according to this weeks Autocar, the UK head of Fiat has stated that the new croma is 'retired' and will only be available in this country as a special order.

Fiat UK only sold 440 in 2005 and another 827 during 2006.

With these figures surely it's only a matter of time before it's quietly dropped altogether what with the expense of conversion to RHD

What a shame. Idiots.
I reckon this is a very fine car.
All they needed to do was fix the silly handbrake, give the steering an extension facility, and cheer up the interior colour scheme.
I'd rather have one of these than the new Bravo, since it ticks more of my 'really useful' boxes. Lots of other people's too I'll bet!
A discretely hansome, quiet, economical and roomy car, gone.
What a shame.
Idiots!

:yeahthat:

outside of a showroom, i have only ever seen one of these, theres more old cromas than the new around west london! and tempras!

Not really a surprise looks a nice car from what I've seen and if you've got a family an alternative to the people carriers but is anyone really going to miss it? Not a safe place to put your money.

I've seen a few.. beautiful cars. I'll be owning one in a couple of years.

Give me £13,000 & a Fiat dealership & i'll drive away in a croma without hesitation

The British motoring press have a lot to answer for with their perpetually trotted-out line of "what FIAT do best is small cars..." Croma never had a chance despite looking like a decent car with good engines; perhaps not outstanding but certainly no worse than its mainstream competitors. If my job involved routinely pounding the motorways I'd choose a Croma over a Passat any day.

Schwenck said:

The British motoring press have a lot to answer for with their perpetually trotted-out line of "what FIAT do best is small cars..." Croma never had a chance despite looking like a decent car with good engines; perhaps not outstanding but certainly no worse than its mainstream competitors. If my job involved routinely pounding the motorways I'd choose a Croma over a Passat any day.

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What we need it to be is "What Fiat do a lot better than other companies are small cars.. What Fiat do better than other companies but nobody knows is large cars!"

fact is if they dont advertise it then how can people make a choice?

Hellcat said:

What we need it to be is "What Fiat do a lot better than other companies are small cars.. What Fiat do better than other companies but nobody knows is large cars!"

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With you there, but there is a huge bias to overcome. I'm sure if FIAT were owned by VW the motoring press would think the sun shines out of their exhaust, even if the cars weren't actually any 'better'...

If you check the reviews for many places - they list the Marea as a highly under-rated car.. I guess most people are sheep and buy ford/vauxhall becoce others do..

Its the name, everyone remembers the old Croma, and no it wasnt a bad car, but not exactly great. So, thats counted against it I think. It was hardly advertised and the looks are an aqquired taste. I mean VW would never call a new car a K70 would they, and Ford woudlnt call something an Edsel either. The Panda was always loved and thats why the new model was so well recieved from the start. Its not a shame, as there are hardly any about and it wasnt even a proper Fiat, its a Vauxhall bodge underneath, good riddance from the dreadful GM/Fiat era!!!

nuovapanda said:

good riddance from the dreadful GM/Fiat era!!!

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After Fiat came out considerably richer

the british motoring press always slaughter any fiat larger than a punto. What they scared of? people finding out that vectras/mondeos etc have a nicely styled very capable alternative at a more attractive price and with more toys? and a lot cheaper. Its always a case of good engines gutsy performance but whatever you do dont try it for yourself just buy a "rep mobile" and follow the rest of the sheep. Very un-derated cars.

Hellcat said:

If you check the reviews for many places - they list the Marea as a highly under-rated car.. I guess most people are sheep and buy ford/vauxhall becoce others do..

Click to expand...

Vauxhall seem to have gone back to 6 years on the perforation warranty too, ( the new Corsa) is the Croma 8 or 12 years? Whichever Fiat is better as is the warranty.

Pity more people don`t look beyond the name because although Fiats rusted like hell in the 70s, so did Vauxhall with its Victors in the 60s.
Trouble is its just Fiat that gets remembered.........
Perhaps more charismatic names would help as in panda and Punto.
`Croma` just reminded me of metal... as in `there`s a rusta on da croma`

Stilo.... now a `stile` is what we call a painful wart like lump on the eyelid here in Yorkshire and yet even that is better than it possibly refering to `style`
Cringe making seemingly......
Well, SWMBO won`t entertain being in cars so named.
Now `Marea` thats another womans name so no chance

Chic sounding Italian names are the way forward I think. ( thats chic sounding in English Fiat

the car was never given a chance really, advertised it wasnt. In fact only place ive seen it on tv is on the silly yell.com sci fi sponsorship adverts on skyone!
I have looked at a croma and it does seem a nice car, comfy to sit in anyway and probably feels fine to drive

also a look on autotrader and you find them available for £9000 or less.

local arnold clark has a new one, 10 miles on it for £12000, £9500 at a branch in england for one with 5000 miles

Its always a pity to see a fiat go out of production, larger fiats never got the press they were deserved, prehaps in time, the company can make a turn-around. But not in peoples tastes i imagine. Its just not done to buy big fiats for fleet sales, this is a preconception that may change; albeit for the best.
C.

Just wonder whether dropping it ties in with the proposed facelift to tie it in with the new corporate front - ala GP and Bravo.

I guess I am the only one here not sorry to see the demise of the new Croma. Like the Stilo, it seemed like a misstep to me.

Obviously their Alfa brand sells larger cars, they can't compete in the budget family saloon market without compromising their smaller ( Brava/Bravo/Stilo and Punto ) car reputation by having a "Fiat is a budget car manufacturer" label slapped onto them.

In the UK, received wisdom on image is all that matters these days, and unless they are willing to go with the Skoda method of accepting the bad image with "yes, but..." type advertising they are in a no win place.

Unless they come up with something startling ( a la Multipla version 1 ) that gets 5 start practically everywhere and is innovative they just aren't going to sell bigger cars in Britain. Why? Because as someone else put it "it isn't a safe place to put your money".

If you aren't peeing your depreciation money down the drain on an image, or something different - a unique selling point - the masses aren't going to come no matter how you build it.

Motoring journalists are just too powerful in the UK. I remember when the Marea reviews came out, it was dismissed purely on the basis of its more compact size than the Vectra and the Mondeo. Now they retrofit reasons ( interior, reliability etc ) that didn't exist at the time. UK motoring journalists are revisionists to a man, just read their initial reviews of the first Mondeos and then the comments they made about the first mondeos being "universally seen as bad cars" when the second edition was launched. I read the follow up reviews and went "eh? Are they talking about some parallel universe?".

The Marea is a great saloon car and is very FIAT.
The new Croma is an OK family car, and isn't very FIAT.

All my opinions I freely acknowledge are subjective.