1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe in Golden Fawn / Bring a Trailer
I spent a lot of time recently staring at this well-preserved 1974 Imperial LeBaron hardtop, wondering again why it didn’t sell. In most respects, Chrysler’s senior make was at least as good as (and certainly no worse than) its domestic rivals, but the Imperial spent the first half of the ’70s barely scraping by while Lincoln and Cadillac thrived — and it sold better when Chrysler repackaged it as a New Yorker Brougham rather than a separate marque. Why?
One of the earliest Imperials — a 1926 Chrysler Imperial 80 phaeton / Bonhams
The Imperial nameplate dates back to 1926, but it wasn’t until 1955 that Chrysler tried to establish it as a separate marque. The post-1955 Imperial really only had three good years, and by “good,” I mean “selling more than 20,000 units,” which was usually only good for a distant third place in the domestic luxury league. (Imperial managed second place in 1959 and 1960, when Lincoln was at its lowest commercial ebb.)
1957 was Imperial’s best year, and the Crown four-door hardtop was the bestselling model that year / Mecum Auctions
At some points, the Imperial boasted muscular performance and above-average road manners for a domestic luxury car, but its styling tended to the eccentric, and its workmanship was often disappointing, especially given the price. By the late ’60s, increased weight and softer suspension settings had eroded the Imperial’s performance and handling, but Chrysler had reined in the oddball styling, and the latest Imperials had most of the expected conveniences and luxury gimmicks.
1969 Imperial LeBaron four-door hardtop in Spinnaker White / Casey Wright — Out Motorsports“>Casey Wright — Out Motorsports
Yet, they still didn’t sell. Imperial dealers moved 22,077 cars for 1969, the marque’s third-best year, but the aging ’69 Lincoln Continental managed 38,290 and Cadillac sales topped 220,000. It was downhill from there: Imperial sold a total of 55,913 units from 1970 through 1973, an average of only about 14,000 cars a year. Among domestic makes, only Checker did worse.
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
Chrysler gave it one more shot for 1974. The ’74 Imperial no longer had its own longer wheelbase, but it had unique front and rear clips, with distinctive taillights, concealed headlights, and a waterfall grille:
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
The new look arguably did a better job of differentiating the Imperial from the senior Chryslers than the previous version did, and it parted ways with the “Fuselage” styling of the 1969–1973 cars, which had been out of step with contemporary luxury car tastes. (I happen to like the Fuselage cars better, but they were behind the times even at launch.)
1974 Chrysler New Yorker Brougham / Druk Auto Sales via ClassicCars.com
Although the Imperial’s split waterfall grille treatment was a novel variation on the formal upright grille theme, the front clip made it clear that Chrysler stylists had been rummaging in Lincoln’s closet:
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
1972 Lincoln Continental Mark IV / Bring a Trailer
In back, the recessed taillights were one of the few elements to more or less carry over from the Fuselage cars, but I also see some 1971 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight in the rear end and sculpted rear fenders. (The 1974 full-size Oldsmobile also had a waterfall grille treatment, but since that was a one-year-only feature that at the same time as the Imperial, I assume the similarity was coincidental.)
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
1971 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight hardtop coupe / Topclassiccarsforsale.com
The gold Imperial two-door hardtop shown here has the Crown Coupe package, a midyear introduction in 1974. Like the similar Chrysler St. Regis option, it had fixed rear quarter windows surrounded by padded vinyl, which also covered the front half of the roof in prewar Sedanca de Ville fashion. The roof modifications for the Crown Coupe and St. Regis were outsourced to the American Sunroof Corporation, which also installed the Imperial’s optional sunroof.
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
1974 Chrysler New Yorker Brougham St. Regis / Druk Auto Sales via ClassicCars.com
I think both the Imperial and the New Yorker looked better without the vinyl-padded quarter windows, but as contemporary Coupe de Ville sales make clear, this kind of thing was fashionable at the time.
1974 Imperial LeBaron two-door hardtop / Hemmings via Classic.com
Inside, the Imperial had an extra helping of fake woodgrain (“simulated Brazilian rosewood,” claimed the brochure) to dress up a dashboard and interior fittings that weren’t all that different from the ones in the New Yorker, down to the smallish gauges for fuel, battery, and coolant temperature to the left of the speedometer and the digital chronometer.
