I think so, and Plymouth was the low cost Mopar. But a top of the line DeSoto was probably more expensive than the Chrysler Windsor, and I'm sure there are other similar cases.
As I recall, Plymouth was at the bottom, to compete with Chevy and Ford. DeSoto and Dodge came next, to compete with Olds, Pontiac, Mercury, etc. Chrysler was once at the top, until the corporation re-introduced the Imperial in 1949. It was a part of the Chrysler lineup until 1955, when it became a separate make.
When introduced, DeSoto was below Dodge...but a few years later they reversed the order, so DeSoto was second after Chrysler. DeSoto got the new ill fated Airflow cars along with Chrysler, while Dodge and Plymouth were "normal" those years.
I thought it went: Plymouth, Dodge, DeSoto, Chrysler, Imperial. I could very well have Dodge and DeSoto backwards, but I have an old Goodtimes VHS tape from the late 80’s or early 90’s that has old sales films and commercials on it. On this tape is an advertisement for the new, 1956 Dodge and they state the lowest trim level, I can’t remember the actual model name, was “In the Low Priced Field”. What a wonderful term lost to history, “The Low Priced Field”.
Where General Motors had it over Ford and Chrysler then was that each of their makes had their own distinct engine. Chevrolet, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Buick and Cadillac...all unique powerplants.
In the past… then they pulled a fast one and got sued by Oldsmobile owners who didn’t want Chevrolet engines even in lesser models. Ford learned early but didn’t share everything; same with Chrysler Corp.
Mopars had their own engines at times....look at the early Hemis, there was one for Dodge, a bigger one for DeSoto, and the biggest for Chrysler. All different designs with no parts interchange. And lowly Plymouth didn't get one at all. Eventually cost cutting got to all the Big 3 and they shared everything among divisions.
DeSotos were were often bought by the business men or folks who really wanted a Chrysler but didn't want the local folks to think that they were showing off. Your banker could drive a new Desoto and you didn't get your nose in a joint about him spending your money as you might if he drove a Chrysler New Yorker.
Alfred P. Sloan introduced this way of thinking with his "ladder of success" model at GM. But insofar as it worked at all it wasn't a ladder but a cruciform spread. Sloan had the mechanism wrong: it never worked by customers coming back; it always worked by covering as wide a spread of the market as possible. So at GM it never was: Chevrolet — Pontiac — Oldsmobile — Buick — Cadillac It was, however unbeknownst to the powers that be: Cadillac | Pontiac —–— Buick — Oldsmobile | Chevrolet It seems that GM began to see this around the mid-'60s. There was even a glimmer of it with Oldsmobile being the "innovation leader" from just after WWII, getting any new tech a year early. But then they lost it again. By 1975 there was no clarity of task, and all five marques were clamouring to make Buicks, in competition with one another. For a time the Mopar marque structure echoed the GM marque structure very closely: Imperial | Dodge — Chrysler — De Soto | Plymouth If I had to translate both of these into abstract marketing value orientations, it'd be: Success | Passion — Convention — Intellect | Utility As an exercise, let me put together a sort of "dream corporation" out of marques outside the American Big Three (though arguably it'd have been more nightmare than dream; it might have become a behemoth ...): Rolls-Royce | Ferrari — Toyota — Citroën | Checker The functionality of this was covering as wide a market as possible for any given amount of capital investment. The fact that GM themselves never really understood this is evinced by the Corvette being a Chevrolet — or alternatively Chevrolet and Pontiac not swapping places around 1950. Of course the 'Vette was first introduced as something a lot more basic than it subsequently became: more runabout than supercar. Still, that always confused things. Keeping the Corvette basic and developing the Pontiac Banshee concept into something really serious (instead of the C2? Now I'm conflicted!) might have kept Pontiac alive today. At an additional remove, Mopar were even worse than GM at keeping their marques' mandates clear. Mopar were too ready to collapse Plymouth and Dodge into the same thing, differentiated only by badges and sticker prices, through the same presumptuous underestimation of the customer's intelligence, expecting them to be swayed by a name alone, which was for long the US motor industry's greatest single fault. The reasons the cruciform strategy eventually collapsed are complex and probably outside the scope of this platform (e.g. political-economic capability to enable greater capital investment relative to output in a context where the technological requirement for capital investment has become an end in itself; legislation which effectively requires all new cars to be Oldsmobiles, making Oldsmobile itself redundant; etc. etc. etc.) So, short answer: How did De Soto fit in? Mopar didn't know either. But if you want to see confused, look at British Leyland's marque structure c. 1970 ...
Yes, that was in the late 1970s. As I recall, disgruntled customers got a $150.00 credit for buying an Oldsmobile with a Chevrolet engine.
For many years the standard taxi in continental Europe was a W114/W123/W124 Mercedes: not exactly cheap. I think De Sotos of that era had a reputation for durability which justified the investment.
