Is a Wrangler your first Domestic Brand Vehicle Purchase?

[Sean L]

Hey guys,

I am interested to know if the Wrangler is your first vehicle you have owned by an American brand. I have always purchased Japanese imports and have not bought any domestic vehicles. I really wanted an SUV/Truck but will only drive a manual transmission so my options are very limited. I like the Tacoma but I would not use the bed much and while its a decent looking vehicle I feel it looks a little plain and lacks character. I personally like the wrangler better except I am not sure about its reliability which I know is very subjective. I again was just wondering how many of you purchased a Wrangler while before only owning import brands and how your experience has been.

Thanks!

I'm actually quite the opposite from you. I've always owned American brand vehicles until relatively recently. I've had a 1992 Saturn, 1998 Mustang, 2000 Dakota, 2002 Mustang and a 2010 Ram 1500. Honestly I've had no complaints about the Yamaha (Made in USA) I got a year and a half ago and the Honda Accord (Also made in USA) that my wife drives I also have no complaints. I would have picked differently but its hard to go wrong with an Accord.

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[Bluerhino]

No....but I have only owned two others. A big mix actually but leaning more German.

In order starting in 1983 with my very first car.

72 Toyota Corolla SR5- good first car
72 Triumph TR6 - What a terrible but such a fun car
79 Jeep CJ5 Silver anniversary -
1984 Corvette convertible - rattle box. Hated it.
1985 BMW 328is - one of the best handling cars I ever owned
1990 Toyota 4-runner - never had any issue or warranty item
1997 Toyota 4-runner - again not even a light bulb. Only regular maintenance 170km on each one. Great vehicles
2001 inifiniti QX - boring
2001 Porsche Boxster S - first second garage spot toy car
2006 Land Rover LR4 - worst car I ever owned. Absolute piece of garbage. Air suspension and alignment problems from day one and Land Rover didn’t stand behind anything. Sold it after 10 months. Waste of time and even a bigger waste of money. #%^*€£* piece of %^*+!!
2006 Audi Q4 Avant S-line - great little wagon
2006 Audi Q7 - great SUV - mall crawler- loved it
2013 BMW X1 35i - fun fast little crossover. Just to small to be useful. Trading this one in next week.
2005 Porsche 911 S - replaced the Boxster as my second garage spot summer toy car. Favorite car ever.
2018 Jeep JLU Sahara Wrangler - PU my new mall crawler next week! My 911’s alter ego .

Wow now that I think of it that’s a lot of cars!!

 

[Ajn13]

My first rides from HS age (hand me downs) were Ford escort, Ford tempo, Chevy cavalier, Bronco II. As for the ones I bought, VW Jetta, Chrysler 300C w/the hemi, handed down Escalade from my ex, Toyota Sequoia. And now my JL (when it arrives!!)

 

[citzen z]

all my vehicles were made in the us. even my wife's Honda civic....Unfortunately made in the US is somewhat misleading today. That being said I have only bought the old Chrysler products for me. I cant wait to get a new wrangler. That is my present to me

 

[auxSwitch]

1993 Mercury Topaz - whatever one can afford
1999 Mercury Mystique (aka Mistake) - seduced by an almost-new car... any almost-new car... crappy almost-new car... while taken advantage of by dealership because you are a foreigner. Totaled because it wasn't meant for offroading, apparently ;-)
1997 Nissan Maxima - dat Engine! if only it was a manual
1995 Subaru Impreza (FWD!!! a FWD Subie!!!!) - gave it to my sibling after 150k, who, if I remember correctly, put another 150k on top. It's a little 1.6L that just kept on chuggin' - a cockroach of a car.
2005 Saab 9-2X Linear (it's a Saab, it's a Subaru, it's a Saabaru!!! one of two bastard outocomes of GM's one-night stand with Subaru) unfortunately Subaru lineage showed at 130k - head gasket started leaking and it costs more to repair it than the car is worth now (in this area). It's still sitting in my driveway - if I had an extra garage bay, I would be very tempted to make it a project car - swap the motor for the turbo, upgrade suspension...

 

[JLU_Pilot]

Short Answer is no.

Long answer -- I come from a lineage of WWII vets and one of them in particular was very vocal about buying American... to be specific, it was buy a Ford... seeing as I am a few generations removed... let's just say, I haven't always stayed the course. In high school I was fortunate enough to share a 1964 Mustang with my sister until she moved off to college. Then bought my first car, 1991 - Ford Probe GT. That was a fun little car. Moved to a '97 Chevy Tahoe after that. The Tahoe was solid till I took it to this one shop... then started having all sorts of problems. Ended up trading it in for the 2008 Tahoe Hybrid, only had the Hybrid Tahoe for a few years before its electrical started acting up -- the Hybrid was way too new and an unknown to us at the time, so we traded it in 2013 for a Chevy Traverse.... somewhere along the way we bought a 2005 VW Jetta. Haven't had many problems with either of the Traverse or Jetta. -- Now returning back to an all american household as we look to trade/sell the Jetta and replace it with the JL! I am not anticipating anything out of the norm for the Jeep; hope I can get the same longevity out of it as I have the Jetta (13+ years) -- for sure will be more fun!

