2010 Toyota Prius Base Hatchback 4-door 1.8l on 2040-cars

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Zombie cars: Discontinued vehicles that aren't dead yet

Car models come and go, but as revealed by monthly sales data, once a car is discontinued, it doesn't just disappear instantly. And in the case of some models, vanishing into obscurity can be a slow, tedious process. That's the case with the 12 cars we have here. All of them have been discontinued, but car companies keep racking up "new" sales with them. There are actually more discontinued cars that are still registering new sales than what we decided to include here. We kept this list to the oldest or otherwise most interesting vehicles still being sold as new, including a supercar. We'll run the list in alphabetical order, starting with *drumroll* ... BMW 6 Series: 55 total sales BMW quietly removed the 6 Series from the U.S. market during the 2019 model year. It had been available in three configurations, a hardtop coupe, a convertible and a sleek four-door coupe-like shape.   BMW i8: 18 total sales We've always had a soft spot for the BMW i8, despite the fact that it never quite fit into a particular category. It was sporty, but nowhere near as fast as similarly-priced competitors. It looked very high-tech and boasted a unique carbon fiber chassis design and a plug-in hybrid powertrain, but wasn't really designed for maximum efficiency or maximum performance. Still, the in-betweener was very cool to look at and drive, and 18 buyers took one home over the course of 2021.   Chevy Impala: 750 total sales The Impala represented classic American tastes at a time when American tastes were shifting away from soft-riding sedans with big interior room and trunk space and into higher-riding crossovers. A total of 750 sales were inked last year.   Chrysler 200: 15 total sales The Chrysler 200 was actually a pretty nice sedan, with good looks and decent driving dynamics let down by a lack of roominess, particularly in the back seat. Of course, as we said regarding the Chevy Impala, the number of Americans in the market for sedans is rapidly winding down, and other automakers are following Chrysler's footsteps in canceling their slow-selling four-doors. Even if Chrysler never really found its footing in the ultra-competitive midsize sedan segment, apparently dealerships have a few leftover 2017 200s floating around. And for some reason, 15 buyers decided to sign the dotted line to take one of these aging sedans home last year.

Submit your questions for Autoblog Podcast #329 LIVE!

We're set to record Autoblog Podcast #329 tonight, and you can drop us your questions and comments via our Q&A module below. Subscribe to the Autoblog Podcast in iTunes if you haven't already done so, and if you want to take it all in live, tune in to our UStream (audio only) channel at 10:00 PM Eastern tonight.
Discussion Topics for Autoblog Podcast Episode #329
Subcompact sales slump, yet again

Lexus eschews production in China over quality concerns

One of the more popular trends in the auto industry is setting up production operations in China. Mainstream manufacturers like Ford, General Motors and Volkswagen have done it, and even luxury marques like Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz have or will soon have manufacturing ops in the People's Republic.
One company that isn't building cars in China, though, is Lexus. The Toyota-owned luxury brand still manufactures all of its vehicles in Japan (aside from a few RXs, which are built at a Toyota factory in Canada). According to Tokuo Fukuichi, Lexus just isn't ready to build cars there yet.
"The German Three have a brand image that they have cultivated over the past century in their long history, but Lexus is not in people's minds like that yet," Fukuichi-san told Reuters UK.