just don't think Lincoln tried with the Mark lt. Then again well no.

[Kenan]

Lincoln Lincoln tried even earlier than that. I mean you think about the Blackwood.

[Doug]

They just took 15 years. But you're talking about trucks and truck buyers it has now been proven want to buy trucks from mainstream brands. Nobody wants a Lincoln truck in their garage. They want a Ford truck. I think the issue however a Lincoln G Wagon based on the Bronco. This is not stupid. Here's the thing. Is Jim Farley listening to this? Does he listen to this podcast? We get a lot of messages from people who work in the auto industry.

[Filippo]

I don't think it's that idea but like the same way that I think every manufacturer would realize that they can do both luxury and still have a luxury brand. Cadillac vs. GMC Denali both exist. I think that Lincoln is not quite capable of doing an off roader well.

[Doug]

And I don't think that's to it to create brand image you this is how you do it.

[Filippo]

I don't think you can fake I I think honestly I think that Lincoln should maybe just stop to exist.

[Doug]

No, I love completely wrong.

[Filippo]

I love Lincoln's products. Nobody I'll stuff you don't understand that's.

[Doug]

Lexus exists Mercedes I don't understand they sell cars. Lincoln deserves more and I have an idea for more investment A Lincoln G Wagon this suggestion which ironically comes from Buick.

[Filippo]

Buick, right.

[Doug]

This suggestion is one of the great suggestions in the history of the car business.

[Filippo]

Hasn't Ford done a high country Bronco?

[Doug]

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I, I don't.

[Filippo]

Why hasn't Chevrolet done a, a Blazer? Denali?

[Doug]

Well, they don't do a Blazer.

[Filippo]

Chevrolet does a Blazer. That's a joke.

[Kenan]

I, I think, I don't know. When I think back on this, like, why is the G Wagon so successful? You know, it was a military vehicle that was cool. So it had that. And then like that was in the 90s. That was kind of when Arnold Schwarzenegger was doing the Hummer thing, they made a civilian version for him. Like that was seen as cool, that kind of monster thing. And then it took off. Mercedes leaned into the luxury side of things with it to do that now like to bring out a totally new thing and then build around that. And it is a pretty heavy lift.

[Doug]

The success of the, of the G Wagon is because of this heritage design that was steeped in capabilities. And that's what the Bronco is. It has a heritage design that is steeped in capability. BMW tried to steal the G Wagon's thunder with the XM and failed and doesn't get it. In Munich. They don't get it right. But this, and remember I predicted all the news stories this week. This is it. Like this is a good. And I gotta give credit to Buick. This is a great, the guy, this is it. Like this is the heritage design. BMW doesn't have that heritage so they're not able to actually do that credibility.

[Filippo]

But Ford is, Lincoln doesn't have that either. But there was never a Lincoln off roader.

[Doug]

There never was a luxury Mercedes off roader until they turned the G Wagon into a luxury car sting product that.

[Filippo]

Had a very specific image that they made luxurious.

[Doug]

It sounds like what Lincoln's gonna do to the Bronco. Existing product with a specific image that they make luxurious.

[Filippo]

I, I just don't, I don't think you can force that. I don't think you can recreate that.

[Doug]

They didn't force it with the G Wagon.

[Filippo]

It naturally evolved A lot of examples like Porsche. I'm looking at a Cayenne. When it came out, the thought was we're going to have an off road. The first gen Cayenne was off road capable and no modern one is. Well, because I think they took the.

[Doug]

Cayenne a different direction.

[Filippo]

But I don't think there was interest in the off roading.

[Doug]

There's no interest in Graz. This the G Wagon. The G Wagon has literally given life to the people of Graz. Like that town.

[Filippo]

The Austrians are thankful.

[Doug]

The Austrians, that town, every restaurant in Graz should be like thanking Mercedes Benz. Like hey, we would have closed if it wasn't for the fact that this car has been here for 30 years.

[Filippo]

You can't fake it. You can't just say we're going to fake.

[Doug]

The XM was fake. The Bronco is not fake. It is a real car with real heritage, a real design and real capability.

[Filippo]

Ford should build that lineup out more and have a luxury version of it now.

[Doug]

Dude. Lincoln G Wagon. And you know what you call it cuz they name their cars. You call it something like really big.

[Filippo]

How does the Navigator.

[Doug]

You're going like the Lincoln rock?

[Kenan]

No, too aggressive cuz I softer. But yeah, something.