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
The Imperial cabin’s big claim to fame was its overstuffed floating-cushion seats, in ribbed velour or extra-cost leather:
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe with ribbed velour upholstery / Bring a Trailer
These seats looked luxurious, and the optional leather was kid-glove soft, but they weren’t especially supportive. Road Test, testing a 1975 Imperial with the same seats upholstered in leather, remarked:
They look like you’d sink into one and never get up: full, deep, as comfortable as the Spanish leather sofa sitting in front of the fire. So it was with some incredulity that we squirmed and fiddled and squirmed some more, looking for some position of the seats that would fit our bodies. We never really found it. The seatbacks are too short, and that gorgeous massive roll on the seatback falls right on your shoulders (unless you’re 4′ 6″) and forces your head and neck forward.
You also sat somewhat higher in the Imperial than in a Cadillac or Lincoln, which some testers didn’t like.
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe with ribbed velour upholstery / Bring a Trailer
Unlike Cadillac and Lincoln, Chrysler hadn’t seen the need to develop an engine bigger than the 440 cu. in. RB, but it had a competitive 230 net horsepower for 1974 and 215 hp for 1975, which gave adequate if not inspiring performance.
440 engine in a 1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
Chrysler also gave the 1974 Imperial standard four-wheel disc brakes, although the pioneering Bendix Sure-Brake four-wheel antilock system offered on 1971–1973 cars was dropped. The Imperial had the usual Chrysler torsion bar/leaf spring suspension, with more emphasis on ride isolation than handling, but it was a bit firmer and more composed than its domestic rivals, while still feeling as massive as it looked.
1974 Imperial had standard four-wheel disc brakes / Bring a Trailer
There are nits that one could pick with this car, even within the established parameters of its class, but as a package, it seems like the 1974 Imperial should have at least been a contender. It wasn’t — although Chrysler hoped to double to sales volume of the ’73 Imperial (not an especially ambitious goal, since the ’73 had sold only 16,729 units), 1974 Imperial production totaled only 14,426 cars, 1,440 of those for the Canadian market.
1973 Imperial LeBaron four-door hardtop / Bring a Trailer
1974 Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe / Bring a Trailer
Obviously, the OPEC oil embargo, which ran from mid-October 1973 to mid-March 1974, didn’t encourage sales of big, thirsty cars like this, but where business picked up at Cadillac and Lincoln dealers by the start of the 1975 model year, Imperial production fell by almost half — to a grim 8,830 cars, 1,145 of those bound for Canada.
Canadian-registered 1975 Imperial LeBaron four-door hardtop / Bring a Trailer
In June 1975, Chrysler announced that it was phasing out the Imperial brand. For 1976, the Imperial LeBaron was stripped of its insignia and some of its standard equipment and repackaged as the new Chrysler New Yorker Brougham.
1976 Chrysler New Yorker Brougham four-door hardtop / Orlando Classic Cars
Surprisingly, this strategy worked: The Imperialized New Yorker Brougham sold 33,732 cars for 1976, about the combined volume of the 1975 New Yorker and Imperial, and 1977 sales almost doubled, to 62,127. Even in 1978, its final year, the fancy New Yorker moved 36,497 units, which didn’t cause any sleepless nights for Cadillac or Lincoln-Mercury sales executives, but would have been the second-best year for Imperial.
1976 Chrysler New Yorker Brougham four-door hardtop with velour upholstery / Orlando Classic Cars
What to take from this? In the ’60s and ’70s, the domestic market had lots of room for fancier versions of low-priced and medium-priced makes, but customers putting up their money for a domestic luxury car were buying the prestige value of the brand more than any tangible attribute. The fact that the last Imperial sold better as a Chrysler than as a separate marque speaks volumes about how contemporary buyers perceived it.
The 1938 Chrysler Imperial C-19 was a mid-level eight-cylinder model, priced between the Buick Special and Century / Bring a Trailer
From 1926 through 1954, which was hardly distant memory in the ’60s and ’70, the Imperial had been a fancier Chrysler — not even always the fanciest Chrysler — and the reflexive tendency to say “Chrysler Imperial” died hard, even for magazine editors who theoretically knew better.
1978 Chrysler New Yorker Brougham four-door hardtop in black / Orlando Classic Cars
When it came to badge cachet, Chrysler wasn’t too shabby in the ’60s and ’70s, but it wasn’t a Cadillac and it wasn’t a Lincoln, and whatever its other virtues, the Imperial never quite made it in that more upscale league.
