[Greg Burr]

This was my response:

The Impala is a great car, you just have to take it for what it is. Impala has never been synonomous with “spirited driving”, SS 409’s of yore nothwithstanding. And even those were only fast in a straight line…

Quite frankly, the life of the average Impala, Crown Vic, Taurus, and Charger, are for the most part, very mundane. Only the lucky ones born as cop cruisers will likely ever see any real excitement. GM has wrapped this tough as nails car in plain clothes with honest, if older technology, drivetrains and durable, but uninspiring trim. Could it be better, sure! But let’s not totally condemn this car because it doesn’t suit the tastes of the enthusiast driver. I own a small business and don’t have any company owned vehicles yet, but if I did, the last thing I would want is something sporty, or something with high cost of repair. The Impala, Crown Vic, Taurus and Charger all share those attributes. Oh, Charger fans that think a base 2.7 Charger is fun, need to drive one. It handles better than an Impala, but wow what a road slug.

The Japanese makes have, for now, cornered the market on seemingly reliable, exciting cars that exude design excellence. I say seemingly, because with the breakout of recent Toyota and Nissan quality issues, tides could be turning. The domestics are making some real advances in reliability and feature content. Now, all that is left is to instill vehicles with some design expression.

Anyone that thinks that foreign cars are cheaper to fix, hasn’t owned one out of warranty! With my 10+ years in the dealership business, I can say that when an imported vehicle needs some service, it’s going to be costly. Toyota, in particular, charges an arm and a leg for parts. I’m not talking about whole engines, but rather things that you use everyday, like oh a left front power window motor. ‘98 Malibu vs: ‘98 Camry.

Malibu: Dealer (new) $134.58, stock item. P/N 22702139
Malibu: NAPA (reman) $66.32, stock item. P/N 49-7118

Camry: Dealer (new) $301.02, stock item P/N 85720-AA020
Camry: NAPA (reman) $119.33, special order 4 days P/N 49-10888

The fact that both local dealers stock this part tells me that they frequently break on both of them. I don’t know about you, but I use the hell out of my window while I’m driving! If your window broke, which car would you rather be driving? I don’t know about you, but the Malibu could be fixed TODAY for $234.70 less than the Camry. That’s quite a bit of gas money!

Hopefully our hypothetical Malibu was a 4 cylinder, or the money saved on the window job would have to go into the piggy bank for a new intake manifold gasket! Oh, and our hyopthetical Camry owner would be standing in the Toyota dealer’s service department, less worried about their broken window and relatively miffed over the locked up engine from the oil sludge…

Food for thought! Cheers…

You're right. A new tranny for an Altima at 70K miles cost me $2,600. No one else I knew with American cars ever had to replace theirs. The shop manager charges only $1,800 for an Explorer or a Caddy.

 

[tollytime]

I don't think the author was wrong about the Impala LS being boring and plain. It is just that. The snide remarks and foreign comparisons are not needed. This car was designed to do a specific job and it does it's job very well. The Impala LS was designed to transport people from point A to point B in a comfortable atmosphere with plenty of trunk space for belongings. A Camry or an Accord do not offer the same amount of space or a bench seat. The Impala LS is the best rental car around, make sure you get one reserved for yourself or your stuck in KIA. There's plenty of room for co-workers and you can lay your laptop right next to you on the big bench seat. If you have some spare time before a meeting, you can always pull over to a local park and the Impala makes a great micro RV (I bring a cooler with drinks and snacks). The Impala is right at home in the fast lane, with the cruise control set at 72mph and the radio on the AM dial. It's a driving scene that the rest of the world has never experienced, and it's what makes this country great! I'm sure the Impala will never impress auto journalist, but who cares anyway? See you at the Cracker Barrel, I'm driving the Gold Mist LS with the Enterprise sticker.
P.S. If you get a white one, drive in the fast lane and everyone seems to slow down and change into the center lane. I think it's because the Impala could be confused with the local Police Cruiser.

