Oh, Chrysler. You used to be an industrial giant. You were one of the Big Three. Now you’re a shell of a brand with precisely one minivan and zero cars to your name. The classic cry has been made once more. Won’t somebody come in and save Chrysler?
This time, it’s Frank Rhodes Jr. calling out for help. If you haven’t met him, he’s a concerned citizen, but more specifically, he’s the great-grandson of Walter P. Chrysler himself. In a “Letter To The People” posted to Mopar Insiders, he shares his love of the brand, his personal connection to Chrysler’s founder, and a forthright plea for help.
As Chrysler nears its 100th anniversary, it finds itself in a weird place. On the one hand, it’s a part of the broader Stellantis stable—which is both enormous, and profitable. But as for the Chrysler brand itself? It’s teetering on total irrelevance, and has been for some time. It’s this dire situation that has Rhodes Jr. calling for change.
Somebody Save Chrysler!
Rhodes Jr. has been on this crusade for a long time. The Seattle Times famously covered his letter-writing efforts in support of the company back in 2009 as the fallout of the Global Financial Crisis hit home. He doesn’t work for Chrysler, but he sees it as a matter of pride that the brand continues on. His hope is that it will live for another 100 years. The biggest threat he sees in this regard? What he believes are “poor decisions and mismanagement by its current owners, Stellantis.”
He puts the malaise at Chrysler down to the fact that it’s not getting the proper attention as one of over 15 brands in the Stellantis lineup. He particularly decries the fact that Alfa Romeo, Fiat, and Maserati are getting new product while Chrysler continues to languish with just the Pacifica to get by. He lays some of the blame at the feet of Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares, questioning his $39.5 million salary amidst the struggles facing the brand.
His ultimate wish? Rhodes Jr. wants to see the Chrysler of old rise again.
My vision is to bring Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep®, and Ram back as an American-owned company that focuses not only on profits but also on the people who build these cars. I propose creating a new Chrysler Corporation, with workers as part-owners of the company. This would give them a stake in the success of the company and ensure that their jobs are secure.
This plan would also allow Stellantis to save face by exploring all options while offloading Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep®, and Ram to a company that truly cares about their future. This is not just a business opportunity but a chance to restore pride in an American icon and secure the future for thousands of workers.
The situation is dire, but with the right leadership and a clear vision, I believe we can turn things around. The time for action is now, and I am ready to step up and save the brand that my great-grandfather built. With the support of investors and the commitment of our workers, we can ensure that the Chrysler name lives on for another 100 years.
It’s a bold idea. It’s one that quite a few Mopar fanatics might fall in love with. It’s also incredibly unlikely to ever happen.
Follow The Money
Examine the corporate realties and you’ll see why. It might look like Chrysler is all but dead in the water, but that’s not true of the other brands. Dodge has an exciting stable of EVs that are almost ready to drop. Jeep has the best selling hybrid in the country and is shifting serious units even amidst not one, but two embarrassing quality issues. As for Ram? Well, it’s America, kiddo. People are still buying trucks. Why would Stellantis drop any of those brands?
If you just wanted Stellantis to sell Chrysler, that would be somewhat plausible. The same goes for brands like Alfa Romeo and Maserati that continue to struggle. But it’s impossible to see a world where Jeep, Ram and Dodge would be on sale any time soon.
There’s also the problem as to who would invest. As much as it would be great to see Chrysler become a worker-owned co-operative, the money simply doesn’t stack up. Running an automaker is expensive in the extreme, even moreso for smaller ones that have to go it alone. Perhaps some multi-billionaire with a fetish for the Chrysler Town and Country might pop up, but it seems like a long shot.
As for Rhodes and his attacks on CEO Tavares? Well, it’s valid to be unhappy with what he’s done with Chrysler. However, it’s hard to say investors would be too upset with him right now. He may be paid 518 times more than the average employee, but he’s overseen some good times for the company. Stellantis made record money last year, recording almost $20 billion in net profit for 2023. It’s faced some headwinds since, but overall, the company appears to be getting on with business.
As car enthusiasts, many of us want to see Chrysler return to its former glory. We also want to see the sedan rise again, wagons return to America, and gasoline back below $2 a gallon. Some of these wishes are more likely than others.
