Chrysler Town & Country
The flagship of Chrysler's minivan lineup, the Town & Country LXi features leather captain's chairs and seating for seven. Other standard features include air conditioning, cruise control, and a convenient driver's-side sliding rear door.
There are currently 26 van & minivan model lines for sale on the U.S. market-- all pictured and described in CarPoint.
Vans and minivans together comprise about 11 percent of all new vehicles sold in the U.S., with minivans outselling full-size vans three to one.
Although technically classified as a light trucks, today's minivans are commonly regarded as cars by their owners and come fully loaded with most of the passenger car's creature comforts and safety features. Not surprisingly, these versatile people movers have done a good job of winning a place in the hearts and driveways of the nation, chipping away at passenger car sales, primarily.
birth of the minivan
Chrysler introduced the minivan concept with the launch of the Caravan back in 1984. Now, 12 years later, the latest Caravan has come a long way with dual airbags, dual sliding doors and many luxury options. Chrysler produces more than 40 percent of all the minivans available in America under the names Dodge Caravan, Chrysler Town & Country, and Plymouth Voyager.
It's not very often that the launch of a new car or truck leads to the birth of an entirely new vehicle category, but in 1984 Chrysler's introduction of the Dodge Caravan did exactly that. Introduced with a seven-passenger seating configuration, 4-cylinder engine and a sliding side door--Chrysler's front-wheel-drive "minivan" ushered in a whole new era of serious Little League hauling.
For years Chrysler owned the minivan market outright with its Dodge Caravan, Plymouth Voyager and Chrysler Town & Country lines. Today it remains the sales leader in a market that has grown from 100,000 units a year to over one million units.
Built on the Accord car platform and featuring four hinged doors (rather than sliding doors), Honda's Odyssey merges the scale and comfort of a car with the utility of a minivan.
Chrysler met competition first from other American automakers who launched minivan lines built on modified versions of existing truck and van platforms. Soon Japanese automakers entered the fray and competition heated up with vehicles becoming more and more car-like.
Today some minivans are actually built on modified versions of car platforms, such as Ford's popular Windstar--built on the Taurus platform, and Honda's recently introduced Odyssey--built on the Accord platform. Meanwhile, the lines continue to blur as minivans incorporate more and more passenger car safety features including dual airbags, 4-wheel anti-lock brakes (ABS) and side-impact protection.
This year the hot new feature is the addition of an extra driver's-side passenger door (Honda Odyssey, Chrysler minivans, Isuzu Oasis). Last year automakers trumpeted quick and easy removal of passenger seats for faster changeover from passenger to cargo configurations.
The Subaru Legacy Outback is a new breed of station wagon, combining the ride of a car with the ground clearance and 4X4 capacity of a sport-utility vehicle.
As popular as the minivan is, it has not been immune to competition from the hard-charging sport-utility vehicle segment. Sport utilities have succeeded in wooing families and active adventurers alike with a higher seating position, comparable creature comforts and a go-anywhere image.
Minivans also face steady competition from the station wagon segment. Before minivans and sport utilities arrived on the scene, consumers turned to the station wagon for its added interior room and passenger car comfort. Today, consumers have a healthy range of wagons to choose from--from traditional large domestic models (such as the Ford Taurus and Chevrolet Caprice Classic), to innovative four-wheel-drive models (Subaru Outback) and turbocharged hot rods (Volvo 850).
GMC redesigned its full-size van for 1996 with the introduction of the new Savana. The Savana can carry up to 15 passengers or over 300 cubic feet of cargo.
Despite their low profile in the U.S. marketplace--only 400,000 units sold last year--full-size vans remain unsurpassed in delivering enclosed cargo- and people-moving capacity. It's a segment with only four players--Chevrolet, GMC, Ford and Dodge. These domestic manufacturers produce commercial-grade cargo vans (with seating for one) at one end of the spectrum, and huge, extended-wheelbase passenger vans at the other end of the spectrum with seating for up to 15. Use CarPoint's Find mechanism to locate all ten model lines.
. . . News on the full-size van front: several new entries from General Motors in the GMC Savana and the Chevrolet Express. These will be available both as cargo and passenger vans and will be sold alongside the models they replace until the end of the model year. Both the Savana and Express feature the new line of Vortec engines from GM.
. . . Isuzu has entered the minivan market with the Isuzu Oasis. With seating for up to seven passengers, the Oasis has four car-like doors for easy entry and exit.
