Re: Year-end Leftover 1953 models

Posted by Craig the Clipper Man On 2014/8/1 9:33:54

I sometimes have trouble telling a 1953 Packard from a '54, I must admit. I think in 1951 and 1952 the styling was new and sharp, especially compared to the preceding series. By 1953 it was getting a little long in the tooth. By 1954 Packard was juggling too many balls. Bringing in a new president, buying Studebaker (a catastrophe), and opening the Conner Avenue plant and switching production from the Grand Boulevard plant would have likely stressed a more solid company like Ford, let alone one that had inherited a mountain of debt thanks to Studebaker.

If there were a lot of left-over '53s, it might have benefitted Packard's bottom line, though as 58L8134 states correctly, Packard's dealer network must have been apoplectic.

Packard was still strapped with its straight 8 at a time when almost all major manufacturers offered V-8s, which the buying public couldn't get enough of. And then in 1954 there was the styling issue ...

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