.

The Montreal Gazette DRIVING section came out with it’s own home grown journalist Kevin Mio piecing together an evaluation of the new 2011 Cadillac CTS coupe!   This is unusual for the Gazette, usually they pilfer articles from the auto journalists in other Canwest locations and those writing for Media News.  

Nice to see a local boy get a shot, but what does he do… he complains that if he wants a red colored CTS v6 Coupe he has to pay an extra 1,295 plus tax.  

And not one mention of the U.S. price and how Canadians are getting taken to the cleaners for over $13,000 more than their wealthy U.S. Cousins.  And do you know why Americans are considered wealthy and have a better standard of living than Canadians… They don’t get screwed on the price of their vehicles!

2011-01-24 Gazette Cadillac CTS evaluation 

Well of course we couldn’t resist this very bias reporting, so we decided to again take a look at the current U.S. / Canadian Price, making sure that we compared apples to apples and here is what we found:

 Here are the detailed summaries that you can find at  www.cadillac.com and www.cadillac.ca

2011 CTS Coupe Canadian Price Summary    2011 Cadillac CTS U.S. Price Summary

There it is all in a nutshell.  Our recommendation is that if you thinking of buying this car, then you have enough cash to hire yourself a broker to do it for you.  see our friends at either www.NAATA.org  or www.apa.ca .

If you do it yourself make sure you either have the U.S. dealer “Canadianize” the daytime running lights or locate a  Canadian Dealer that will do it for you.  Most of the Canadian guys will tell you they can’t do it, or try and charge you a couple of thousand dollars to do a 5 minute task.  Legislation recently introduced in California has put a stop to this type of gouging.  The government and consumer organizations there don’t put up with it! 

Canada… well what more can I say… we have Don Cherry and GM spokesperson Bobby Orr..

Bobby lives in Boston, maybe he can get us a good deal!

Well the fine print on the latest Ford ad, which begins with ” WISE BUYERS READ THE SMALL PRINT”.  is pretty deceptive and we are told these ads “stink so much, they are there just to get you into the showroom, and then squeeze you for an extra 5 or 10K.”

 After reading and examing the Ford ad today, we thought we would check out the Internet.  In their rush to combat CWB’s entry yesterday pointing out that “Even Ford is Screwing Canadians!” , the build and price feature doesn’t appear to work.

So we phoned up a Canadian dealer and learned that the current deal for a 2011 Manual Escape Xlt I4, is for cash only!, If you want to finance it the rate is 6.99% apr!

But he told us that if you purchase one of the more upscale models, ie…  the price will be 4-5 k higher but you can get 0% financing for up to 72 months.    The same model with Automatic transmission is $6,000 more, but you can get 0 % financing!  You can check the specs and options and pricing out here.

Now how many of us think this is a good deal?  How many Canadians think that if they overpay for a vehicle, but obtain 0% financing they are getting a good deal!  

These car companies really think you Canadians are stupid!

We have included a PDF version of the Ford ad  in order to help you read the small print! We couldn’t make it out ourselves until we loaded it into a PDF file, rotated it and then blew it up to 400%.  Don’t you just luv the Canadian Consumer laws that allow Multi-national companies to get away with this deceptive marketing.  The 2011 Ford explorer ad.

Now,  to top this all off, Page B16 of the Gazette featured an article by Zack Spencer titled ”Ford’s Faded Explorer gets a new life with redesign”… he could have titled it:   Ford’s Faded Explorer Gets a new Life, unfortunately Ford still screwing Canadians on Price!

So the battle for your hard earned taxed dollars goes on!  Please shop smartly!

A friend of ours is considering a new Ford Explorer.  We were originally under the impression that Ford pricing was very reasonable, but never the less we took some time today to check them out. 

Unless we missed something in the details, 2011 Ford Explorer XLT V6 FWD version with no options has a difference of over $7,000 or 15.55%.

So Ford Canada has decided to get on the band wagon and screw hard working Canadians! 

The good news is that they are not taking any chances with warranty coverage and respect an all  North American solution, (this will keep them out of court) according to the APA.ca web site.  We recommend you call first!

Here are the details: 2100-01-16fordex-can.pdf     2011-ford-explorer-us

So we assume the bottom line here is if you want a Ford… do your homework!

A little birdie told me late yesterday that the print version of the Globe and Mail article was different than the Internet version!  They left out the most important part of the article; see the paragraph below:

“The shame of it all is a normal Canadian citizen with a family and a couple kids can’t just go and save five or six thousand dollars on a car. And they are losing that money,” Mr. Lamb said

So I figured that they must have run out of space and some hack editor with a grade three education decided to deep-6 the most important message…..  

 Then after a bit more thought it occurred to me that they too must be worried about their car ad revenues… so the print version misses the boat…

Another example of the power of the internet and the more I think, the more I realize we need a CarsWithoutBorders WikiLeaks?

The  legitimate work of good intentioned reporters continues to be massacred by bonehead editors and publishers.  

This morning the Globe and Mail published an article “Retailers feel heat from parity-happy Canadians” by Rita Trichur and Greg Keenan.  Retailers feel heat! . 

We were interviewed in depth on many issues they neglected to outline, but we are grateful that they were able to get across the biggest issue Canadian Consumers  have today.  **

—- The Government, and Multinational Companies hiding behind non-tariff issues, are preventing hard working Canadian Families from not taking advantage of lower prices.  ——-  They are keeping our standard of living down.  Our Own Government, the one we elected a few years ago, with Mr. Harper’s key slogan “a vote for me is a vote for the little guy!”,  is really screwing the Canadian Consumer!   Even most of the Canadian Consumer Groups with their highly paid Directors,  glossy magazines and websites avoid the real issues. 

 As of 10:00 a.m. this morning and the article has generated over 200 comments of outraged Canadians, on both sides of the issues.  How many GM lobbyists are secretly signing to the Globe and Mail and advocating Canadians spend their money in Canada!

Well as my good friend Roy Green states quiet frequently…..

 

 Standard Podcast: Play Now | Downloads 163

But Canadians need to wake up!  They need to spend time out of their hectic lives and get involved, let your polititians know that you aren’t happy.  The internet is a fantastic tool use it to save time and get your point across! 

And to all those folks working thanklessly for Transport Canada, The Conservative Government or the Big Multi-nationals,  if you  are aware of plans, actions or  incidents against hard working Canadian Consumer… let us know.. .. join our forum…. CarwithoutBorders…. the WikiLeaks of the Canadian Automobile Consumer!…

**(It is not easy to explain and highlight issues that their editor would not let them print)

- the media is afraid to lose revenues from Car Advertising.  So they don’t always tackle the sensitive issues. Wonder how Don Cherry feels about hard working Canadians getting the boots.  We know his friend  Bobby Orr sells overpriced GM cars to Canadians!