If you go to any European countries, you'll mostly see local brand cars!
Example:
France - Citroen, Peugeot, Renault
Germany - Mercedes, Audi, VW etc.
Sweden - Volvo, Saab (Merc & Audi pretty well too)
Spain - Seat (and Skoda too)
Czech Rep - Skoda
Netherlands - mostly European cars
even USA - Ford, GM etc. (though many people buying Jap/Euro brands now)
But see in Britain...
Rarely you see British cars (well, they are out of reach for most of us)
but probably you won't see more Japanese/Korean cars anywhere!!!
=:-0
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Plenty of British made MINIs, Nissans, Hondas, Vauxhalls and Toyotas ! What else is there ?
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Oooh and Landies of every shape and lets not forget Jags - even arffordable ones.
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Nissans, Hondas, Vauxhalls and Toyotas - they may be made here but are not actually British brands!
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Isn't the biggest British car maker LTI? See plenty of those in my neck of the woods
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Nor Landies, Vauxhalls etc. There are none then that's why ! Plenty of Rovers around that prove we'll buy anything vaguely home made.
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Vauxhall is definitely a British brand name. Opel is not.
Morgan are the only British owned car firm of any size but they do use Ford and BMW engines....
At least the Russian owned TVR used British sourced engines AFAIK.
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I wasna fu but just had plenty.
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>Morgan are the only British owned car firm of any size
Wrong. As I said above LTI is the biggest British owned car firm
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PS I think that they use Toyota engines
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> >> Morgan are the only British owned car firm of any size Wrong. As I said above LTI is the biggest British owned car firm
And they have a factory in China planned, too, since their products are so popular in AP.
No mention I have seen on whether, if successful as a venture, this will have implication for Coventry or not beyond the fact that they won't be building cars for AP consumption.
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movilogo - So Vauxhall is not a British brand? So which country does the Vauxhall brand originate from then? Can you guess that there is a connection between the area of London called Vauxhall & the car maker?
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It makes me laugh , when you see cars with Union flags , flags of St George, "support the UK" etc, stickers, how many of the cars themselves are Japanese, French....
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I do not think we are patriotic at all really. (I count myself in that category as well - driving an Accord).
Take the BR's on this site for instance - my observations are lots of German car owners and a smattering of Jap mixed in as well.
As the post above says if we were patriotic we would all drive Toyota, Nissan, Honda, Mini and some Ford and Vauxhall - although the trend for them is to move production elsewhere leaving us with just the Jap brands - at least they are staying loyal to the UK workforce.
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It makes me laugh , when you see cars with Union flags , flags of St George, "support the UK" etc, stickers, how many of the cars themselves are Japanese, French....
I was on the receiving end of one of these comments during the 2002 World Cup when he asked why my "Frog car" 306 was wearing a small England sticker. As I got into my Ryton built car, I had to chuckle as he got into a flag covered Belgian built Ford Mondeo and drove off.
Twit.
Cheers
DP
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I meant "a guy" not "he". Re-wrote the post and it didn't make sense.
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i've always done my best to 'buy British'.....but sadly that's become increasingly difficult
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I was on the receiving end of one of these comments during the 2002 World Cup when he asked why my "Frog car" 306 was wearing a small England sticker. As I got into my Ryton built car, I had to chuckle as he got into a flag covered Belgian built Ford Mondeo and drove off. Twit.
Yup, I had a similar one. Bloke in Spanish-built Fiesta having a go about my Sunderland-built Nissan being foreign.
I wouldn't care, but Sunderland is only 30 miles from here. He really should have known better.
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Rarely you see British cars (well, they are out of reach for most of us) but probably you won't see more Japanese/Korean cars anywhere!!!
That last bit doesn't stack up.
Toyota are the second-largest manufacturer in the world, yet in the UK they're nowhere near.
This country is addicted to French and American cars, to the point where they falsely refer to many of them as British.
In the States, and especially Australia, Far Eastern cars are everywhere.
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Damn colonies.
God these people are so disloyal.
No wonder we condemned them to the outer darkness. Serve them right.
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It's not the British car manufactors that're declining, it's also the truck industry if im not correct it's non existent!
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Its not what you drive, its how you drive it! :-)
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If more of the Welsh had bought Gilberns there would still be a Welsh car industry.
Or Scots and Argyls.
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I've never given a damn where anything I bought was made, from cars and bikes to matches. If it suits I'll buy it, if it don't I won't.
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There's panic on in the French motor industry at the moment because the natives aren't buying the beads any more. Renault sales down about 14 per cent year on year I gather, and PSA (you know, the ones suddenly all touched with the ugly stick) in the doldrums while imports are up five per cent.
The trade is still doing its best at positive discrimination, though - even buying tyres for an import can be a pain because only sizes for French cars are in stock, and as for discount offers on servicing or parts, forget it...
