Канадская газета вроде не врёт; уже с июня я в России и лишь один человек однажды похвалил свой автомобиль "Ода", сделанный на Урале. Остальные - " поливают" и мечтают ухватить немного западного старья. Итак , слово сторонним канадцам: #2 National Post (Canada) February 1, 2003 Little love lost for Russia's forlorn Lada Noisy, leaky, prone to break down -- but at least it's cheap By Matthew Fisher
MOSCOW - Tell Yuri Mareev you want to buy a new Lada and the veteran car salesman bursts out laughing.
"Perhaps you're telling me a joke or wish to amuse your friends in Canada with stories about your experiences with such a car. I mean, when it was first built by Fiat it was Europe's car of the year in 1966," he said as a prospective foreign buyer kicked the tires of several Ladas during a tour of the immense Auto World showroom on the outskirts of Moscow.
Mr. Mareev's reaction is pretty typical among Russians. But it's not a good sign either for Lada or the domestic Russian car industry, which is teetering on collapse.
Ladas -- called Zhiguli 6s or Zhiguli 7s in Russia -- have never been much loved. They were imported into Canada for a brief spell during the 1980s. Although Fiat stopped producing them in Italy decades ago, they are still being built at two plants in Russia.
A brand-new Lada, albeit with 40-year-old technology, can be bought for as little as $4,600.
Despite the low price, there are not enough customers for the boxy, four-cylinder vehicles to keep Russian assembly lines going. At least 50,000 of last year's 715,000 units remain unsold. Most unpopular are the four-speed Zhiguli 6 and five-speed Zhiguli 7.
These days, most Russians prefer foreign vehicles, even though they may be battered and clapped out after years of use on roads in western Europe or Japan.
To try to force Russians to buy Russian, and rescue the domestic car industry, in October the government slapped a duty of 35% on foreign cars more than seven years old.
But Russian car dealers and customers had known the new charges were coming for almost two years. To beat the new tariffs, dealers imported 470,000 used cars last year, up 30% from the previous year.
Foreign automakers also increased their share of the new car market last year from 24% to 29%. Sales of Toyota, Hyundai and Chrysler more than doubled while Opel, Ford and Peugeot also made big gains.
"The situation for Russian car makers is very, very bad because of severe competition from used foreign cars," said Elena Sakhnova, an automotive analyst with United Financial Group.
"There are now so many foreign cars waiting to be sold in Russia that demand for Russian cars will be severely damaged for at least six or eight months more.
"But that is not the end of it," she said. "Parliament is now discussing raising the import duties on cars more than three years old. All this will mean that our used car dealers will go on another big buying spree overseas and more Russian cars will be left unsold."
This was all old news to Mr. Mareev, who sold cars in Moscow long before foreign models became available in the early 1990s.
"A Russian who has tried a foreign car, even a very old one, would never go back willingly to a Zhiguli," Mr. Mareev said.
"First of all, it is a question of comfort. Let us not even begin to speak about matters such as speed and reliability."
Pointing to a new Volga's broken glove compartment, he laughed and said, "What can you expect from a car made in Russia?"
Asked about a robust-looking Russian four-wheel-drive vehicle, the car salesman almost shouted, "Forget it. There is always a draft and when it rains everyone inside gets wet. Plus, you have to register it with the military and if there is a war, they can take it away from you."
As he spoke, he edged toward the front of the showroom, where new Renaults from France, Nissans from Japan and Kias from South Korea were given pride of place.
Not 500 metres away from Auto World, behind a garish yellow "Autosalon" sign, another salesman was at work. A specialist in the bottom end of the car market, he trudged by more than 50 snow-covered, unsold Zhigulis as a pack of German Shepherd dogs kept a snarling watch.
Smiling at the notion a foreigner would come to this remote, frozen place to buy a Lada, "Oleg," as he asked to be called, launched into his routine sales pitch.
"Zhigulis are much cheaper than foreign cars. A guy like you could buy three of them for what one new little foreign car costs. Spare parts are cheaper, too, and easier to find. It costs kopecks to fix one of these cars compared to lots of dollars to fix foreign ones," he said. "It is also well equipped for Russia's terrible roads. I, myself, have a Zhiguli, and I am very satisfied."
As if by some miracle, an elderly Russian man in a track suit suddenly appeared to pick up his new Lada. "You are an eyewitness to the fact that my cars sell well," said Oleg, accelerating his spiel.
"A Russian guy is happy to buy a Zhiguli 7 for less than US$4,000, everything including registration included. For that we are giving them anti-corrosion, an alarm and central locking. He wants for nothing. It's fully loaded."
After ensuring the rear de-icer worked after a fashion, the buyer said, "If life is dear for you, buy a foreign car, if money is dear for you, buy a Russian car."
Russian automakers employ 350,000 people, down sharply from 500,000 in the last years of communism, but much deeper cuts are needed for the industry to survive.
AvtoVAZ, which employs 150,000 people, did US$4.5-billion in sales last year. GAZ, which makes the even older Volga, has 80,000 workers and sales of US$2.3-billion. In comparison, BMW had US$60-billion in sales with 100,000 workers.
"To become competitive, the Russian car industry has to lose about two-thirds of its workers," Ms. Sakhnova said. "The problem is quality. Many people have to have their Zhigulis serviced once a month and some people have to take theirs in every week."
This is because Russian auto technology is stuck in the 1970s and the plants are outdated.
"The industry is trapped in a circle," she said. "It doesn't have cars that consumers want, so there is no demand and therefore no money coming in to re-invest."
The only hope is to stop churning out dinosaurs such as the Lada and the Volga and enter joint ventures with foreign manufacturers keen to get a piece of one of the most lucrative emerging car markets in the world.
Already, BMW and Kia are assembling some models in Kaliningrad, while Ford opened a plant near St. Petersburg last year.
Ford's Russian-built Focus is so popular it has a waiting list of several months. The Detroit-based multinational plans to push annual production to 25,000 cars in 2005, from 4,000 in 2002.
"Every car has its customer," Mr. Mareev said. "The Zhiguli's difficulty is that it does not have as many customers as it once did. It offers nothing but a low price."
Playing the part of a good Russian patriot, Ms. Sakhnova said she owned a Lada and it had given her virtually no problems since she bought it three years ago.
But when pressed, the 26-year-old analyst said she preferred her German-made Audi 4 because "I like to drive fast."
As for the Lada, she lets her younger brother drive it.