 

[mcmlxv]

Besides its anonymous styling, the problem with the current W-body Impala is that it's sized too small for its target market. The Impala just doesn't meet the needs of families who have defected to trucks and SUVs. It has very limited towing capacity. It's narrow, and not really a 6-passenger vehicle. The trunk is bigger than most, but not huge. Ask anyone who drives one professionally.

GM would have been much better off to have replaced the B-body with an H/G-body product! That car would have been a worthy successor to the Caprice. Instead, the largest Chevrolet sedan for 3 years was the Lumina. Then in 2000, GM slapped the great Impala name on a reworked Lumina with awkward styling. Six model years brought virtually no updates.

2009 can't come fast enough. Let's hope GM delivers this time.

 

[ByTheLake]

Why did GM’s designers settle on an update of a late-90’s Chevy Lumina?

So true! I still scratch my head with wonder. I know there will be all sorts of posts that defend the Impala based on its sales figures, but how many of those customers simply settled for the Impala rather than yearning for one?

 

[Ttple]

I've seen a few Impalas today. They're really not that bad looking..

 

[1G6]

Besides its anonymous styling, the problem with the current W-body Impala is that it's sized too small for its target market. The Impala just doesn't meet the needs of families who have defected to trucks and SUVs. It has very limited towing capacity. It's narrow, and not really a 6-passenger vehicle. The trunk is bigger than most, but not huge. Ask anyone who drives one professionally.

GM would have been much better off to have replaced the B-body with an H/G-body product! That car would have been a worthy successor to the Caprice. Instead, the largest Chevrolet sedan for 3 years was the Lumina. Then in 2000, GM slapped the great Impala name on a reworked Lumina with awkward styling. Six model years brought virtually no updates.

2009 can't come fast enough. Let's hope GM delivers this time.

So true.

I dig the bench seat. At least one can pretend.

 

[ponchoman49]

The fact that they say the Impalas styling is plain and dull but the new Camry is exciting just goes to show what the drug culture of the 60's has produced in todays society! There is not a single Toyota car, save the Corrolla that I would buy, even at gunpoint! The new Impala is hardly stunning or exciting but it has a nice, normal look to it and at some angles looks upscale. The 07 Camry looks ill proportioned, pig faced, overbloated and plain and dull all at the same time. It's lackluster base 4 banger, lack of bodyside door protection and trim, tiny trunk and an interior with more gaps than a gorge further reinforce that. The idiot that wrote this article also seems to forget that the upper trim LT model that does have bucket seats, satellite radio, moonroof and alloy wheels is only hundreds more on the base MSRP, not thousands like he makes it sound! Also the base LS 2006 Impala I rented did 0-60 in 7.8 seconds, handled really well, got great gas mileage and had plenty of standard features for the price like tachometer, trip computer, power drivers seat with power recliner, Onstar, power everything etc. I would take one of these over any Camry or base Accord any day.

 

[b4z]

I guess I shouldn't tell you guys about the front wheel bearings that went out in my 44K mile '01 Impala LS or the transmission solenoid that died at 50K miles.
Total cost for those 2 items including the 50% cost reduction by Chevy on the transmission was $1086.
Sold the car after owning it 33 months and leased a SRX.
Not gonna buy an Impala ever again.

 

[AutoGrifos]

I must agree with the 2007 Camry styling rants.
I didn't mind the previous Camry's styling, but I just don't get the new one. The way it is all stretched out in the middle and the front and rear are, to me, rather homely. The new Avalon is a pretty nicely styled car, and even the Corolla is very well done, which really leaves me wondering about this new Camry. Are people really liking its styling or is it just the Toyota Kool-Aid kicking in? The worst part about the 2007 Camry, to me, is the its tail lights. Their perimeter contours don't seem to flow naturally between the sections on the rear corners and the sections on the trunk lid. Moreover, why do they have to look so cheap, like the last gen Impala's tail lights. A loaded Camry gets up there in price, but the car still looks like an ordinary rental car on the outside, while many other cars in that range have some sort of crystal-like or even LED style tail lights. The 2007 Camry is just so dull and devoid of any real style to me that I don't think I should be the only one to notice.

