Just a short post to get you in touch with some cars you might not be familiar with. GM in Brazil has had a very unique history, as analyzed here many times. And its unique ways haven’t stopped. Unlike, for instance, the blue oval’s “One Ford” strategy, Chevrolet in Sao Paulo still comes with its own designs, for production there and in Argentina, which are the main countries (alongside smaller Paraguay and Uruguay) that form the Mercosur trading bloc.
And what you are seeing here are two recent examples, the Onix and Prisma, the latter being the saloon/sedan version of the former. They take the place once occupied by the Corsa and Celta (a booted variation of which was the first Prisma), at the bottom of the Chevrolet lineup in Brazil and Argentina. They were originally launched there in 2012 and 2013 (Prisma), but the ones pictured and coming to Chile are the facelifted versions (in the front; tail remains the same). Because of their recent launch in Chile (my country) that I could take these pictures and share some info with you.
In Chile they will be well equipped and not-so-cheap, leaving the bottom of the range to both the current facelifted Sail and the older model, still on sale as Sail Classic (both made in China). These brasileiros come with a 1.4 engine (and 97 HP), with just 8 valves, which is the most telling part of how outdated some of their components are. Still, probably more important for their target audience, these cars come with the MyLink infotainment system standard, including Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.
Nothing spectacular, and most of you would probably not like them very much, but they look good (I think) and will probably be enough for the youngest drivers (Onix) and their families (Prisma). And by the way, I just recently noticed how the Prisma keeps alive one of the long traditions of the General: Recycling old model names, this time with a translation in between: Remember the Geo/Chevrolet Prizm?
What the Onix looked like when launched in 2012. Photo by Matti Blume on Wikipedia
How do these come to be? Why does Brazil keep on coming up with these oddities? Mercosur imposes heavy tariffs to imported cars, artificially propping up a domestic industry, spread between Brazil and Argentina. That is why they’ve remain able to come up with their own products, although there is international cooperation on their development, from other branches of GM. Onix and Prisma are developed from the GSV global platform which I think was mostly created by GM Korea. So an international platform with carryover engines and unique styling, that is what you see here.
… and the original Prisma.
I’m from Chile, which has an open economy that has near-to zero tariffs for most imports. Therefore, we get a wide range of cars from all over the world, and GM isn’t in any way forced to source its cars from other South American countries. Chevrolet here can choose to bring their models from Korea, the U.S., Mexico, China, Brazil, Argentina or elsewhere, depending on their marketing strategy and currency exchange. We even receive the Opel lineup separately.
And so for the last few years Chevrolets sold in Chile have mostly come from Korea and China. Spark (not the EV), Orlando, Cruze, Sonic, Camaro and Sail. Sadly, no Malibu or Impala. And with those, Chevrolet has been able to remain the no. 1 best selling brand in Chile. Until this year. 2016 will be undoubtedly be lead by Hyundai, seconded by Kia, ending a 33 year-long streak at the top by Chevrolet. And this despite the Chinese Sail being the top selling model. Probably because of this defeat, GM in Chile is in the midst of unleashing a new batch of Mercosur models.
Chevrolet aims to compete with Onix and Prisma against the leaders of the compact car segment, like the Kia Rio, Toyota Yaris and Hyundai Accent, with similar pricing. I’m not sure they will be able to pull that off, as Korean cars have a solid image in our market (they are top sellers for a reason). And they can’t drop their prices in the future without competing with their own Chevrolet Sail.
Chevrolet Prisma interior, with neat brown touches.
Next week, a further two cars from Brazil will be included, Cobalt (not your Cobalt) and Spin.
The Onix is the best-selling car here in Brazil for the past two years or so, it’s a solid little car compared to the competition. Some people don’t like the fact the Onix doesn’t offer any 3-cylinder 1.0 engine, as most competitors offers, instead it uses basically the same “Family 1” 1.0 and 1.4 4-cyl engines from the 1994 Chevrolet Corsa B, but many people appreciate this, so…
I find myself a little troubled by these international offerings wearing the Bowtie. To at least some extent, the name must be trying to imply an American car experience. Not a Chinese or South Korean one. Seems dishonest.