It’s easy to see why Stellantis is taking this path. As much as it could invest in a Chrysler redemption, it has a lot of other brands to spend money on, too. Quite a few are surer bets, compared to a legacy American giant with a catalogue that’s rapidly becoming forgotten.
It’s not the first time we’ve examined the plight of Chrysler. When our own Matt Hardigree took a look at the Stellantis brands earlier this year, he ranked Chrysler, DS, and Lancia as the most likely to hit the chopping block. That’s based on cold, hard vibes—and some genuine insight.
Real talk, if there is a plan to revitalize Chrysler, we’ve heard absolutely nothing about it. Short of a wacky concept car, we haven’t seen any hints of new product in the works. The Pacifica is approaching seven years old, and it makes up the entirety of the brand’s lineup. As for sales, the numbers aren’t super hot. Back in 2005, the brand sold over 600,000 vehicles a year alone. That sank to just 133,839 sales in 2023, and the brand hasn’t broken 200,000 since 2016.
Maybe we’ll all be pleasantly surprised. Perhaps the great minds at Stellantis are planning some kind of grand, last-minute Iaccocca-style spectacle that turns everything around. Maybe the brand up will go up for sale and it will rise from the ashes with the blessing of a new owner—and lots of money. But right now, there’s little promising evidence of either. Hang in there, Chrysler.
Image credits: Chrysler
With how many times Chrysler has been almost dead, rescued, sold, rescued again… its honestly probably time for it to die.
Stellantis has torn the heart out of the American side of the company and their best talent is fleeing. It makes me really sad to see, as I was very proud of the work I was doing and our products when I was at FCA (I left in 2018).
After working 20 years at Packard(went bankrupt), my Grandfather got a job at Chrysler. He was so happy, because Chrysler Corp was the innovator(Like Apple/Telsa is today). He retired in 1973, and collected a fat pension for 31 years. The whole time, we got the employee discount. And as good Company Men, we bought their cars(the whole family-over 50 cars). The last one, was a Jeep Patriot(No CVT!). The new ones are no longer Chrysler. They are Socialist Euro-Slugs, with terrible quality. Even we no longer buy them. It is very sad to see what has become of CC. Maybe Elon can scrape up the change from the floor of his Tesla and buy the remaining shards, and bring them back?
Killing off all the wildly popular SRTs was such a Chrysler thing to do. And then replacing them with electric cars that make phony muscle-car noise — what a creative way to tell your customers you think they’re dumb.
It is ultravierous. I don’t know why.
He wants to see Chrysler in Dodge, fall in my eyes. People’s grandkids. Could do a better job running the company?Then carlos Traverse.
He does not understand north america
I’d give Stellantis, oh… say $2 for Chrysler and Lancia. That way they could forget about them entirely, rather than just mostly. Just a thought…
Well they’ve still got the dopest building on the planet, chrome eagles and all.
At least until it becomes the Bitcoin Center or some shit.
Chrysler has been on life support for a while now. It has been the 300 and the Pacifica for years. Before that you also had….the 200….no one missed that.
The fact Dodge basically has no product now is the bigger surprise. Yeah we’ll just stop making half of our line up while we wait for the new model.
No non-Italian car brand stupid enough or unlucky enough to get in bed with Fiat deserves to survive. And if it was forced to – well, tough luck.
Italian brands are vaccinated, they’ll get in bed with Fiat and survive – even if dimmed to the brink of extinction for decades. No other brand is, and none should presume it is.
To be fair, it did work for Lada.
Yeah, twenty years on government subsidies and another ten on life support, building crap for a captive market. The epitome of success.
I think the main thing is they need Imperial style branding for Chrysler. Dodge is basically boned, but imagine if we went back to the late 1950s hierarchy, minus DeSoto and Plymouth:
Chrysler makes boutique to-order vehicles. You don’t get a car a dealer allocated on a lot, you get a car that’s requested from the factory. You check out the demo vehicle in the dealership, get the store number, and then go online to option out your order. To offset the costs you make basic bitch versions of these Chryslers and sell them as Dodges. The shift to electrification makes this much simpler, because you don’t need to pass as many tests and can re-use the same drivetrain over and over again as quickly as you can finalize the design.
