Last week Manyu and I bought a new car. As much as I dislike car shopping, our old Subaru Outback had stalled on me twice in the last three months. If we were a two-car family, I would have kept it around as our in-town car. Because we have only one car, we needed something more reliable.
The first stop on our car search was a return to the Subaru dealership. Jeff, the sales representative who’d sold us our Outback fifteen years ago, was still there. Manyu’s and my purpose for being there was to test drive a new Outback, but while walking across the lot to look at their inventory of Outbacks, I asked Jeff about the Subaru Crosstrek. His reply was, “Crosstreks are for urban adventurers. Is that who you are?”
To my surprise, Jeff’s words brought up a memory that I didn’t even know I had. It was about the first time I ever went car shopping with my mom and dad. I was about ten years old. I don’t remember why they brought me along, but they had. In retrospect, I realize that it was probably the first time in my parents’ lives that they were able to look for a car without making affordability their only consideration. At one point in the search, we test drove a used Lincoln Continental. Even before we returned to the dealership, my dad said, “No, this is not who we are.” I had no idea what he was talking about. The car that my parents were planning to trade in was a ’57 DeSoto station wagon. Was that who we were? Were we car so boring that even Chrysler stopped making it?
I have my suspicions as to why Jeff asked me whether I was an urban adventurer. He is an astute salesman, and he’s figured out my preferences in cars. In addition to the time we spent with him when we bought our Outback, I have met with him several other times when helping Chinese friends (i.e., those with limited English skills) buy cars. He knows that I want no car that blatantly declares the personality of the driver. No muscle car, no oversized pickup truck, no vehicle that shouts money. I can only guess what an urban adventurer is, but Jeff knew that I wouldn’t buy any vehicle that labels me. His comment about urban adventurers was a way for him to steer me away from that particular car.
Of course, small SUVs like my old Outback (and the Hyundai Tucson that Manyu and I ended up buying) have as much of a market niche as any other car. When I see someone driving an SUV, I think practicality over style and enough money to pay more than $40,000 for a car. I picture the driver filling the back of the hatchback with groceries. I see him or her tossing a canoe on the roof rack. The difference between SUVs and some other cars is that the SUV niche is broad enough that it does not define the exact character of the driver. Young adults drive SUVs, but so do old men not willing to admit that they should be driving Buicks. It is a middle class car, it is a Middle America car. With so many of them on the road, I can get lost in the crowd when I drive one.
I’d like to believe that I am too smart to be manipulated by clever marketing, but the fact of the matter is that the car designers, advertisers, and sales reps know exactly who I am – and they direct me straight to the car that is me. That’s okay. They are only taking me to where I want to go.
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The Hyundai Tucson that Manyu and I bought is a fairly basic model. Still it has features I may never use. On the second day that we had the car, I set my iPhone on the vehicle’s console. Without any coaxing from me, the car started playing music from my Spotify playlist. I feel like my phone, my car, my tv, and my computer all talk to each other, but they leave me out of the conversation.
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