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Genesis cars win accolades, offer value — so why are sales so bad?

My high-school buddy Brent Cormier was so smitten with the Genesis G80 when he saw it at an event I hosted at SXSW in 2016 he bought a used 2013 Hyundai Genesis a short time later and fell in love with the car. "It surpasses my every expectation," said Cormier, a self-described "renaissance man" who owns and runs a real estate agency with his wife Laura, is a food service executive chef and part owner of Austin-based Thin the Herd Guitars. "I was locked into Mercedes and Audi for 10 years," he added. "And felt trapped in an endless pit of maintenance costs." After owning the Genesis over the past two years — including using it as an Uber and Lyft driver to earn extra cash — Cormier learned what some frugal luxury sedan buyers and a handful of car reviewers have discovered: Genesis offers great bang for the buck compared to other premium brands and can compete with the best in terms of performance, features and comfort. Hyundai's luxury brand also earned a prominent third-party endorsement last week when for the first time Genesis topped J.D. Power's 2018 APEAL study, surpassing German luxury-performance icon Porsche. The APEAL study (which stands for Automotive Performance, Execution and Layout) "measures owners' emotional attachment and level of excitement across 77 attributes," ranging from performance to comfort, and asks nearly 68,000 owners of new 2018 models to score vehicles on a 1,000-point scale. In its second year ranked as a stand-alone brand, Genesis earned an APEAL score that bumped it up 15 points to 884 and helped push it past Porsche — and past BMW, Lincoln, Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Volvo, Cadillac, Land Rover and Lexus, in order of ranking. Last month, Genesis also topped J.D. Power's Initial Quality Survey (IQS) for the first time this year. And both its models were awarded Top Safety Pick Plus ratings by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, among 11 Plus ratings in all for Korean vehicles. Despite high J.D. Power rankings and great reviews, Genesis U.S. sales were off 50 percent for the first six months of 2018 compared to 2017, and in June Genesis sold only 796 vehicles — the first time U.S. numbers dropped below 1,000 in a month. Part of Genesis's APEAL and IQS success can be attributed to its small product lineup: just two models, the G80 and G90 sedans, with a third, the 2019 G70, launching later this year. And while those numbers may help in J.D.

Best and worst car brands of 2022 according to Consumer Reports

It's that time again, Consumer Reports this morning lifting the curtain on its 2022 Annual Car Brand rankings and its 10 Top Picks in the car, crossover, and truck category. Drumroll, please: This year, Subaru climbs two spots to claim the winner's circle, having come third the last two years. Last year, Mazda climbed three spots from 2020 to take the crown. This year, Mazda slipped to second, BMW taking the last spot on the podium, also a one-spot drop from 2021. Six automakers in the top 10 hailed from Japan, which is one more than last year, and five luxury makers occupied the top 10, which is two more than last year. And South Korean representation didn't crack the top this year, after Hyundai managed tenth last year. The seven makes after BMW are: Honda, Lexus, Audi, Porsche, Mini, Toyota, and Infiniti.  The magazine and testing concern says its Brand Report Card "[reveals] which automakers are producing the most well-performing, safe, and reliable vehicles based on CR’s independent testing and member surveys," and that "Brands that rise to the top tend to have the most consistent performance across their model lineups." The domestics also took steps back among the 32 OEMs ranked on the 2022 card. Chrysler and Buick were the domestic carmakers who made last year's top 10 in eighth and ninth, respectively. This year, Buick dropped to eleventh, Chrysler to thirteenth. Dodge went from fourteenth to sixteenth. CR continues to ding Tesla's yoke steerer, the not-exactly-natural handhold responsible for the electric carmaker going from sixteenth last year to twenty-third this year.

Recharge Wrap-up: New and old Audis get greener, as does US electricity

Audi has made environmental improvements to the its TT while boosting performance. The new TT sees an 11-percent reduction in emissions, and up to 14 percent more power. Audi says that each TT will save around 5.5 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions over its lifecycle. Additionally, the TT's manufacturing process has been cleaned up a bit, reducing emissions by about nine percent. Read more in the press release, below, or see Audi's lifecycle assessment here. Speaking of greening up Audis, Al Swackhammer of Washington converted his 1960 Audi DKW 1000S to run on electric power. Swackhammer first fell in love with the Audi Ur-Quattro, became an enthusiast of Audi and Volkswagen cars, and has owned nothing else ever since. With his DKW, he combined his passion for the classic car with his responsibility to the environment. "I am pleased that I did this project," says the happy owner, "and I enjoy driving it very dearly." Meet the man and his beloved electric Audi DKW in the video below. Toyota has chosen a sustainable design firm, Corgan, as the lead architect for its new North American headquarters. The new campus will be built in Plano, TX, and will be the workplace of about 4,000 Toyota employees. Corgan, who has already done 47 LEED certified projects, is already designing a temporary office for the site while it finishes the project. Toyota expects to begin working from the site in late 2016 or early 2017. Learn more in the press release below. In July, all new electrical generating capacity in the US came from renewable sources. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's Office of Energy Projects' newest "Energy Infrastructure Update" report says new electric generation put into service last month came from wind (379 megawatts), solar (21 megawatts) and hydro (5 megawatts). So far this year, 53 percent of new energy generation capacity has come from various renewable sources, and none from coal or nuclear. Currently, renewable energy accounts for 16.3 percent of the US electric generation capacity, providing about 14 percent of actual electricity. Read more in the press release from the Sun Day Campaign below. Positive life cycle assessment for the new Audi TT Compact sports car scores high for dynamic performance and efficiency Emissions reduced by 11 percent compared with predecessor Customer benefits from the very first mile Ingolstadt, August 18, 2014 – Dynamic performance and efficiency: The new Audi TT* impressively combines both qualities.