It’s desperate and stupid and blurs the line between Chrysler and Dodge pretty heavily, but that’s essentially what Chrysler and GM have done multiple times to save themselves in the past. Remember that the LeBaron was an Aries modification in the 1980s.
Is there a valid reason for Stellantis to have anything besides Dodge (fold the last remaining Chrysler and all RAM products back in) and Jeep at this point?
No I would not do it.
Chrysler and Dodge used to Stand out and be proud.
And then you get these people that come in and just wanna reap and pillage. Every company that they take Uber
But I’m very optimistic if it could be put back on u. S soil.
Things would turn around, it would be a totally different ball game. It will make everybody proud again. The morale is SO low at the plant. I come from brampton, assembly.
And they took The 3 models that we were making and transfer them to Windsor.
And they still cannot get it, right? They should have just left everything. The way that it was And it would’ve picked up a refresh, yes?
But we, as the people need to get it back
On North American soil 4 generations of my family have worked there. I am number 4. I just hope people will be optimistic and it will turn around. I would like to see all the employees divvy up and by the company it would be a long process, but in the end I believe it would be well worth it. I would even take a pay cut until things get back on track. That’s hard as it may. I would.
There’s more than enough people in the corporation to be able to dig deep
Indivia up to the table
Chrysler/Dodge’s lineups are being allowed to die on the vine in preparation for killing off both brands. I predict both will be gone in less that 5 years. The ICE Challenger/Chargers will be done soon. Replaced by an EV that will start at double the current entry Challenger price. Failure imminent on that one.
Durango and Hornet will be rolled over to the Ram label. If the poor selling Hornet isn’t taken behind the woodshed and put of its misery. Durango sales are steady but not growing.
Chrysler has 2 models. 2. Both will be gone soon. The Pacifica sells well, but not compared to Ram trucks and not enough to support an entire brand. The 300 is not long for this world and soon to see the halls of Valhalla.
Ram truck will be all that’s left soon.
Mopar, more like Nopar. Say hi to Oldsmobile for me.
The 300 has already been discontinued.
True, but still listed as an available model on the site. Get’em while the gettin’s good I guess?
The new Charger is not only EV. It has a 400 – 550 hp turbo 6. Liftback. RWD. Basically the last full size sedan on the market. I really don’t see a problem here.
And I don’t think Dodge would introduce the car if they planned on killing the brand.
I was under the impression the ICE Charger/Challenger were being cancelled.
The current gen is, but the new gen has EV and ICE options.
No worries, I think a lot of people are in the same boat. So many articles have been written about the new EV version that the new ICE version is being overlooked. As I said, a 550 hp turbo full size RWD liftback is very appealing in my opinion.
Sorry, but when your brand has been little more than a sarcastic lyric choice for Cake and the Bare Naked Ladies for more than 2 decades, it’s well past time to be thinking about “saving the brand.”
All this Ioccocca talk is making me crave Yocco’s
Let’s go get Yocco’d!
Oh man, I would kill for some Yocco’s.
They’ve had plenty of time to create a brand that doesn’t suck. Don’t cry now! Chrysler does not deserve to survive and the market doesn’t need them either. There are plenty of other American Tupperware-mobiles for low iq shoppers to pick from.
Okay Comrade. Good luck getting that to happen in the US.
I mean, I am 100% for it, but it’ll never happen.
Employee-ownership is, and has been, a thing in some US companies for a while. It’s a form of private holding, rather than being publicly-traded. Does it take some money out of investor-shareholders’ pockets and fold it back to the employees and operation of the company? Sure it does, absolutely! And it tends to ensure that employees are compensated appropriately and that the company is run in such a way as to be profitable and continue to grow — but not so fast that it flames-out due to excessive cost-cutting or raiding every last cent to fill major stockholders’ bank accounts. Instead, without the fast cash-raising opportunities of public stock offerings, the company must pursue a steady-growth, fiscally conservative approach that focuses on long-term growth and profits instead of short-term gains as a priority. It can work with investors, but on a much smaller scale, and needs to work with investors who seek long-term growth over short-term gains. It can work quite well.
