Re: 1954 Packard What-If Showroom

Posted by Rusty O\'Toole On 2013/3/29 10:52:01

These are some impressive what ifs. I don't know if such a lineup would have been practicable for a company making as few cars as Packard. Some of the styles would have required a big investment in tooling for only a few hundred, or few thousand sales.

It always bothered me that Packard changed looks so slowly from 1951 to 54. I know on close examination they did change them but the changes were so subtle, at first glance they all look the same.

This was very poor planning. In those years the public responded to new styles, if you did not have a brand new car you at least had to make it look new. This was not frivolous. An all new body, if it caught the public eye, could set new sales records. The second year, no matter how good the car, you would expect sales to drop by 1/3 or more, just because it was not fresh in the showroom. In succeeding years, sales would drop again.

To put this in perspective if the first year sold 100,000 the second year would sell 70,000, the third year 45,000 fourth year 30,000. This is more or less what happened to Packard. It happened to everybody. This is why companies restyled or face lifted their cars every year.

If Packard followed the usual industry practice they would have had a new car in 1951. 1952 would have been the same car with enough trim changes that you could tell one year from the other. 53 would have been a face lift with new grille, new tail lights, new trim. 54 would have been an all new car.

They should not have kept the same grille for 4 years and the same tail lights as long as they did. The 55 should have been the 54 and the 56 should have been the 55. That is, if they could not afford a complete new car for 54.

Then there was the skimpy selection of models. I agree they were not competing successfully with Cadillac, the Patrician being the only model solidly in the Cadillac class, and it only available as a 4 door sedan.

Would it have been possible to put the hardtop body on the senior long wheelbase chassis, with longer rear fenders? This gets back to the question of tooling costs. Packard did a lot with trim dies and interchangeable parts. What about senior rear fenders for the 2 door hardtop body?

The Carribean was solidly in Cadillac territory. But had too much hand work and too expensive to build. Could they have mass produced something in a hardtop and convertible style that looked impressive but not at such a high price?

The other style was the station wagon. The fifties was the hayday of the station wagon but Packard had none after 1950.

I always admired the way they made the Station Sedan, using existing sedan tooling as far as possible, pieced out with wood. The wood structure required expensive hand work but the tooling cost was low. This worked well for a low production, premium price model. I'm sure the Station Sedan made a profit, and added prestige to the line to boot. I don't know why they didn't make a 51 Station Sedan on similar lines.

The high sales of medium price and high price station wagons may have made it practical to tool up an all steel wagon.

Convertibles, hardtops and station wagons were the most expensive body styles in any make's lineup at that time. They should have turned a profit, and added style and prestige in the showrooms and on the street as well.

I'm afraid Packard had a stuffy, old fashioned image at the time. I know they did this deliberately to position themselves apart from other, gaudier cars. But it turned out to be a mistake - in the early fifties the public wanted gaudier cars, hardtops, chrome, tailfins, and 2 tone paint jobs.

If they had made more of an effort in that direction, along with getting a V8 a few years earlier, things might have worked out different.