Sorry, I don’t understand but I could be misunderstanding your thought. It’s a worldwide industry nowadays, nobody is constrained by their own borders anymore.
How is it different than Honda, Toyota, Mercedes, BMW, etc made in USA and sold in countries other than the US? Aren’t they implying a Japanese or German experience?
Or Chevy Silverado, Dodge RAM, various VWs, Fords etc made in Mexico and sold in the US? Or the Buick Envision made in China and sold in the US? Or the Toyota Yaris made in France and sold in the US?
Our Cruze and Sonic may be made here but they weren’t engineered here. And the Spark wears a Chevy badge and was engineered and is built in Korea. There are many more examples of this.
Two different things: a car being engineered and sold in one place – its “home market”, so to speak – but built in another (i.e. Silverado and Ram, engineered and sold in the US but built in Mexico) versus a car never designed for its purported country of origin (Chevrolet=”USA”), probably not engineered there, and obviously not built there (i.e. this Onix). In other words, it could be perceived almost as if they don’t want Americans to see or know about it, but are passing it off as “American”.
Honestly, I don’t see a problem with the latter, but I can see how some would find it bizarre.
Another example of the latter: those Ssangyong SUVs sold as Mercedes in certain Asian markets, which they could never get away with in Europe or the US.
It also works the other way: the Infiniti FX/QX70 is built in Japan and was probably engineered there, but was never sold in Japan!
So VW is guilty of the same thing with the US-market Jetta. Engineered here, sold here, built here, different and inferior car entirely compared to the rest of the world’s offering, to hit a much lower price target. Is it dishonest that it carries the VW badge?
(Maybe it is, or at least it should be its own model with a different name…)
John; Ford started building unique and small Fords for/in Europe back in the 1930s, and has ever since. And they also sold the US versions too, depending on their marketability. Buyers aren’t as stupid as you seem to imply: they realize that these small Chevrolets aren’t classic big American cars. Give them more credit than that. This has been going on all over the world for going on to 100 years. Localization of products is ubiquitous.
We have Chevrolets from Japan the original Cruze is a Suzuki we have South African Chevrolets from Australia rebadged Holdens we got in the 70s and again in recent years Australia doesnt have them and neither does the US so is Chevrolet even an American brand now it doesnt seem so.
Here in Brazil and neighboring countries, the Bowtie is more related to Opel cars than the American Chevrolets, especially considering the last 20 or 30 years, when virtually all passenger-vehicles wearing the Bowtie were rebadged Opels until 5 years or so, when GM started to replace the then aging Opel-based models with the korean-based ones.
Just as an example, here is a picture of a Belgium-made Opel Astra F wearing the Bowtie on the typical Opel/Vauxhall grille to be sold in Brazil. When equipped with air-bags, these Astras had the Opel logo on the steering-wheel as General Motors Brasil didn’t bother to replace the logo to match the Chevrolet ones on the rest of the car.
Chevy is making some nice cars, but they all look the same to me
+1… the featured Brazilian Chevy looks like a little Cruze, which looks like a little Malibu, which looks like a little Impala…. This is nothing new though, as brands have an identity through “design language”.
In the early to mid eighties you had the same thing going on with Ford (US Market). A Tempo looked like an Escort with air pumped into it. A Taurus looked like a Tempo with air pumped into it. At least the Panther platform Crown Vic looked a little different from the rest of those jelly beans, as well as the Thunderbird and Mustang having their own unique styling.
The ’92 Crown Vic quite infamously sported a Taurus-esque grille-less front schnoz, which was replaced by a more conventional grille the very next year.
The window cutout was also very remniscent of the Taurus.
