House Confidential
Frederick Vogel IV’s Historic East Side Mansion
The MIAD instructor and Vogel heir continues his old Milwaukee family's tradition of owning mansions in the neighborhood.
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The MIAD instructor and Vogel heir continues his old Milwaukee family's tradition of owning mansions in the neighborhood. Back to the full article.
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Categories: House Confidential
Since you aren’t a “car person”, maybe you don’t know this but Cadillac is on a definite upswing and I’d be more than happy to own the “Cadillac” of anything, or even a new Cadillac! They’ve come out with several great new models and in one of my recent issues of Car and Driver (where they LOVE German cars, especially Bimmers!) they tested a new Cadillac CTS vs BMW 5 series, Mercedes E Class and Audi A6 and the Caddy bested the Merc and the Bimmer and barely lost to the Audi, which is an exceptional car itself. Beyond that, according to several sources, Cadillac’s quality ratings have well surpassed the Germans and are nearing those of the Japanese, who of course have been #1 for many years. So, I’d say that owning a “Cadillac” of a house is quite nice, indeed!
Dear East Slider:
It is nice to know that Cadillac is back on top. In 1979 the company had to remind readers that it was still the “Cadillac of automobiles.” The SUVs are hideous — the Cadillacs of tasteless ostentation.
Things generally went to hell when the company stopped making the Fleetwood 75 limousine in 1986 and owners started driving themselves, rather than hiring others to do so. I miss the window in the seating area separating driver from The Driven.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/08/magazine/08FOB-onlanguage-t.html?_r=0
If one holds an opinion of Cadillac based on vehicles they made 30, or even 15 years ago… I can see why they’d think the way you do Michael. Same if you base it on one particular model…
For others, they’ll judge individual models, or at least a nameplate as a whole… otherwise I’d have a very interesting view of Mercedes based upon the production of the G63 AMG… Let alone my eco-friendly image of Toyota completely blown out of the water thanks to the Sequoia or Land Cruisers.
You’re certainly correct Andy, Cadillac did have some pretty dreadful years for a while there, especially in the 1980’s when they were producing vehicles that were simply re-badged Buicks or Oldsmobiles with a little extra “glitz”! The cars were woefully underpowered, especially one Cadillac-only engine in particular that was very lucky to reach 100,000 miles without a full rebuild of the internals. They’ve definitely turned things around though and their latest models are really knockouts and that’s coming from someone who has much preferred foreign cars for years.
When you look also at the reliability data compiled by companies like JD Power or Consumer Reports (which does incredibly detailed and extensive research of each and every make and model) all GM products and especially Cadillac have been making major strides forward in long-term reliability, even approaching Toyota and Honda, which for years have been far ahead of everyone else. Especially interesting is that the three top rung German brands, Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz aren’t very good at all when it comes to reliability and are darned expensive to fix when something does go wrong, which apparently (and from personal experience!) can be often!
Finally, we have to look where everyone is looking these days, to the Chinese. In China, GM is doing exceptionally well, both Buick and Cadillac are very sought after brands. Cadillac, just because its Cadillac and apparently a lot of Chinese hold Buick in very high esteem because the last emperor owned several Buicks, so if its suitable for the emperor, it must be quite a car! Interesting as well, many Chinese consider Mercedes to be the domain of the retiree, something many Americans think of Buicks!