Hyundai

Malcolm Bricklin, the man who bought you the sports car bearing his name, promised bigger things from a micro called the Yugo GV.  Imported from the Zastava factory in Yugoslavia, where labor costs were only 60 cents to a dollar an hour, the Yugo’s US price was only $3990.

What sold Hyundai’s here was partly price, but that wasn’t the entire story.  The Excel’s initial $4995 base sticker brought floods of customers into Hyundai showrooms.  yet, it took more than price to convince people to buy.

2 Responses to 1987 Hyundai Excel & Yugo GV Test Drive

1. Kevin Woodard says:

   November 27, 2014 at 8:29 am

   I will never forget the year when Hyundai and Yugo were released in North America. It was 1986. Yugo seemed to have had a far worse reliability record than Hyundai, at least to begin with. Yugo also had little to offer over the years, but then a “cabrio” was added eventually. It was 1991 when Yugo was phased out fully from North America. Hyundai eventually came up with quality problems also, which continued throughout the 1990s and early 2000s. Since then, Hyundai has improved quailty on its products considerably.

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2. djkenny says:

   February 21, 2017 at 11:59 am

   Late 90’s Hyundai was a good car. I had a friend with a $6700 new base model Accent in 1995. Drove through til 2005 with over 200k on it. Very little failed or needed repair. It was a good vehicle.

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