Chrysler Listens—not to everybody though.

A while ago, I saw that Chrysler was instituting one of those ‘industry firsts’ again. This time a Customer Advisory Board. Detroit actually wanted to hear from me! Not quite. After signing up and giving them minimal email/name info, then never hearing back, I got this yesterday:


Hello Bill,

Thank you for your interest in Chrysler’s Customer Advisory Board. We’ve had an overwhelming number of responses and have added your name to our waiting list.

You may have a chance to serve on the Customer Advisory Board at a later date. You’ll be among the first to be invited into our exclusive online community as soon as more spots become available.

In the meantime, we’d love to hear your ideas or any feedback through these channels:

Chrysler Listens
Chrysler LLC blog
Red Letter Dodge Blog
Jeep® Brand Facebook Profile

Thanks again for your participation.

Well, I wanted to give you my feedback in the first place, but apparently you don’t need it. And if you don’t need it there, what’s the likelihood you’d want it from those other sites you listed. So I guess I’ll just have to let you know here what I think, here.

Rented another fine Chrysler product for a weekend biz trip and I can safely say that while I sorta dug the Challenger I rented a month ago, the 2008 Dodge Caliber is everything I expected from Chrysler—and less. In general, what Leno said about Detroit only needing to make better cars to improve their sales, well, It’s just not trickling down to the compact-midsize category.

Who cares about the perceived value of more cup holders when the ride sucks?

So in this car, you have seemingly little things that foreign cars tend to execute better: stuff like a very loud horn beep when you hit the remote to lock the car. Clunky interior and cheap dash features, rough ride and questionable breaking ability when leaving the highway. The audio system had bass that vibrated anything loose and was geared more towards the front of the car. (Sorry backseat drivers.) Gas mileage? Not bad actyually UNTIL you hit two letters: AC.

I won’t go on but you get the picture. And to be fair, this trend is not just something Chrysler is dealing with. I drive a range of cars when renting and notice a lot of the same issues with Ford and GM. And, regarding their suggestion box, they do have a comment field on their site, but the initial idea of a community where someone in management would actually hear complaints, maybe even respond, was appealing.

Not that I expect innovation from Detroit in terms of what social nets they hang out on, (Ford’s MySpace series being one of my least favs attempts in the space), but when Zappos, Southwest and Dell can monitor Twitter and respond literally in minutes, then you end up feeling disappointed with this effort to reach out to the masses.

Tags: Chrysler Caliber