[alfa] [Alfa] market flops

[Richard Lane <srlane@xxxxxxxxx>]

John Hertzman commented on Peter Webb's commentary that..
>>the Arna and the Alfa 6 as the two largest flops in Alfa history,

I remember when living in the UK at that time that the Alfa-6 went down in
history as the lowest-ever volume selling car in the UK for a single year - 7
cars in total for 12 months. It was a long-running joke and always re-emerged
in the auto-press as a "How not to market a car" story. The Alfetta (sedan)
sold pretty well at the time and the magazines wondered why Alfa thought they
needed a version with longer overhangs. I did, however, once see an Alfa-6 on 
London's North Circular road. What are the chances...?

The Arna I remember being shocked to see all over the place, though not as
frequently as its Datsun Cherry half-brother. Purely anecdotal evidence but
definitely not a flop on the scale of the Alfa-6.

A great car rarely talked about on the Digest was the Alfasud Sprint - usually
known as a "Sprint Veloce" in the UK and not to be confused with the version of
the Alfetta GT in the USA. Just a great looking little coupe that sounded great
too - sadly they rusted away and are very rare on the UK roads now. The Alfasud
hatchback predated the 1st Golf/Rabbit by a few months, if they hadn't rusted
then Alfa could be as big as VW now...(dreaming on..).

-Richard
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