Photo credit: performancedrive
We’ve been writing about Alfa Romeo now for about ten years, and things have changed drastically. The company that developed a bad reputation due to some reliability issues in the nineties now managed to almost grasp the glory of the old days.
The rebirth of the company started with a production of 4C, the model which wasn’t really meant for mass production, however, the same model was the sign that main people from FCA meant business. Even though it was massively impractical, it still managed to capture the hearts of the true petrol heads, and with its beauty and feistiness, it built itself a solid reputation.
Then came the Giulia and Stelvio. Many purists didn’t like them due to the somewhat generic design, but times have shown that Giulia is the special car inside and out. It blew the competition away with its looks, as well as engineering, and now, few years into production, it still manages to keep its spot close to the top. It took the seconds place in customer satisfaction, right after Lexus, and whoever buys it, simply loves it.
However, there is another side to the story which isn’t good in any way. Sale numbers are still disappointing in Europe, as well as in USA (even though perceptually, it increased drastically), and when it comes to reliability, QV version got some bad feedback from certain car magazines, but mainly because they dealt with pre-production versions of the QV. Nonetheless, Alfa Romeo should have paid more attention to this.
They never should have let things like this slide through. As a company that’s looking to rebuild its reputation, they have to pay attention to each individual car, even though that might sound unreasonable. Sixty thousand units of Giulia and Stelvio were recalled, and even though that is not a big deal nowadays in the automotive world, it would’ve been much better it that didn’t happen.
What every car enthusiast needs these days is a reliable, simple, well-designed, performance-oriented car that is well-built, and tested just like cars were in the old days, not the generic cars whose lifespan is programmed to 5 or 10 years. And Alfa, the special company that it always was, should bank on this.
Recently, they revealed Tonale, and new Sprint should be coming out soon, so we have a lot to look forward to. But there are few things Alfa has to do to ensure their survival in the future. They have to keep making special – unique cars, pay obsessive attention to quality, and keep up with technology. If they manage to do that, their future might be brighter than their past.