Related Reading
Curbside Classic: 1973 Imperial LeBaron by Chrysler – Those Were The Days, My Friend (by Tom Klokau)
Fender Blades on a Fuselage: The Design of the 1973 Imperial by Chrysler (by Alan Petrillo)
Curbside Classic: 1975 Imperial LeBaron Coupe – The Last Real Imperial (by Paul N)
Vintage Review: 1975 Cadillac Coupe DeVille, Chrysler Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe, Lincoln Continental Town Coupe – Battle Of The Behemoths (by GN)
Curbside Classic: 1977 Chrysler New Yorker Brougham Coupe – The Recycled Imperial and the Recycled CC (by Paul N)
Curbside Classic: 1978 Chrysler New Yorker Brougham – A Most Imperial Chrysler (by Tom Klockau)
Very nice looking car. Looks especially Intimidating looking at it from 2025.
It’s been awhile, but I recall that some standard equipment on the Imperial was dropped when it became a New Yorker Brougham…but uncertain of the details…maybe went back to rear drums? I think the price was also lower which undoubtedly would help explain the higher volumes of the NYB than the Imperial…you’re getting essentially an Imperial for the price of a NYB…who’s going to look at your wheels and notice the rear drum brakes (if that’s what they had instead of disks)? Of course the nameplate was different so that would be more obvious that you didn’t buy the Imperial Imperial. What I wish I remembered was which parts were unique to the Imperial; for some reason I think the brakes were different but not sure what else…that might figure to be important when trying to get parts; fifty years later I’m thinking you might need to get some of them from a salvage yard or have a parts car available at least for the non-Chrysler parts.
I too prefer the 2 door without the opera window…guessing the ’73 didn’t have opera window? Wonder if the rear windows rolled down on the 2 door….if so another reason to prefer the non-opera version for rear passengers though I’m not sure of the cost difference.
Yeah, the NYB versus the last C-body Imperial thing was a little strange, with the former, while being much cheaper, was also quite decontented. My understanding is to get the 1976 NYB up to the standard equipment level of the 1975 Imperial meant it would be more expensive, too. I think the only real difference between the two might have been the omission of the Imperial’s four-wheel disc brakes.
OTOH, even though it cost more to do it, maybe the whole notion of being able to personalize your NYB with your own, personal set of options was what made it more appealing to the Chrysler luxury car aficionado over the Imperial and explains the tri-fold increase in sales.
AFAIK, throughout their history, the New Yorker had always been a solid-seller for Chrysler, while the Imperial was typically just the opposite. I wonder if, just maybe, the whole idea of being able to a la carte the options on a New Yorker (as opposed to the Imperial’s fully-loaded standard equipment) was a big reason.
I only learnt fairly recently that Imperial was a separate brand from Chrysler; I had long thought it was just a top-line model all along. Even Chrysler’s own marketing and advertising seemed to give up on Imperial being a separate brand by the early ’70s, sometimes sharing brochure or advertising space.
I think “Chrysler New Yorker” may have been better known than “Imperial”. I find the styling of the ’74-75 Imperial nicer than the New Yorkers from those years so combining the nicer styling with the better-known name (at a lower price) was a good move, especially since they (and the ’76-78 NYB) were evocative of the elegant 1965 New Yorkers.
For anyone who spent time in cars of this class, the Imperial (certainly after 1966, and arguably even before) just didn’t feel as special as the others. It was a very nice Chrysler and really only appealed to that shrinking bunch of aging men who wouldn’t consider anything but a Chrysler.
This generation made a really fabulous New Yorker, though – a car that needed to make not a single apology to the Electra 225 or the 98. Until the Lean Burn acted up, at least.
Eek! Memories of our “lean burn, Lebaron” are still traumatic. Those “lock up, torque converters never wanted to unlock.
” Imperial LeBaron Crown Coupe … It Sold Better As A New Yorker”
If the shorter name wasn’t the reason, maybe pricing to meet market was?
“Crown Coupe” wasn’t technically part of the model name — it was an option package for the two-door LeBaron — but since the gold car has that package, which was very rare in 1974, I wanted to highlight it in the title.
I am not sure of how accurate this is, but JD power gives the starting price of a ’75 Imperial at 8.844$, while the ’76 New Yorker Brougham is reported as 6.737$.
Assuming the figures are correct, a 24% lower price (not accounting for inflation, which was another 5%) could account for the increase in sales; the New Yorker was a better deal, even considering the loss of some standard features (air conditioning seems to be the biggest item).
