Buick, Jaguar Top Dependability List

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MELISSA BLOCK, host:

In this economy, when it comes to cars, you may be just hanging on to the one you already have, or buying a used one instead of a new one and hoping it's reliable. Well, today, J.D. Power and Associates released its latest ranking of vehicle dependability, and the results, a tie: Buick and Jaguar topped the list. Lexus was bumped from the top spot where it's been for years. That's based on 2006 cars.

Washington Post's automotive columnist Warren Brown joins me now. Warren, this seemed a little surprising. Buick and Jaguar aren't widely known for their dependability or their low frequency of repair.

Mr. WARREN BROWN (Automotive Columnist, The Washington Post): It's not surprising to me and it's not surprising to the owners of those vehicles. I've been saying for the past seven or eight years that, you know, the Detroit that people love to complain about, it hasn't existed for almost a decade. They've been the victims of perception, not reality. The reality is that their products are competitive, they're innovative, they're very creative.

BLOCK: Well, let me just point out that Lexus, Toyota and Mercury rounded out the top five on that J.D. Powers survey. How did they actually figure this out?

Mr. BROWN: Well, this is a dependability survey, which is done a little bit differently from their initial quality survey, and that's the one that a lot of people pay, you know, attention to. The dependability survey looks at, you know, complaints that people have, primarily in terms of vehicle operation. Think of it as the survey that says, you know, my vehicle starts and does what I want it do every time I want it to do it.

BLOCK: So the survey looks at what happens when the rubber literally hits the road.

Mr. BROWN: Exactly.

BLOCK: Now, I just want to ask you about another survey, Consumer Reports happens to be also out with its auto issue right now. And we took a look at their reliability ratings, and they apparently didn't have enough 2006 Jaguars in their survey to report on that model year, but Buicks, according to their survey, looked to be pretty average. And there's one in particular, the Terraza, that apparently, according to their respondents, was a real lemon. What do you make about the - what do you make of the difference there?

Mr. BROWN: What I think about that is the J.D. Power survey surveys everybody, you know, who buys whatever it is they are buying, whether or not they are reading Consumer Reports or not. The Consumer Report survey tends to survey consumer reports of readers.

BLOCK: So it's a more particular…

Mr. BROWN: It's a specific demographic and it's a demographic and psychographic that they are the people who initially discovered that gee whiz, you know, this Toyota doesn't break down, this Honda goes forever, which certainly in the '70s and '80s, you know, American cars, you know, weren't doing.

BLOCK: You're saying they were the first to really point out that Hondas and Toyotas had very low frequency in repair.

Mr. BROWN: Yeah, precisely. Yeah. And so, as a result, that's what they buy, you know, for the most part and that's kind of the mindset. I'm not saying -because Consumer Reports does do a lot of brilliant scientific testing of their vehicles, but my argument has always been that they weren't really paying close enough attention, you know, to, you know, to what the Americans weren't doing.

BLOCK: Warren, you're saying that for those who really closely follow the auto industry, that it's not a big surprise that Buick topped this J.D. Power survey. It's curious because when the auto executives were here in Washington negotiating this federal bailout with Congress, those weren't the stories that we necessarily heard.

Mr. BROWN: Of course not.

BLOCK: Is it that the auto industry doesn't do a good job of telling its own story - that vehicles are much improved?

Mr. BROWN: It will come as a surprise to no one in Detroit when Warren Brown says that you guys do a lousy job of telling your own story. I've been telling them that for a long time.

BLOCK: Warren Brown, thanks so much for coming in.

Mr. BROWN: My pleasure.

BLOCK: Warren Brown is an automotive columnist for The Washington Post.

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