 

[HammerTime]

Hey guys,

I am interested to know if the Wrangler is your first vehicle you have owned by an American brand. I have always purchased Japanese imports and have not bought any domestic vehicles. I really wanted an SUV/Truck but will only drive a manual transmission so my options are very limited. I like the Tacoma but I would not use the bed much and while its a decent looking vehicle I feel it looks a little plain and lacks character. I personally like the wrangler better except I am not sure about its reliability which I know is very subjective. I again was just wondering how many of you purchased a Wrangler while before only owning import brands and how your experience has been.

Thanks!

Hell no!

I've had 8 new Dodge/Ram pickups (Currently a 2017 Power Wagon), 4 Jeep Wranglers (Currently a 2020 JLR), 3 SRT Challengers (Currently have a Jazz Blue Hellcat Challenger), 5 Grand Cherokees, 1 Cherokee, 1 1969 GTO, a 1979 F150, and a 2006 Commander... (Yuck....)

I have had a 1985 Toyota 4-Runner, and a 2000 Tundra. (Shit off road rig, way to much flex in frame)

Uhm, sorry if the post went off topic! LOL! No, actually I'm not.. Go Mopar!

 

[HammerTime]

The Wrangler is #1 in the "American Made index", although there are three Hondas in the top 10.

https://www.cars.com/articles/the-carscom-2017-american-made-index-1420695680673/

FCA is an Italian company, so it's mostly European executives pocketing the (massive) profit margins on the JL, although profits are also redistributed to shareholders all over the globe.

The world economy is so globalized, "buy American" is impossible to sort out. What matters? American owners? Investors? Employees? Executives? Raw materials?

Don't over think it!

 

[HammerTime]

This sentiment is a commonly repeated misconception, exacerbated by faulty or incomplete information such as the Cars.com American Made Index.

Just because you ask several difficult questions in your post doesn’t mean that they cannot be answered. It just means we have to do a bit more digging because the answers are complex and lie below the surface.

The fact is, as consumers, we are part of the largest voting block in the world. And because money talks, corporations are forced to be responsive to our votes.

There are a variety of reasons beyond blind nationalism (quality, labor practices, repair costs, environmental impact, economic ripple effect) that we should try to be informed about the origin of products that we buy. Trying to reduce it to such simplistic terms is lazy.

Please check out a much more accurate metric for determining the impact on the American economy of your auto purchases:
https://www.american.edu/kogod/research/autoindex/index.cfm


From the website:

What percentage of your vehicle's value contributes to the overall well-being of the U.S. economy and why does this information matter to you?

Kogod's 2017 Made in America Auto Index seeks to answer these questions by evaluating the domestic content of vehicles sold in the US. The index takes into account other aspects of vehicle manufacturing that are not accounted for in other measures.

Seven criteria are considered, including profit margin, labor, and research and development location, among others.

You definitely over thunk it...

 

[HammerTime]

The following seems evident to me as a business man:
1. Jeep is an American subsidiary of FCA, so it is incorporated in the US. Just to put things into perspective, of the original Fortune 500 companies from 1955, when the list was created, only 60 remain, that's 12% so 440 or 88% are gone by some means.
2. The global automotive industry is highly competitive so no one is making huge profits on the JL.
3. Please don't forget the development costs of the JL likely ran into the $ billions and this has to be amortized over the units produced so it will be years before Jeep is actually in the black on the JL.
4. If FCA hadn't bought Jeep it likely would have gone bankrupt in 2008 and at a minimum the JL never would have been developed as it exists today.
5. Jeep and it's dealer network create more than 100K US jobs, mostly high paying, and this doesn't include the numerous suppliers to Jeep which are largely US based.
6. Jeep, it's dealer network and suppliers will pay taxes to the US government, both the corporate taxes and the income taxes of the 100K+ workers so it's contributing significantly the the US economy.
7. Yes, the executives at Jeep have undoubtedly made significant amounts of money recently, but this is because the FCA stock price is up substantially as most public company executives make any real wealth in stock appreciation (which costs the company nothing), not with their salaries. No one gets rich on their salary. Bonuses help but they are linked to company financial performance, very similar to stock price.
8. As for buy American, this is an excellent reason to buy a Jeep. At a minimum consumers should understand where the new cars they are buying are designed and manufactured. If you don't make an effort to buy (substantially) American designed and/or made products then you forfeit the right to complain about the loss of high paying jobs in this county.