P.S. The SE appearance package certainly helps, but I still wouldn't call it a looker, especially since the tires seem too small with the SE's ground effects on the car. Unless that is just the 4-cylinder SE models I'm noticing. Do the V6 equipped SEs have larger rims & tires?

 

[MaxLegroom]

Seems to me that the guys at TTAC write what they do just to see how witty and clever they are. Truth is, they merely come across as catty. If it were a print magazine, I'd say kitty as in kitty litter.

I've driven two '06 Impalas in the course of one evening. One thing of interest is that the 1LT car I drove got 24 mpg despite the fact that I'd left it in 3rd. The other was a LTZ. While the seat materials were different, one must remember that the basic seat itself was still the same. It has the same frame, the same stuffing as well. I actually thought the LT was decent, and the LTZ a bit sharper. However, it isn't a good thing that the Impala goes head to head with Accords and Sonatas for interior room when the Impala is substantially larger outside. It should be larger inside than those cars.

 

[63GrandSport001]

Besides its anonymous styling, the problem with the current W-body Impala is that it's sized too small for its target market. The Impala just doesn't meet the needs of families who have defected to trucks and SUVs. It has very limited towing capacity. It's narrow, and not really a 6-passenger vehicle. The trunk is bigger than most, but not huge. Ask anyone who drives one professionally.

GM would have been much better off to have replaced the B-body with an H/G-body product! That car would have been a worthy successor to the Caprice. Instead, the largest Chevrolet sedan for 3 years was the Lumina. Then in 2000, GM slapped the great Impala name on a reworked Lumina with awkward styling. Six model years brought virtually no updates.

2009 can't come fast enough. Let's hope GM delivers this time.

I wouldnt call the current Impala small, its not as big as the Impala's from the old days but its about the same size exterior wise as the Mercedes S class and is in many ways bigger then the 300.

 

[iluvcamaros]

The difference between the Impala and Camcord is that 20+ years from now Impala's will still be on the road, Camcords will have been sent to the junkyard with whining engines and ruined transmissions long ago. After 100K Camcords fall apart, my Aunt has a mid 90's Accord and it is CRAP. Our Lumina on the other hand is still providing nearly problem free service at 10yrs and 140K miles. What few problems there have been were very cheap to fix.

The Impala is simple, but that simplicity will keep it going problem free a lot longer than many other cars on the road.

 

[Highlander]

This article isn't even worth getting worked about about. This "review" is pathetic at best...starting right with the hamburger analogy, which is nothing more than his (pathetic) way of justifying picking out the bare-bones Impala so he can rip it apart against cars that are $6k more. This wasn't a review...it was a biased rant and nothing more.

 

[cc3399]

It's rather disingenuous to review a base model and complain that it's plain. That's what it's supposed to be. It's mostly for fleets and those who'd rather have a large 6 cylinder car than a loaded small 4 cylinder. Is a base 6 cylinder Camry, which costs several thousand more really that more exciting? Thanks to Lutz's improvements, the Impala has become an attractive car.

 

[theantigeist]

Us GM fans need to stop getting so excited about the "advantage" of a lower transaction price. We decry the grim future of GM, but then celebrate that GM gets $5000 less for their cars than the imports do. Shouldn't GM be making cars that merit full price in the market? Shouldn't they be making cars that make people go "it's worth the price, even if it's a little high", rather than "look at all the stuff I get for so little?"

Look at how cheaply you can absolutely stuff yourself at Taco Bell. Does that make it a satisfying, nutritious meal?

The difference is there is a market niche for $.99 burritos. There isn't really a market niche for "value" bargain basement cars. If there is a perception that a car is junk (whether or not it is true), who would spend $20,000 for said junk when they can get what they think is a good car for a few thousand more?


People are suspicious when spending thousands of dollars. Rather than saying, "Wow, its larger than the competition, and has a standard V6 for thousands less. What a deal!", customers say "It's larger and has a standard V6 for thousands less? What's wrong with it? What's the catch? It must be junk. I'll pass.

