To the surprise of many, the Dodge Grand Caravan is going away in a couple years. The announcement was made this week, as Chrysler is planning to make Dodge a performance brand, which means that Dodge is going to lose products that are decidedly not performance focused. This means, of course, no more minivans, since those are made largely to carry around children. It also means the end of the Avenger sedan, which in spite of an aggressive name was still a sensible family car.
The announcement did send some analysts into a frenzy of paranoia, as they declared there would be job losses in Windsor, where the minivans are made, since there would be fewer nameplates on the line, and the Caravan was a popular one. This paranoia is unfounded, because it ignores what is actually happening at Chrysler, which is a rebranding above all else. If you want a minivan from your local Chrysler dealer - and you might, as they are traditionally rather good at making them - after 2016 it will have a Chrysler badge. For Chrysler, it means that they only have to produce one variation of the product, which reduces costs and redundancy. For consumers, it just means different badges, as it is unlikely that the company will remove profitable packages that sell rather well.
It's actually a very common tactic taken throughout the industry. The fewer variations there are on a product, the fewer parts a company has to make, which means lower costs. It also means that a company is not competing with itself for sales, all product moved in any particular category will be counted together. It means less money for Dodge, of course, but more money for Chrysler.
Of course, they are also cutting a brand that is instantly recognizable, since everyone knows what a Caravan is and represents. It's also a model that sells very well, especially in Canada, and is generally associated quite strongly with the minivan category. Chrysler-Dodge dealers will naturally have to get consumers comfortable with the change in branding when they come in looking for a vehicle to cart around their children. Since the majority of Chrysler dealers sell both anyway, that should not be a huge issue, and while I suspect there will be people who become concerned like the unnamed analyst earlier, it will not take long before people are familiar with the product line.
I'll admit that I thought it would make more sense to pitch Dodge as the mainstream brand rather than Chrysler, but I'm going by tradition rather than what the company is actually trying to do. Just driving by a Dodge dealer one can basically see that they're trying to pitch Dodge models as aggressive cars for cool people, and as useful as a minivan might be it does not quite fit within the same model line as the much more aggressive looking models Dodge is actually trying to sell. It does, however, fit quite nicely beside much more sensible models that get Chrysler badges, so I understand completely what they're trying to do. The mission right now, from the dealer level to right to the top, is ensure that consumers themselves understand what they're trying to do. Some reactions make it clear that it will be an adjustment, but in the long run, it actually does make sense when it comes to building a pair of brands.