Put it another way: the Imperial was priced as a Cadillac and Lincoln, the New Yorker was a step down.
The not-so-original look combined with high cost certainly contributed to the slow sales of the last generation Imperial
Prices for this period were sort of a moving target, because they sometimes changed multiple times during the year. However, based on the Standard Catalog of American Cars, the 1976 New Yorker Brougham was over $1,000 cheaper than the 1975 NYB, as well as over $2,000 cheaper than the 1975 Imperial. So, I can see how “exclusive Imperial style at a price less than last year’s New Yorker” would go over well.
The deletion of air conditioning lowered the advertised list price, which may have been a psychological benefit, but it didn’t make any real difference in actual transaction prices, since nearly all Chrysler buyers ordered air by this time anyway (97.2 percent of all 1976 Chrysler series except the Cordoba, of which 95.7 percent had air conditioning). I think the 1976 New Yorker Brougham enabled you to decide if you wanted to save $85 by skipping Auto-Temp climate control, which a few buyers might have preferred.
I was speculating in an earlier post about the price difference (I don’t remember where I read it). But if someone has access to the 1975 Imperial’s standard equipment list, versus what it would cost to add those options to the 1976 NYB to bring it up to the same level, it would be interesting to know definitively.
Regardless, it was a shrewd decision to move the NYB to the Imperial body. I have no doubt that those buyers were happy to get an ‘Imperial’ for less, and sales certainly reflected that.
Ia and J P hit the nail on the head. For 30 years it was CHRYSLER Imperial, and people still called it that post 1955, like Dodge Ram. Hell, go online and type Chrysler Imperial for the true Imperial years and see what pops up. It did not help that for most of its existence it shared, or appeared to share, far too much Chrysler sheet metal. When a person is paying a 20% or so premium to move up from the New Yorker they want people to know it. When they didn’t you had the 59-63 line of Exner at his most grotesque, or the 64-66 line that finally, finally, hit a sweet spot. Also, Cadillac just sucked up all the oxygen in the luxury car market.
In my freshman year of college, one of our star basketball players drove a grey 75 Imperial coupe. He was a big guy about 6’6″ and 260 pounds. His father was a sucessful businessman and bought the car for him. One night, I went with him and 5 other guys on a spur of the moment trip to a party at a school in New Jersey. All six of us were in the car for the 45-minute drive. I had the misfortune to sit behind the driver who liked to drive with the seat reclined. But the ride was smooth and comfortable despite having six grown men with the smallest standing at 6′ (I was 6’2″). It was a fun and memorable night!
Had it not been for Cadillac, these would have been more successful. I think they were great looking cars, even if they drew styling cues to try to steal sales from Olds and Lincoln. For a car this long to be called a coupe is ridiculous. To me a coupe is something small, nimble and sporty. These are aircraft carrier size cars. For that matter, these should always have been four door cars. The doors on a two door would have been among the heaviest made in the industry, perhaps as heavy as a medium sized man.
Probably because I come from the land of the almost relentless 4 door, (Oz) I love 2 door cars, but I agree with you on the 4 door versions looking vastly superior.
Just on mine, hold the vent windows, which seem to be a very popular option on these.
Those long, heavy, doors started “hanging” pretty quick. Remember a lot a “early, 70’s Oldsmobiles”, in that color brown.
The only Imperial I ever rode in was a ’71 fuselage owned by a die hard Mopar fan coworker. No way was it equal to Cadillac, even if those seemed cheapened in the late 1960’s. Even he eventually bought a Cadillac, after Chrysler went front wheel drive.
Is it an Imperial or a New Yorker? That is the question. Whatever its called, it is a beautiful car and probably the nicest car of the Brougham era.Maybe someday………. In white or silver, thank you.
At the time, back in the 70s, my partner had a 1972 Mark IV that he traded for a 1975 Imperial, last year it was called Imperial. At first I was not impressed but it was burgundy red with red interior so what not to like.
What I remember is driving this car, when new, from Richmond VA to Daytona FL, non-stop and cruising at 100 mph on the Florida Turnpike. So effortless and comfortable I went dancing that night in Daytona.
I had driven new Lincolns, Cadillacs, and even a Rolls Royce long Interstate miles at above posted speeds. I have never experienced a more comfortable auto then that 1975 Imperial.
How often did you stop for gas? At 100 mph, the gas mileage can’t have been pretty!
I too find this a pretty car .
Far too big for me but I understand why those MoPar or NO Car guys felt that way .
-Nate