I must say I could never understand what that was all about. From GM's viewpoint, making four substantially identical engines with no common interchangeability made no sense at all. It only happened at all due to GM's organizational inefficiency and inertia. From an enthusiast viewpoint it gives a bit of variety in exploitable detail, and a unique following in each case, which is cool, but I'm left disappointed that GM didn't take it further. Making four substantially different engines might have made perfect sense: if Chevrolet had gone into purpose-made diesels, say, and Pontiac had run with overhead cams; and Olds had done all the rotaries and heterodox layouts and cycles and stuff? I sporadically daydream about what if Cadillac had developed a modular family of engines, during what instead turned out to be called the "malaise era", ranging from a 110 cu.in. V8 to 365-odd cu.in V16, using contemporary Opel combustion-chamber and valve train tech. That would have been real difference: a reason for the V under the Cadillac shield, some idiosyncrasy with truth behind it, and respect for the customer's intelligence. A small, rwd Caddy with a 140 cu.in. 4-cam V8 could have taken on the E30 M3 with conviction; instead they Wurlitzerized an Opel Ascona — Opel engine notwithstanding —, called it a Cimarron, and expected people not to know the difference. Not that the expectation of an in-house engine is really a thing, surely? A lot of respected marques had proprietary engines at one time: Continental, Lycoming, Wisconsin, Meadows, Blackburne, White & Poppe, Ruby, CIME, Anzani (Italian, French, or British), Dorman, JAP, Villiers, etc. Nobody was upset because their 4½-litre low-chassis Invicta had a Meadows engine in it. Many others had engines bought in from larger manufacturers: no Morgan owner complained because their car had a Ford, JAP, Standard-Triumph, Fiat, or Rover engine, or a Railton owner because theirs had a Hudson engine. Sometimes the bought-in engine is the whole point. If you'd bought an AC Cobra you'd be seriously angry to find an AC 2-litre six in place of the Ford V8 you'd paid for. And if you had an Opel Diplomat, the SBC in it is what distinguishes it from a lesser Kapitän or Admiral. Some might have thought the Olds V8 better enough than the SBC to make a difference. I just can't see it. Each might have its detail idiosyncrasies but they're for all intents and purposes identical, except that parts for one won't fit on the other. As my wife says of a lot of stuff: "Same thing, you just spell it differently."
Growing up in the 50s I viewed the DeSoto as being a competitor with the Mercury and the Pontiac, upscale from the most popular bottom tier but not up there with the higher class models.
Observations made on the street, Dodge verses DeSoto. While Dodge in 56 made a Nascar version with a Hipo hemi 4bbl., Desoto offered 2x4 intakes on their hemi. While Dodge tried to make their fins look special in '57, Desoto hit a style home run with chrome / stainless fins featuring three 3 lights per. Cruising the internet I found a style anomaly of the 1941 Desoto. It is an art deco chrome and stainless/ manufacturing, cosmic dream / nightmare.
Look at them in order of base price. With the exception of the first couple years as noted: Plymouth is lowest, then Dodge, then DeSoto, then Chrysler then then Imperial. Same with horsepower ratings if you exclude the high performance Chryslers.
Back when ( 1938 ), there was style and attitude, in the form of elegant adornment ! Great logo as well.
NoNoNoNo, First, thanks for the pics. I couldn't recall where I had viewed one. The words should have been broken to: Art deco chrome chrome stainless, cosmic dream / manufacturing nightmare BTW My pops learned to drive in a 38 DeSoto ( automatic drive ) 41 GMC K-18, Stunning pics
From top to bottom: Imperial Chrysler Desoto Dodge Plymouth Desoto had its best sales year ever in 1957 but was almost immediately squeezed out of existence by its own sister marques. Chrysler went significantly down market with the Windsor for 1958, moving from the "big body" Chrysler chassis it had been built on in 1957 to essentially becoming a Chrysler-engined and -bodied Dodge chassis for '58/'59. At the same time, Dodge had been moving steadily up market since 1954, well into Desoto territory with its own performance model (D500) and increasingly fancy models, trim, and paint. Desoto thew a hail mary from '56 to '60 with the incredible Adventurers, but in the end, they were still competing for the same pool of buyers as the 300s and Custom Royal Lancers. By 1960, Desoto had little to distinguish it from a mid-line Chrysler. It was not a bad car, it was just redundant. The 1961 Desoto was a complete give-up. They didn't even give it a model name, just "Desoto" and then killed off the marque for good after a few weeks of production.
We will, but they might leave in taxi, if they don’t leave in a taxi they can leave in a huff or if that’s too soon they can leave in minute and a huff. Lol
My gramps had a 58 DeSoto with the 361 engine, and remarked for years that it was the fastest car he had ever driven- and friends and family backed that up, in particular my uncle, who buried the speedo a couple times. Dark blue with those huge tailfins, 4-door boat. He gave it to my aunt to drive in her last year of high school (1960), when he bought a new Dodge Phoenix- but numerous small-town stories of her driving skills (or lack of them- she was a terrible driver) and a few near misses convinced him to take it away from her for her survival.
The Jalopy Journal
