Americans Miss Pontiac More Than Any Other Defunct Car Brand

Like all industries, the automotive world has seen tons of change over the last several decades, and an unfortunate side effect of the evolutionary process has been the closure of several once-popular car brands. Here in the U.S., car nerds mourn the loss of brands like Saab, but it might be surprising to learn the brands that enthusiasts in other countries pine over.

Saab. It’s Saab. People in Japan, the U.K., India, France, and Korea all said Saab, according to a recent study by Hippo Leasing. People in the U.S. miss Pontiac the most, perhaps due to the frequency of Smokey and the Bandit reruns, but the American brand is also missed in Italy, Canada, and Brazil. Germans really miss Trabant.

Americans didn’t forget about Saab, ranking it second, followed by Oldsmobile in third. Our friends in the U.K. rated Pontiac second and Holden third. Interestingly, people in Japan also miss Pontiac, and Edsel earned the number three spot – even though it's a brand that has been defunct since the late 1950s. Hippo Leasing also polled Reddit users on their most-missed car brands, where Pontiac also took the top spot. Saab and AMC came in second and third, respectively.

It's unlikely that brands like Pontiac will make a comeback, but automakers often find ways to revive historic nameplates, especially as they transition to electrification. It’s also quite likely that one or more of the younger automotive startups will go out of business or be absorbed into a legacy automaker, so we could be complaining about the loss of a company like Lucid or Rivian in the future.

[Image: Aimur Kytt]

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from TheTruthAboutCars https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/cars/news-blog/americans-miss-pontiac-more-than-any-other-defunct-car-brand-44503318?utm_medium=auto&utm_source=rss&utm_campaign=all_full