Fade to black: Acura updates the ZDX before banishing the unloved crossover.
Some makers prefer to let their failures slip away quietly. Acura, however, is giving a big send-off to the unloved ZDX as it prepares to banish the slow-selling crossover off into oblivion.
The ZDX has been one of the poorest performers in the entire lineup of Honda/Acura products – and one of an assortment of niche products that didn’t quite connect with U.S. consumers, also including the Honda-branded Insight and CR-Z models.
The maker is now looking to either find fixes – as with the updated CR-Z unveiled at the Paris Motor Show — or pare back and, as a corporate statement suggests, “sharpen (the) focus on new models and core products.”
The Acura ZDX emerged in 2009 as part of a new wave of crossovers that seemed to be trying to find a balance between sports coupe and sport-ute. Perhaps the only real success in the segment has been the BMX X6. For the first nine months of the year, Acura sold just 642 ZDX crossovers, down from an already anemic 1220 during the same period the year before. By comparison, the luxury maker sold 4692 of its more conventional MDX crossovers in September.
Acura is hoping to bump up sales for the coming model-year – though it may be acting at cross purposes by also announcing that the ZDX will go away after 2013, news that almost always cuts demand for a soon-to-vanish vehicle.
All the more curious is the decision to raise the base price by $5,000, though that’s meant to cover the significant additional content for the 2013 model-year, Acura says. There’ll be a standard-equipment navigation system, a 10-speaker premium audio system, a multi-view backup camera, keyless access and new heated and ventilated seats – as well as forward collision warning and lane departure warning.
From a visual standpoint, the 2013 Acura ZDX will get the sort of modest exterior tweaks that normally come along in mid-lifecycle – which this would have been had the quirky crossover proven more of a success.
That includes a revised front grille with a less aggressive Acura “beak” design, new front grille, power-folding side mirrors and dark accented wheels.
The ZDX will retain its 300-horsepower 3.7-liter V-6 during its final year of production at the Honda plant in Alliston, Ontario.
In an interview this past summer, Honda’s top American executive, John Mendel, admitted the maker has stumbled with a number of recent products, mostly models that were developed primarily for sale in other markets, such as the Insight and the CR-Z — though there had clearly been high hopes for the Acura ZDX in the States. Mendel promised that going forward, Honda would focus more on the needs of American buyers, even on niche products, and pointed to the new 2013 Honda Accord as the test of that new strategy.