ONE ‘NEW DAWN’ TOO MANY FOR ALFA
Times change and companies evolve, but where is the magic that made Alfa Romeo?
It’s now been 37 years since I bought my first copy of Viz comic, and I’ve been a loyal reader ever since. It’s the dark humour and tragic inevitability as Eight Ace spends £1.49 on eight cans of cheap ghastly lager despite assorted platitudes.
Equally as tragic-yet-amusing is Alfa Romeo. I have forgotten how many ‘New Dawns’ this marque has had, but from memory it was 1987 with the facelifted 75, 1997 with the 156, circa 2007 with the 159 and Brera, quite recently with the lovely Giulia and once more with an ugly Qashqai type SUV thing called the Tonale. Already, this has been nicknamed the Toenail, and to anyone who really loves cars and especially Alfas, this ghastly apparition is about as desirable as the one from your big toe as it goes flying across the living room when you’re busy with the clippers.
Alfa is indeed a Greek tragedy in automotive form. If you can remember the 1960s, then you will remember how achingly desirable an Alfa was. That 1750 GTV Bertone Coupé was expensive, desirable, looked great, sounded marvellous and was beautifully made. I mean, the two rounded humps for the speedo and rev counter... view them from the outside looking into the windscreen and you knew exactly what they were meant to represent. Only Italians would have done that.
They sort of dropped the ball with the Alfasud because despite being the best car they had ever made, they didn’t make it very well in the all-new southern factory. The Alfasud was the best car Alfa made because in all the years it was in production, nobody ever really beat it. Even in 1983 as the last one was coming down the line, it still had a combination of ride, handling, brakes and verve that not even Ford or GM could beat. The Golf GTI did trump the 1.5Ti, but only just, and the regular 1.3 Sud was just unbeatable.
It sold like hotcakes, and had Alfa been able to get themselves in gear, they would have sold it in VW quantities. But Fiat took over in 1986, and this was the first New Dawn. I mean, with Fiat’s money they just could not go wrong, could they? Sadly, they could. It didn’t matter that in 1979 Alfa outsold BMW in the UK, and it didn’t matter that here was a loyal market where tens of thousands of cars could be sold. Fiat launched the 164 successfully, but that was finishing off an existing Alfa project. From there on it was the now familiar story of a mediocre product done on the cheap. The first was the 155 launched in 1992 to replace the 75. Being based on the Fiat Tipo, a car known for its superb handling, it came as a shock to drive the 155 and realise that it was an absolute pudding. Not bad looking and packing some very good engines, the 155 nevertheless had very average road manners, a cheap interior, limited front legroom requiring some spanner work to reposition the seat runners and a legendary reputation for annoying electrical faults. Of course, the BMW E36 ate it for breakfast without so much as a satisfied burp.
It was improved for 1995, but the moment had passed. Ditto the 33 replacement, the 145. Powered by a regurgitated 33 Boxer unit that struggled to pull the 145’s surprising heft,
I can vividly recall my bitter disappointment when, working at an Alfa dealer, I drove our demonstrator. This was the era of the Peugeot 306 and that ate the 145 for breakfast, lunch and tea. The FWD GTV, Spider and 156 signalled Fiat’s most serious effort yet and these were quite good cars, but it didn’t take long for the fast-selling 156 to get itself a grim reputation for engine and electrical problems. The 159 was in my book an Italian Mondeo, good looking but utterly unremarkable to drive being so heavy.
The late Sergio Marchionne knew that the cars were not good enough and set in motion a product range to equal and beat BMW, Audi and Mercedes. The Giulia was just that, superbly engineered, lovely to drive, free of Fiat bits and achingly pretty. A coupé and convertible would have followed had he lived, but tragically he passed away and so did Alfa Romeo as a viable maker of proper cars. In truth, Alfa’s chances of a revival had nearly gone, frittered away over the previous 20 years as the Germans took over with wide ranges of well-made and attractive cars sold from a plethora of neat dealerships.
The Toenail is a product of Stellantis, the huge conglomerate that owns Fiat, PSA, Vauxhall and Opel. There is no Giuseppe Busso, Vittorio Jano, Rudolf Hruska or any chain smoking wolf whistling Italians in those beige workshop overalls at Alfa, and the Arese Milan factory is long since empty. Interviews with those responsible for the Toenail are entirely predictable – guys in sharp suits and trendy jeans/jacket (no tie) talking empty PR balm and resolutely unaware that the Alfa name may actually be beyond saving. Its glory days are now so long ago that trying to reinvent it is going to be tricky, though I hope I’m wrong.