Re: IML: Airflow's affect on Chrysler during the 1930's

[Kenyon Wills <imperialist1960@xxxxxxxxx>]

--- David Duricy <desotobravo@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> --- Kenyon Wills <imperialist1960@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > Despite the Airflow almost dragging the company
> > under > (it was a sales disaster)
> 
> Shame on the person who told you this.



Hmmm.  Always willing to eat crow when it's the only
thing on the menu.

Up at Harrah's in Reno (now called the Natn'l
Automobile Collection/Museum/whatever) they have a 37
Sunshine Cab.  I think it was a Plymouth, but not
certain.  That car is featured pretty prominently and
the story on the long placard next to it says that it
was part of a giant Chicago(?) cab co. order that
partially saved Chryco. near the end of the depression
- not that you can believe everything that you read
(much less remember in my case).

I got that impression from the following sources,
also:
http://imperialclub.com/Articles/35OldCars/Page01-reg.jpg


The quote in particular that I was thinking of is at
the bottom of the center paragraph on this page:
http://imperialclub.com/Articles/Apr83AutoQuar/Page11-reg.jpg
and it says that the Airflow basicall destroyed the
image that Imperial had cultivated in the luxury car
segment, and the airflow, for all of its terriffic
qualities, does not have the same cachet as a classic
luxury car that the 1931-33 cars do.

So let me re-phrase, if I may?  The airflow design
features, had they been adopted company-wide (as I
think the original plan was), would have certainly
doomed the company, and despite Carl Breer and Walter
P's correct assertion that it was a modern,
ahead-of-its-time car that was supremely logical
car-purchase choice, the public voted with its feet
resoundingly, forcing Chrysler to return to a more
standardized appearance for 1937.  

The design is widely quoted as a "flop" sales-wise,
while in hindsight we can see that it set the context
for what was to come from a design and stylistic
perspective.  

I'm not sure if I ate crow or not (probably), but
while the Airflow didn't threaten to sink Chrysler, it
certainly didn't help the company from a bottom-line perspective.

Kenyon Wills
 
 






















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