[Filippo]

You're going to the Lincoln Navigator press launch.

[Doug]

I'm going to Navigator press launch on Friday.

[Filippo]

How many Navigators are sell?

[Doug]

A lot.

[Filippo]

The Navigator was that aren't too uber blacks.

[Doug]

The Navigator was pretty popular especially when it first came out. So was the Aviator. Those were high quality products. The problem is that Lincoln's product cycles are too long. Yeah. And that they don't. And the other problem is they don't have a G Wagon competitor.

[Filippo]

Okay. I'm coming around to this legitimately. But I and it could be Bronco based. But in my head I was thinking about like a luxury Bronco the same way that Lincoln when they did the Aviator took an Explorer, the original Aviator took the Explorer, changed the tail lights.

[Doug]

No. No change.

[Filippo]

Nothing else.

[Doug]

They got to do better than they got.

[Filippo]

It needs to be like a whole Lincoln version of that. Not just a Bronco with leather.

[Doug]

It needs to be a serious well done car.

[Filippo]

Yeah.

[Doug]

Right.

[Kenan]

And considering the Bronco, you know, the roof leaks and all that stuff like.

[Filippo]

No, that only happened early on.

[Kenan]

Yeah.

[Doug]

But I wonder if there's a market for I wonder how what it would take given that Audi can make a Sportback of anything which is a completely new roof design. How hard would it be to just make a non opening roof on a Bronco?

[Filippo]

They don't have that problem anymore generally.

[Doug]

Like so make it. What? But I don't think that this vehicle if positioned by the Lincoln brand should even have an opening course. Not. But the way I'm thinking of it is it's a giant glass roof and it's got a V8 and it feels.

[Filippo]

Like screens here, here, here, here. And also maybe the roof is a screen.

[Doug]

Yeah. The roof is a screen. See, you're getting on this now.

[Filippo]

I'm getting there. I'm getting there.

[Kenan]

Thank you.

[Filippo]

I love Lincoln, by the way. I love the Lincoln SUVs. I pushed everybody I know towards one. Nobody has taken me up on it.

[Doug]

The Nautilus is a great car. It was almost car of the year.

[Filippo]

The. The Aviator, I thought, is a great car. It looks great.

[Doug]

I, I, you were correct.

[Filippo]

I'm sorry for saying that. You were wrong.

[Doug]

Imagine if. Okay, so you now agree.

[Filippo]

Yeah, but I, I think that it, it's both. I think that Ford should make a luxury Bronco, and then Lincoln should figure out what their own product based on that is.

[Doug]

You know what you call it? You call it the granite. The Lincoln granite. The Lincoln basalt.

[Filippo]

Jim, you listen.

[Doug]

The Lincoln. I'm looking up.

[Filippo]

Are you looking at Porsche?

[Doug]

I'm looking up rocks that are like, that are, like, tough, because that's what I think it should be named.

[Kenan]

Well, tough, but luxurious. Tough, but like Blackwood.

[Doug]

Maybe they should bring back the black name for this.

[Filippo]

It would actually work.

[Kenan]

Bring back.

[Doug]

This isn't stupid. Remember, don't, don't Forget Mercedes makes $74 billion for every G wagon they sell. Yeah.

[Filippo]

And for what? For. The other example here was, was Jeep and Chrysler. That's not the right positioning there.

[Doug]

No.

[Filippo]

And also Jeep sells $100,000 SUV. Well, sorry, Jeep tries to sell $100,000 SUV. And I think they could go up market with the, with the Wrangler in their own lineup. The Grangler Grand Wrangler, if you will.

[Kenan]

The Grand Wrangler.

[Doug]

They could, maybe. Wranglers are already sold to really rich people. It's, like, shocking.

[Filippo]

So there's money to be made.

[Doug]

Last question. Because we're over time. Final question from Core2RAN, Doug. If Chevy moves all of its production to the US because of these tariffs, should they make an actual competitive K5 blazer to celebrate its heritage instead of basically four variations of the equinox? Four variations of the equinox. Excuse me. Two variations of the equinox and then.

[Filippo]

Two variations of the tracks and the Blazer. Can you pull up something for me?

[Kenan]

Sure.

[Doug]

The answer to this question is of course, yes, but it has nothing to do with the tariffs. This should have happened 10 years ago. Regardless, this is another example of bad product planning from General Motors.

[Filippo]

Yep. Buddy.

[Kenan]

Dude.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Filippo]

Yeah. Somebody already makes a new version of the K5.