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Which is why the Renault Logan is being punted out to Europe now !
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I wonder why....As an unhappy* french car owner, I think I know why.
Maybe at last the penny (sorry, euro) is beginning to drop.
* and that's being polite.
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Are Union Jack/St George stickers made here?
Why do cars get the attention - where're your 'white goods', TV, computer, furniture, holidays made?
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Car - I would buy one if there was one that met the criteria (RWD, 6cyl diesel estate). Used to be Vauxhall Omega but nothing now.
White goods - try and buy German!!
Food - always where possible buy British and get annoyed when SWMBO buys NZ lamb.
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Since when was the Vauxhall Omega in any way British?
German-designed, American owned. Only the badge was a Brit design pretty much.
Agree with you about German white goods -- Miele are fantastic!
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Agree with you about German white goods -- Miele are fantastic!
Yup, and Bosch.
Cheers
DP
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In the 1950s we were just as patriotic as the French - I was going to say 'are'now' but Mike's post above is interesting.
British Leyland have a lot to answer for - driving buyers into going 'foreign' partly through unreliability and partly through designing the wrong cars for the time (e.g. the dumpy 4-door Allegro as successor to the pretty 1100/1300, which should have been a hatchback like thr Golf).
Maybe the French are now getting dissatisfied as we did 30-40 years ago.
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Many years ago, soon after the original Ford Fiesta appeared, a friend bought one. He was a rabid anglophile saying that there was no way he would buy a car built by foreigners and that he would only buy a good honest British Ford car. Looking under the bonnet soon after he bought it I spotted the identification plate. I think it said something like 'Fabricado en Espana' (pardon my Spanish!). He was beside himslf and even tried to get the Ford dealer to take the car back!
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We tend to forget how emotive the whole subject of buying foriegn cars used to be, and how heated any debates used to get. After leaving school I worked briefly in a local garage where the owner refused to service foriegn cars, and I was once refused petrol in a "frank and candid manner" when I pulled up at a filling station in the backwoods of Kent on a Honda motorcycle.
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It's about time people stopped regarding Ford and Vauxhall as British brands (even if American-owned). They lost the claim to any popularity based on patriotic emotions when they moved just about all their assembly operations abroad. Toyota, Nissan and Honda are now more British than those two quitters.
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It's about time people stopped regarding Ford and Vauxhall as British brands (even if American-owned). They lost the claim to any popularity based on patriotic emotions when they moved just about all their assembly operations abroad. Toyota, Nissan and Honda are now more British than those two quitters.
Well then you can take it further and say that any listed company is basically multinational due to there being so many shareholders. For example, Vodafone - is that British? Who wons the shares in it.
That leaves about 2 big car companies that are still privately owned (although I stand to be corrected) BMW and Porsche. I am not sure if the Quandt have more than about 46.6% and haven't VW taken a big part of Porsche?
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"Toyota, Nissan and Honda are now more British than those two quitters." So the thousands of Astras that are made at & exported from Ellesmere Port make Vauxhall a quitter? Plenty of Vauxhall vans made in Luton.
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"Toyota, Nissan and Honda are now more British than those two quitters." So the thousands of Astras that are made at & exported from Ellesmere Port make Vauxhall a quitter? Plenty of Vauxhall vans made in Luton.
That is true.
However the Astra was not designed here. Several of the Japanese cars were.
If you are going to consider these Vauxhalls to be British, then so are many Nissans, Hondas and Toyotas (and some Peugeots as well before they shut up shop).
As I have said before, it really, really hacks me off when I hear people refer to Ford and Vauxhall as British. Whenever Nanjing start to release their Chinese-developed and built "MGs", will you refer to them as "British" because of the name and history?
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I have made a conscious effort to buy cars with at least some UK content. We have 2 Swindon built (or assembled) Hondas. A Freelander would have been preferred to the CRV but for the poor reliability reputation. I could find no more British alternative to our Panda, unfortunately. I also prefer to take most of my holidays in the UK, I admit not solely for patriotic reasons but it helps me to live with being too old for Club 18-30.
I will continue to buy cars from manufacturers, British or not, who maintain plants here for as long as I can.
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caterham, just up the road from me (earls shilton)
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I just try and buy the best I can get for the money I have to spend, who cares where it is made? I'm not a charity.
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I think it matters more the older you are. My mum (89 not out) was a Wren officer in the 2nd World War and still remembers what the Japanese did to many of her friends. I never lie to my mum but when SWMBO had Hondas I said 'most Hondas are made in Swindon' which kept her heppy. Actually the Jazz wasn't, the Civic was.
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Vauxhall will eventually quit Ellesmere Port - it's just a matter of time. The Japanese are expanding here, the Americans are contracting.
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