Chrysler’s Lynn Townsend in 1973: Even a compact is too small

1973 Dodge Dart

CEO Lynn Townsend hinted at why the Chrysler Corporation arguably neglected its aging line of compacts in the first half of the 1970s.

Townsend told Forbes in 1973, “The subcompacts are just too small. The American people won’t climb into them. They have to give up too much in creature comfort. I think even a compact’s a little small. I would think that probably the most popular car size you’ll see 15 years from now will be like our intermediates today” (Hyde, 2003; p. 212).

Chrysler instead invested heavily in an ambitious lineup of redesigned mid-sized cars in 1971 — which were given meaningful changes only two years later in 1973 and again in 1975.

Meanwhile, in 1974 Chrysler gave its big cars an all-new body after the previous generation had only a five-year production run with a major reskinning two years earlier.

1973 Plymouth Road Runner
For 1973 the mid-sized Plymouth’s two-door coupes received their second of three redesigns after only two years, yet sales were well below that of the aging compact Valiant. Pictured is a Road Runner model (Old Car Advertisements).

Did neglect actually help Chrysler’s compacts?

Throughout this entire period the compact Plymouth Valiant and Dodge Dart soldiered on with a goodly portion of the same sheetmetal that they started off with way back in 1967.

The A-body Chrysler compacts sold well in the first half of the 1970s, but might they have done even better if given more substantial updates and a broader range of models such as a wagon? That was what Chrysler of Australia did.

Also see ‘1970 Plymouth Barracuda should have been like an Australian Valiant Charger’

Maybe . . . but maybe not. The irony of Chrysler keeping the third-generation A-body in production for so long was that it steered clear of the deficiencies of the automaker’s larger cars. Their new bodies had trendy “fuselage” styling but suffered from overly plasticky interiors and hollow-sounding doors.

In a very real sense, the Plymouth Valiant and Dodge Dart represented the good-old days when Chryslers had a more solid feel to them.

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1 Comment

  1. The problem Chrysler had in 1973 was the problem that was killing A.M.C. and I.-H.: Too few cars and trucks to spread costs of development as inflation was becoming a bigger and more undermining factor to stay competitive. The Dart / Valiant / Demon / Duster were still competitive cars compared to the Nova, Maverick and Hornet. Lynn Townsend was only doing what his board and bankers were telling him: Big cars mean bigger profits (Detroit GroupThink ?)! Besides, with the full-size cars set for introduction in the fall of 1973, refreshed intermediates for the fall of 1974 and the Aspen / Volare for the fall of 1975, I am certain that within the boardroom in Highland Park, confidence ruled on Labor Day, 1973. When the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries started raising prices to countries giving aid and support to Israel on October 6th, 1973, I wonder if Chrysler understood the full implications of what it would do to its future.

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