[Doug]

We don't need. Click on this. We don't need the one.

[Filippo]

Look at that. This, my friends, based on.

[Doug]

We don't need Chevy to do it.

[Filippo]

This is the only attractive picture of this car.

[Doug]

No, go back to the previous Photoshop. It's way too dark to be seen on the screen.

[Filippo]

Go to the one that has the both the. The blue.

[Doug]

Get no, click on.

[Filippo]

Click on that one.

[Doug]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Filippo]

It has both angles. What this is, it's an SRF from the back, a K5 Blazer from the front, and it's based on a RAV4.

[Doug]

RAV4. The answer to this question. And by the way, this is only in Japan. Another thing the Japanese get that we didn't. The R34 Skyline, the Evo 6, the Earth, the GC8 impression, the 22B, the Mitsuoka Buddy. The answer to this question is of course, but it has nothing to do with the tariffs. I truly think that making the Blazer not a Bronco competitor is one of the most laughably bad automotive decisions that has been made in the last 25 years. And it's proven by the fact that the Bronco has been a massive runaway success. The Blazer has been primarily confined to rental car fleets and also nobody. Because in some cases even the rental car companies are like, no, thanks though. And it's just the kind of stuff you get from gm. You know, GM does such a good job some of the time and such a bad job some of the time. And I don't understand why they don't just do better.

[Filippo]

Yep. And hopefully Mary Barra is listening.

[Doug]

You agree with me 100%. It should have been a real K5.

[Filippo]

Blazer without singular doubt.

[Doug]

If they didn't, there should be a Cadillac version and it should be a G wagon for what it's worth.

[Filippo]

Like they have have the Tahoe, which is a good product. They could have just made a smaller Tahoe.

[Doug]

Yeah, I mean, to do it right.

[Filippo]

Which by the way, is what the Blazer version was.

[Doug]

To do it right, you would want. Well, there was no Tahoe originally. To do it right.

[Filippo]

Yeah.

[Doug]

To do it right. You would, you would want to do it like the Bronco where you do like a ground. You wouldn't want to just make a small Tahoe. You wanted removable doors.

[Filippo]

They could have and it would have been better than the actual.

[Doug]

It wouldn't have sold though. A two door Tahoe wouldn't sell.

[Filippo]

No, but like style differently. Instead of two door Blazer. It would have worked. It would have been better than the current Blazer.

[Doug]

I don't know about that.

[Filippo]

Would have been better than the current Bronco. Lowest bar. Anybody could Possibly.

[Doug]

The current Blazer is the worst car on sale. Except for the Maserati Gran Turismo.

[Filippo]

I'm debating this in my head for a second.

[Doug]

Come at me. You thinking Grand Wagoneer?

[Filippo]

No, no, no, I'm not. It crossed my mind, but let's get past it. No, you're right.

[Doug]

Worst car on sale, current Blazer. Is it even still on sale? And the Gran Turismo, which is ev, good car.

[Filippo]

Blazer, not ev. Bad car.

[Doug]

Yeah, the Blazer EV is fine. The Blazer Regular is bad. I want to be clear about that because they're inexplicably. They're completely different cars.

[Filippo]

Just like the Equinox and Equinox ev. Yes. Both of exist.

[Doug]

Both exist. Okay, that's our podcast. Do you have any parting thoughts? Kenneth?

[Kenan]

Make a G. Let's American manufacturers make a G wagon.

[Doug]

Make a G. Everybody should.

[Kenan]

Everybody should.

[Doug]

G Wagon is for all.

[Filippo]

What is the groth of America?

[Kenan]

Oh, that's a great question.

[Doug]

Like a secondary country to America that can be used for manufacturing. Whatever country it is. I think we terrified. I think it's not going to work.

[Filippo]

What a shame.

[Doug]

The answer is probably like Indiana, because the. There's no other options. There's no other options right now. Anyway. Watch. Trump's going to start tariffing Indiana as.

[Filippo]

An Ohio and he'd be thrilled.

[Doug]

He'd be like, yeah, keep Indiana. A lot of tariffs are coming your way.

[Filippo]

Indiana.

[Doug]

That's true, actually. Even though that. Anyway, thank you for watching. We absolutely appreciate it. We love everyone and everything, especially Filippo.

[Filippo]

Except for the tariffs.

[Doug]

Except for the tariffs, which we hate. Goodbye.

[Kenan]

Goodbye.