An Acura executive has admitted that the company is considering joining Cadillac and Mercedes-Benz on the wagon bandwagon. According to John Watts, Acura's senior manager of product planning, Honda's premium brand is considering offering a wagon version of its TSX.
"We're closely, closely looking at it," Watts said.
A TSX wagon would follow in the footsteps of the upcoming 2010 Cadillac CTS SportWagon and the 2011 Mercedes-Benz E-Class Wagon. The premium brands are hoping to capitalize on consumers' exodus from SUVs in the search for smaller, more fuel-efficient alternatives like crossovers. Acura hopes to appeal to younger buyers who don't have the same stigmas about wagons as their parents do.
"Boomers and Gen X who had wagons as kids don't want one, but the new kids do," says Watts.
Notoriously cautious Honda may wait to see how well its competitors' entries fare before it enters the premium wagon segment, but introducing the car to the U.S. market would be a relatively simple affair for the Japanese automaker, which already builds the TSX wagon. The European Honda Accord is actually the same vehicle as the Acura TSX here in the states, and in Europe they offer a wagon version called the Honda Accord Touring. Some badge swapping and NHTSA approval are virtually all that need to be done to import that Accord Touring as the TSX wagon.
Source: Car and Driver