I currently work for a manufacturing company that’s been employee-owned since at least the 1950s, maybe earlier. It’s been on a decades-long growth profit growth trend, and in the current climate of companies operating on the edge (but paying huge C-level salaries and shareholder bonuses), it’s been able to make a number of no-brainer acquisitions that are turning struggling companies into profit centers — and ones that are now enjoying stability and better pay. We haven’t had to lay anybody off either. The old companies and employees just keep doing what they do best, now with better financial underpinnings.
Could it be done with a publicly-traded auto manufacturer? That’s hard to say. If it’s formed out of a stock buyout, you have the double problem of funding the stock buyback, servicing that (inevitable) debt, and then working with a much smaller public stock issuance going forward since the employees will be holding a sizable portion. And you need to form a shareholders’ board that’s not so steeped in short-term burn-and-churn MBA-think so as not to sabotage the future success of the company in the name of maximum profits right now. It would be an interesting experiment.
ok so – hear me out – new manager of product at Chrysler:
me
Am I qualified? not really
Am I skilled? not really
Do I have any of the necessary credentials? also no
What will I do with this power? OK Here is my plan:
note that it is a substantially better plan than what the brand currently has
In your defense as far as Chrysler goes, Carlos Tavares is about at this level and your plan IS better
Read this in Grover’s voice, it really works.
I worked at a Chrysler/Dodge/Plymouth dealer in the 90s, it was a glorious time, so many products from Dodge Colts then neons up to Chrysler Concordes, and Dodge Vipers and Ram Trucks just did the Kenworth front ends, and the Dakota was a thing.
To see it now a shell of itself, and then Jeep, which used to be just 3 cars, has the Renegade and Compass, Wrangler, Gladiator, Grand Cherokee, Wagoneer, GRAND Wagoneer, what is even going on? Is everything Jeep now? How the heck did that happen?
Stellantis has the models they don’t sell her to badge as Chryslers but aren’t, guess they don’t see the brand as having value so wondering how long before they just shutter it. Like if they saw it as something worth saving the Hornet couldn’t gone to it as the Imperial or some such, and the Grand Wagoneer could’ve been the Town and Country to compete with the Escalades of the world. I’m wondering if this time next year it’ll be done.
Maybe Frank can meet up with Ransom Olds’ great grandkids and share a toast to what was.
“To see it now a shell of itself, and then Jeep, which used to be just 3 cars, has the Renegade and Compass, Wrangler, Gladiator, Grand Cherokee, Wagoneer, GRAND Wagoneer, what is even going on? Is everything Jeep now? How the heck did that happen?”
The same way Land Rover has several models, including four varieties of Range Rover (Range Rover, Range Rover Sport, Range Rover Velar, Range Rover Evoque) and cars that are available in multiple wheelbases and lengths (Defender, Range Rover); meanwhile Jaguar has been relegated to a non-entity that plans to sell no cars for a year and then go full-out on an EV lineup that will surely fail.
And yet the company is called Jaguar Land Rover…
Maybe Chrysler should discontinue the Pacifica in order to become a kit car manufacturer of reproduction K-cars. Probably wouldn’t be any less profitable than the current lineup, and certainly more interesting.
I bet the Kit K-cars would be a lot more reliable than the Pacifica too…
All I hear is Kit-Kat cars…
My family has been mostly a Mopar family. Amongst all my family, we have owned:
While my 300C won’t be the last Chrysler built, it will be one of the last. I just don’t see Chrysler surviving much longer. With the Pacifica as the only current model, it’s also starting to get long in the tooth in a segment that is pretty well saturated (and maybe shrinking).
If Chrysler were to be spun off, who would buy it? What does the brand offer these days? Nothing really. The Pacifica could easily be rebranded as a Grand Caravan. There isn’t anything in the pipeline that we have seen. The Airflow looked like it could have been a decent crossover, but that was scrapped. They haven’t shown anything remotely production ready, which means that we are at least 24 months out from anything new in the showroom. Where is the BEV Chrysler based on the Charger? Nothing. Crickets. FCA and Stellantis let Chrylser whither and now it is about to die.
When Oldsmobile was killed off, it had 5 vehilces in the lineup. Most of which had just been recently refreshed.
Pontiac: 8 models
Saturn: 5 models
Mercury: 5 models
Unless there is a quick federalizing plan to sell Peugeots, Citroens, or Opels in the US as Chryslers… the brand is dead man walking.
