It’s not like you to come home empty handed after you’ve been shopping. But I’m surprised you actually got out of those dealerships without buying something. Does any serious Saturn shopper really care that the SL1 has a new low-fuel indicator for ’97? The extras aren’t as critical as they’d be in a Mercedes or a BMW. Decent price, decent styling, decent handling and decent treatment when you buy it or get it serviced. When you’re shopping in this price category, you want to keep it simple. She: We’re probably missing the big picture, here. You feel like you have more stability with the 15-inch ones, but again, you’d have to step up to the SL2 to get them. And I’m not crazy about those fourteen-inch tires and wheels either.
#97 PROTEGE CAR ALARM SYSTEM UPGRADE#
He: I’d upgrade to the optional in-dash CD player for $495, which Saturn resurrected for this model year.
But you have to upgrade to the more expensive SL2 if you want body-colored bumpers.
#97 PROTEGE CAR ALARM SYSTEM DRIVER#
There’s no driver vanity mirror and some people may not like the black bumpers. I still don’t like the fact that you have to pay extra for remote control mirrors, but you only get the feature for the right-side mirror. The base 1.9-liter four-cylinder engine only makes 100 horsepower, which seems a little sluggish especially when you’re trying to merge on the freeway. Besides, there are still things about the SL1 that I don’t like. She: I happen to like that, and it doesn’t mean that I’m a wimp. Well, I can tell you that guys don’t care about that at all. The next thing you’re going to say is that women like Saturn’s three-year/36,000-mile roadside assistance. And that’s got to count in some households. AAA of Michigan said that the Saturn sedan is one of the most economical vehicles to insure. She: Before you take any more shots at the quality of the trim, may I remind you to look at the bottom line here? Our test car had a base price of $11,595 and once you added options like air conditioning, cruise control, power accessories and anti-lock brakes with traction control, the entire price was $14,975.Īnd there are other intangibles that attract people, including women, to Saturn. If you ran your hand along the flashing of the A pillar on our test vehicle, you’d feel rough edges and the trim pieces didn’t fit perfectly either, which bothered me. But I’m still critical of the quality of trim on the interior of the car. The engine mount and torque struts were revised a bit to reduce noise and vibration, and new non-asbestos organic front-disc brake pads also are supposed to cut down on noise. Not a lot of squeaks and rattles like you’d hear on the older models. On the SL1 we drove, there was a discernible improvement. Granted, Saturn keeps making modest improvements. He: Too bad the products are not as superior as the dealership experience. Ditto with the second Saturn dealership I visited. It was more like going to the library than a typical showroom. And he had a lot of outside reading to give to me, like part of the Kiplinger’s 1997 New Car Buyer’s Guide. He pointed out that the original warranty can extend to the second buyer in many cases. He absorbed the fact that I said I was on a budget and actually suggested that I might want to consider a used Saturn – not just a new one! She: We can joke about dealers all day, but the fact is I felt like this guy was listening to me. He: Sounds like he went to dealer charm school. But he wasn’t aggressive at all, and he asked me if I wanted a cup of coffee before we sat down. I first browsed around the parking lot for a bit, and he greeted me outside the front door. He treated me like a serious buyer and I must admit, it was a rather pleasant surprise. He was wearing a blue knit polo shirt and khaki slacks. In fact, he looked more like a fraternity brother than a car salesman.
He: I bet it got even worse when you went in and the salesman told you to come back with your husband, right? Was he wearing a burgundy sport coat and white shoes? She: I hate to go car-shopping by myself and I must admit I had sweaty palms when I pulled up in front of Saturn of Warren, a suburban Detroit dealership, on a recent afternoon. She not only emerged alive, she was smiling. Posing as an ordinary shopper looking for a sedan with a base price under $12,000, Anita ventured into two Metro Detroit Saturn dealerships. Because the ’97 sedans have few dramatic alterations (a major redesign happened last year), we decided it was the perfect time to check out Saturn’s much-ballyhooed dealership experience, where shoppers don’t have to dicker over the sticker price or feel threatened by aggressive sales people. A huge part of our test-drive of the 1997 Saturn SL1 sedan occurred outside the car.
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