Avoid the "meatloaf of cars"- really filling, but mostly filler.

 

[regfootball]

TTAC isn't worth anyone's time.

Even though their review bring up many valid points, the style of journalism is more about shock and pomposity (from folks who have the cred to do it?), seemingly from almost all the articles I read (and most of the time didn't finish because they were amateurish). I mean, to me its a blog site. Not any sort of credible journalistic source. Its fine if we make comments like that on our posts, because we're not trying to pass ourselves off as writers.

If anyone can tell me the industry credentials of all those guys on that site. I know karesh has useful insight and posts here, but he's usually not venomous in his reviews and doesn't really seem to be doing the shock bit.

let me put it to you this way. if i saw csaba csere on that site writing the same words, it has some credibility. but if all i want is shock laced blogging, i'll just stick with message boards because the posting is more intelligent anyways.

Let me sum it up this way. If someone held a gun to my head and forced me to read TTAC, I'd really rather read Ann Job, Dan Neil, or the Leinerts. Do I get my point across that way?

 

[GM-Joe]

I guess it's as bland as it looks.

It is bland, but some chick I was messing with last weekend had her 07 civic parked next to it and to be truthful, the Impala looked just as exciting as the import, though from behind the Impala does not even gather the magnetism of a LaCrosse.

So my interpretation was that the Impala looks very good close up, but still has a stale trunk and light assembly.

 

[cc3399]

I know what you mean. Yes, it'd be great if GM where to go for the finest materials, and all that good stuff, and increase the prices of their cars by thousands.
But not all Americans make as much as you do. If GM where to increase their prices by a couple thousand, I, and many others, would be forced to buy Korean cars. It's not a matter what we want to buy but what we can afford.
For a company as large as GM and with that many brands, it makes sense to have a brand that offers value.
Problem with GM is that even at Cadillac and Buick you see that nasty black plastic all over the radio/HVAC. I'd have no problem with GM using premier materials for their luxury brands.

Us GM fans need to stop getting so excited about the "advantage" of a lower transaction price. We decry the grim future of GM, but then celebrate that GM gets $5000 less for their cars than the imports do. Shouldn't GM be making cars that merit full price in the market? Shouldn't they be making cars that make people go "it's worth the price, even if it's a little high", rather than "look at all the stuff I get for so little?"

Look at how cheaply you can absolutely stuff yourself at Taco Bell. Does that make it a satisfying, nutritious meal?

The difference is there is a market niche for $.99 burritos. There isn't really a market niche for "value" bargain basement cars. If there is a perception that a car is junk (whether or not it is true), who would spend $20,000 for said junk when they can get what they think is a good car for a few thousand more?


People are suspicious when spending thousands of dollars. Rather than saying, "Wow, its larger than the competition, and has a standard V6 for thousands less. What a deal!", customers say "It's larger and has a standard V6 for thousands less? What's wrong with it? What's the catch? It must be junk. I'll pass.

Avoid the "meatloaf of cars"- really filling, but mostly filler.

 

[theantigeist]

I know what you mean. Yes, it'd be great if GM where to go for the finest materials, and all that good stuff, and increase the prices of their cars by thousands.
But not all Americans make as much as you do. If GM where to increase their prices by a couple thousand, I, and many others, would be forced to buy Korean cars. It's not a matter what we want to buy but what we can afford.

Or you could buy a smaller car. It's ironic that in Europe, even luxurious cars are small, while in America, even cheap cars are big. What American company sells a small car with stability control, navigation systems, HID's or climate control? Often, big cars are the only choice if you want features. Where's our Jetta or Mazda3?

 

[Ach]

Please stop with bland vs. exciting...anyone who thinks the Accord, Camry or Sonata is "exciting" in or out is simply not in touch with reality. These are some of the most insipid, dowdy, mundane (and, in the case of the new Camry, downright ugly) cars ever made IMHO. The Impala might not be exciting, but excitement isn't selling in this segment. Perceived quality is.