Wow, I’d forgotten about the ’92 looking like an ’80’s Taurus in the front… those headlights and the elliptical cutout around the Ford emblem give it away. I think the first generation Tauruses, Tempos, and maybe the second refresh of the Escorts all had that look IIRC.
I particularly like this “family feeling” from Taurus, which was the most gorgeous Ford aside the Sierra. I remember independent importers bringing to Brazil some Escort SW and sedan from US, to figure out the big amount of them if compared to other models, probably Ford would be very well succeeded making them in Brazil instead of the wishy-washy euro Escort.
They should have stayed with this look as the more “aero” nose matches the look of the rest of the car. The dorky little plastichrome grille they slapped on the next year looks like the afterthought that it obviously was–they didn’t even bother to remove the row of air intake slots in the bumper.
I’d love to find a ’92 header panel to fit to my ’97 as I feel it would noticeably improve the looks of the car, even if it would often be mistaken for being five years older than it is (which matters very little when the car in question is nearly 20 years old).
Recently Chevrolet made some wrong moves in Brazil:
1. Frozen in time – too slow making renovations / releases in the first decade or 2000’s, they left the S10, Blazer, Corsa C and Astra G without any actualization for years neither brought their successors, resulting in the end of exportation to Australia, Mexico and Middle East, losing those marketing for Daewoo-based products from China and Korea;
2. Instead of releasing quickly the Opel Vectra C to replace de old B version, they kept the old Astra without renovation and brought the new Astra naming it as Vectra… and it didn’t help them, specially because its main public consumer already had in touch with what’s going on in Europe and they’ve been waiting for the Signum and Vectra, but received a smaller Astra as a luxury car equally expensive…
3. Maybe GM already had been expecting the end of Opel after the bankruptcy (what didn’t happened thanks to the Germany Government ultimatum), untying GM-Brazil from GM-Europe on its projects. But the first fruit was the Chevrolet Agile, a car that showed us that the new team in GM-BR wasn’t able to make cars as they used to do by themselves, at least not those ones we expect with the Chevrolet signature.
4. At some point of meaning, Chevrolet was Opel for us, something with the same status of VW or Ford, not that one with cheaper products (even if it means just the perception of quality and luxury only by the exterior design). The fact is, Malibu replaced the Holden Calais – Chevrolet Omega, but its insipid style only helped to get even worse in the market than the already old and outworn Omega… the Agile and Sonic short lived due to the low sales and lack of interest from the public (it never happened before inside GM in Brazil). Only the little monster Chevrolet Cobalt experienced good reception due to low prices and good internal space, the taxi drivers fell in love for it, but only them…
5. Aiming for cost cutting, GM ended the compact pickup Montana, based on the Corsa C in favor of a previous version made in the older Corsa B, rebuilding it outside to give it the “beauty” style from the Agile, making a big step backward in technology and safety.
At least the Cruze experienced a good reception as long as the previous Astra named Vectra used to be far expensive for what it offered.
In that situation, the couple Onix/Prisma was the biggest move for GM-BR, the first well succeeded product after so many slip-ups. It’s not so gorgeous, but in person it is more imposing than the Sonic and looks better than it. It sells so good GM chose to keep the previous design style for the entry versions instead of bring the Sail/Sail sedan to Brazil, what is good, as long as the Sail is far smaller inside than the Onix.
It has a controversial style, but is easier to get used with it than to the previous Aveo or the current Sonic. GM don’t end the old engines because it is robust like a mutt, it runs fine without many cares like old cars and people here used to not make revisions or preventive maintenances as they should do in their cars. Taking in account an average life span of a car here is over 10 years.
So the couple of 3 door Corsa B I have seen locally did actually come from there!
Having seen also the Euro version, it was a bit off putting seeing a Barina with the front bumpers I knew from LATAM.
I will just keep my 1990 Taurus wagon, thanks very much. I paid it off 18 years ago (bought used) and my operating costs are next to nothing and I do most of my own car work. Can’t say that about the newer “cars” on the road now.