Generally Aspen and 360k on the odo don’t go together, was it a slant 6/no rust combo?
Yeah, it was a slant6, the Super-6 with the 2bbl carb. Southern car all of it’s life (NC, LA, CA, NM). It had occasional issues, but was a pretty robust family car. It retired from full time family duty in 1992, and became an occasional car. I drove it to college from 1995-1999. Back to occasional status with my dad (driving to the golf course a few times a week). Then I had it for a mild restoration/resto mod. But financial situation and unable to pass CA smog finally did it in. 🙁
Do you like cars that suck or is this just typical weird American brand loyalty?
Probably american brand loyalty.
You know how a large percentage of our population now generally likes to shit on anything that involves or came from Elon Musk, no matter how nice a Tesla is compared to a BZ4X?
There are still pockets of the country where driving a Japanese or Korean car will get you shit on just the same, and it used to be much worse. You used to have guys literally wanting to kick your ass, and it wasn’t because a Tacoma was more reliable than a Ranger. It was because you grew up hearing stories about what people in 1930s and 1940’s Japan, Korea, and such were like, and that stuff would stick around for generations.
Growing up in the Rust Belt, people also saw it as a slap in the face to your neighbor who worked at the auto plant. Every Honda sold was one less Chevy/Chrysler/Ford being sold.
Of course now, Toyota and Honda probably build more cars here than “the Big 3”.
Yup, and thus the line gets muddied more and more every year.
I grew up in a hard core Union democrat house, did my time in the steelworkers as well. I’m less anti-foreign and more just highly in favor of buying Union made when it’s possible.
The current daily driver shitbox is a $2000 Kia Soul, but I slapped a Chevy emblem on it to feel better about myself.
Pickups skew that number. North America is the only volume market for big American style pickups. Foreign brands generally have at least one NAFTA plant for volume products and import their low volume models. The US generally is a good place for manufacturing unless you’re specifically looking for low wage employees. AFAIK the largest brand the doesn’t manufacture in NAFTA is Audi.
BMW and Mercedes manufacture nearly as many vehicles in the US as the sell and they export the majority of that production.
“Typical weird American brand loyalty,” I would suggest looking in a mirror, it’s not just an American sensibility. Thing is, there were several times when Chrysler made some pretty decent cars, so some of it may be nostalgia for those who remember. I just want more choice, everything is cookie cutter now. If someone could bring them back and put out interesting vehicles I would absolutely take a look.
The brand will never be the same, but could create a new identity with the public just by being daring. Yeah I know, it’ll never happen, but why not be hopeful?
The only one of those cars that sucked was the 2016 Ram EcoDiesel, which had to be bought back as a lemon. Since this is an article about Chrysler, I only mentioned the Mopar cars that my family has owned. I didn’t list out the Fords that we owned, the two Mercedes, the Range Rover, the Nissan, the Hyundai, or the Kia minivan that my brother’s family has.
As far as I’m concerned, the Chrysler brand was dead in the 1970s, when management refused to sell anything smaller than a tank, amidst a fuel crisis. The M-bodies were just reskinned F-bodies, and the R-bodies were just reskinned intermediates. Every Chrysler after that was just a K-car.
I mean there has been a reason why Chrysler has been on the brink twice now in my lifetime. If there were selling high quality cars that people wanted all the time, that likely would not have happened.
Alternate take:
Look at what Rhodes is saying. Yes, he is fighting for the brand, but that aside, he is claiming to fight for jobs. Chrysler barely has any models under it’s brand, but what it does have is substantial manufacturing capacity across it’s historical brands. Some of those plants are even pretty modern or could easily be modernized. In a world where automakers are adopting the General Mills, Proctor & Gamble, RJ Reynolds business plan of a bazillion brands and sub-brands (i.e. Stellantis), Maybe Chrysler’s real value is as a contract manufacturer, say like Foxcon or Magna?
Sure, they have had misfires with quality and recall issues, but those could be also attributed to poor engineering, not always manufacturing. Chrysler should focus 100% on perfecting their manufacturing processes. Let other people design and market their vanity project cars (ahem, Mr. Fiskar) and build their business around screwing stuff together for other people. There be jobs in doing that.