Posted Wednesday, December 11, 2024 at 10:24pm
As a professional car reviewer and a recent Subaru owner, I am always a little surprised at the exuberance everyone else seems to have for the brand. I’m not alone. Many, if not most, of my automotive peers seem to feel this way. Yet, talk to a regular person and the feelings they have for Subaru are strong. Talk to a new Subaru owner and those feelings are even stronger. I call this the “Subaru Effect.”
I was reminded of the Subaru Effect this morning when I saw that Consumer Reports named Subaru as its overall #1 brand, beating out BMW. How did it happen? It’s worth going deeper into both the Consumer Reports methodology and Subaru’s approach to the car market for this morning’s Morning Dump. Similarly, people tend to think of electric cars as simpler and more reliable, but reality and expectation are quite far apart as Consumer Reports found in a recent study.
