> "Manufacturers are too busy covering every possible niche with dozens of models"
I agree. It amazes me how many models and variants there are. Look at Volkswagen, they have ~20-25 active Basemodels (Polo, Golf, Passat...) with each Basemodel having a addtional 15-20 variants. You can buy a Golf anywhere from 15k Euro to 40k Euro. But even a much smaller manufacturer such as Porsche has 9 Basemodels with nearly 200 variants.
Who _really_ needs that?
Granted, i never worked in the automobile industry, but the overhead with producing, developing and maintaining so many different models really seems insane.
I agree. It amazes me how many models and variants there are. Look at Volkswagen, they have ~20-25 active Basemodels (Polo, Golf, Passat...) with each Basemodel having a addtional 15-20 variants. You can buy a Golf anywhere from 15k Euro to 40k Euro. But even a much smaller manufacturer such as Porsche has 9 Basemodels with nearly 200 variants.
Who _really_ needs that?
Granted, i never worked in the automobile industry, but the overhead with producing, developing and maintaining so many different models really seems insane.