Some days you get the bear

Some days you get the bear, some days the bear gets you. To the smart Mississauga annual meet at Hilton Falls - the usual affable affair of some fifty smart car owners run by our favourite salesmen Justin and Ed. Turns out it was something of a wake for the diesel smart. Some agile punters had snapped up a diesel version before they were all gone.

For now we are on hiatus until early '08 when it is the new gas engined car or nothing. The US market is calling the shots from now on. They are getting the new model ahead of Canada and dictating the marketing approach. Existing Canadian customers were lamenting the end of the diesel era but it seems the smart pioneers no longer count for much.

Marketing folk are always making incomprehensible decisions. Ford have just dropped the Focus wagon, for example. Why do they mess with a winning formula? Why do they give their existing customers a reason to switch? RLT