These little crapboxes being sold worldwide now are overpriced, underpowered and ugly as sin. Dealers salivate when they see me drive onto their lot to see what’s being produced now, and I don’t want to hear what they’re thinking as I leave. 😀 (I tell them I’m looking for a 1965 Lincoln, or Ambassador.)
…How is this relevant to Brazilian Chevys? FWIW, the most powerful non-SHO Taurus (a mid-size car) had a 140 hp V6, which is quite a bit less powerful than most modern compacts.
They look ok as basic transportation devices, but they wouldn’t meet my needs to haul wood and stuff for my small business. Thus, I shall be keeping my 2007 Ford Focus as long as I can.
Thanks for the look at what people in your area drive.
Coincidentally, this evening I have been in a conversation on another site about a new Dodge Neon offered in Mexico: a retrimmed Fiat Tipo.
I think that Dodge Neon (based on the Fiat Tipo) is quite attractive. Perhaps Chrysler should consider bringing this to our North American market, to replace the slow-selling Dodge Dart. I think that it is a wrong move for Chrysler to give up the entry-level / subcompact / compact passenger car field altogether with the discontinuation of this model, however, they did not ask me my opinion! I loved my 1989 Plymouth Sundance 5-door hatchback; it was an excellent car, and lasted me well for 9 years! (it even had white-walls!) Here is a pic of the 1994 model.
I think that it is a wrong move for Chrysler to give up the entry-level / subcompact / compact passenger car field altogether
From what I have read, the dealers agree, they don’t like not having a price leader to pull people into the dealership. Apparently, some dealers have been trying to use Fiat to fill the low price slot, but, thanks to FCA’s requirement that Fiat dealers be in separate buildings, there aren’t that many Fiat dealers. Reportedly, FCA is now dropping that separate building requirement, but, with Fiat sales falling, a lot of dealers will probably not bother picking the brand up, even if they can offer them in the same showroom as the other FCA brands.
…however, they did not ask me my opinion!
They never ask me either. I would offer the Tipo sedan as a Dodge, and the Tipo hatchback as a Fiat, leveraging that one existing model line to give both brands a mass market model to sell, while differentiating the Dodge and Fiat versions by body style.
Dealers can always get Hyundai and Kia smaller cars into Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep-RAM dealerships, just like how they used to sell some Mitsubishis. One more thing, they have to make sure there isn’t existing Hyundai/Kia dealers around.
However, the cheapest thing in the lot now are those Jeep Compass/Patriot.
Dealers can always get Hyundai and Kia smaller cars into Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep-RAM dealerships, just like how they used to sell some Mitsubishis.
Chrysler used to hold an equity position in Mitsu, so that was a different situation.
When Chrysler went BK, they yanked a lot of dealerships. The three Chrysler brands were represented by three different dealerships in Kalamazoo, MI, and all three dealerships were dualed with other makes: Jeep with Mazda and Mercedes, Dodge with Honda and Chrysler with Subaru and Hyundai. All three of the Mopar dealerships were yanked, leaving owners with a drive to Vicksburg to the one surviving dealer in the county, a dinky, grubby little place, but the only one in the county that did not dual Mopar with any other brand.
Mopar has since returned to Kalamazoo, with Chrysler/Dodge/Ram in a new, stand alone, store and Jeep in another stand alone store across the street. Neither of these dealerships carries any other brand.
I suspect FCA would have something to say about dealers picking up other brands to fill holes that FCA is creating in it’s lineup with the departure of the Dart/200.
I am just happy that I took more notice of the perky model than whatever car that was.
Two notes:
1) Happy to see from the interior photo of the Prisma that in Mercosur & Chile one can still buy a car with a manual transmission.
2) My Ford Transit Connect was designed in Germany, built in Spain and sold in the USA under the blue oval logo. I don’t feel it falsely trades on that proud, respected brand name.