Sorry if this sounds like I'm ranting but I get upset when people say the FCA executives are "getting rich" off the products they are producing. The market for proven, capable senior executives is highly competitive and any to the leadership team at FCA can get a similar paying job in a heartbeat. FCA and Jeep have done a remarkable job over the past 5+ years, when FCA was honestly the laughing stock of the auto industry, we as Jeep fans should be delighted with what's been accomplished. Full disclosure, I don't work for FCA or in the automotive industry.

OMG.

 

[HammerTime]

No....but I have only owned two others. A big mix actually but leaning more German.

In order starting in 1983 with my very first car.

72 Toyota Corolla SR5- good first car
72 Triumph TR6 - What a terrible but such a fun car
79 Jeep CJ5 Silver anniversary -
1984 Corvette convertible - rattle box. Hated it.
1985 BMW 328is - one of the best handling cars I ever owned
1990 Toyota 4-runner - never had any issue or warranty item
1997 Toyota 4-runner - again not even a light bulb. Only regular maintenance 170km on each one. Great vehicles
2001 inifiniti QX - boring
2001 Porsche Boxster S - first second garage spot toy car
2006 Land Rover LR4 - worst car I ever owned. Absolute piece of garbage. Air suspension and alignment problems from day one and Land Rover didn’t stand behind anything. Sold it after 10 months. Waste of time and even a bigger waste of money. #%^*€£* piece of %^*+!!
2006 Audi Q4 Avant S-line - great little wagon
2006 Audi Q7 - great SUV - mall crawler- loved it
2013 BMW X1 35i - fun fast little crossover. Just to small to be useful. Trading this one in next week.
2005 Porsche 911 S - replaced the Boxster as my second garage spot summer toy car. Favorite car ever.
2018 Jeep JLU Sahara Wrangler - PU my new mall crawler next week! My 911’s alter ego .

Wow now that I think of it that’s a lot of cars!!

HFS! You had only 4 cars that I would own on that list! the 4-Runners and the jeeps...!

My first "car" was an 1979 F150. My second was a 1969 4sp GTO... Good grief, it took 33 years to upgrade that one! LOL! 2012 Challenger SRT Yellow Jacket did finally do the trick!

 

[Kluk Ztopolovky]

Hey guys,

I am interested to know if the Wrangler is your first vehicle you have owned by an American brand. I have always purchased Japanese imports and have not bought any domestic vehicles. I really wanted an SUV/Truck but will only drive a manual transmission so my options are very limited. I like the Tacoma but I would not use the bed much and while its a decent looking vehicle I feel it looks a little plain and lacks character. I personally like the wrangler better except I am not sure about its reliability which I know is very subjective. I again was just wondering how many of you purchased a Wrangler while before only owning import brands and how your experience has been.

Thanks!

I really never needed the flip flops and free bag basmati rice one used to get with Honda . Some US cars were crap but so used to be many other imports . In past years there was lots of unjustified propaganda aimed at American manufacturers only to ease up greedy international trade that relentlessly choked up US economy. I simply grew up dreaming of a car that has some muscle on it , bumpers of steel and engines that could power steam locomotive , running over sizable debris on the road way should be just a visual experience and not landing in a ditch with tiny 14 inch tires .

 

[HammerTime]

I'm actually quite the opposite from you. I've always owned American brand vehicles until relatively recently. I've had a 1992 Saturn, 1998 Mustang, 2000 Dakota, 2002 Mustang and a 2010 Ram 1500. Honestly I've had no complaints about the Yamaha (Made in USA) I got a year and a half ago and the Honda Accord (Also made in USA) that my wife drives I also have no complaints. I would have picked differently but its hard to go wrong with an Accord.

Yamaha is an awesome manufacturer. I've had a shit load of Yamaha dirt bikes and a large handful of their street bikes. 2 Roadstars, 3 Stratoliners, and a Virago for the road and OMG, god only knows how many dirt bikes... Many Motocrossers for sure. and 1 Honda CR450F, and one RM250. Both good bikes but not up to Yamaha quality standards.

Oops, I guess that was a little off topic...! Go Mopar!

 

[Wabujitsu]

Here’s our list, as well as I can remember:

Mercury Comet
Z28 Camaro
Chevy Suburban
VW Bug
Toyota FJC FJ40
Ford Courier
Toyota Corolla
Ford F-150
4 Nissan Frontiers
Dodge Pickup
2 Chevy Pickups
Saturn Vue
Nissan NV200 van
FJ Cruiser
2 Jeep Wranglers

I probably forgot a few. The absolute WORST vehicle for failures was the Ford Courier.

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