JSROOKS

I feel it is kind of sad that Nissan always pushes the Maxima to the back of the line when it comes to promoting it. While I get generally the Maxima stands on it's own by name and history, but come on. Everything else is getting pushed, but I guess it's about moving smaller and cheaper units. Sorry for the rant just had to get that off my chest.

maxud

I think a lot of people on this board bought Maxima because its not an Altima.
Maxima is lower volume car and few people will agree that its better off that way.

MadMax07SL

Dude, on average more then 5000 are sold every single month. That's pretty good for a flagship car.

http://www.goodcarbadcar.net/2011/01...s-figures.html

Look at a Kia Cadenza, they average like 3-400 a month...Kia should be pushing the **** out of that car but they don't.

lightonthehill

This goes back to 2001, when Nissan's Ghosn announced that the Maxima was being taken upscale and would be the flagship vehicle for Nissan. The plan was to include lots of bells and whistles on even the base Maxima, so that there would not be such a wide diversity of Maximas coming down the assembly line, simplifying assembly and marketing, and reducing the space needed in ever more crowded dealer parking lots.

At that time, Nissan said they intended to sell around 70K Maximas each year, which is not a great number when compared with the hundreds of thousands per year of cars such as the Altima. I do see the Maxima included (but not often featured) in Nissan corporate ads, but seldom in dealer advertising, because dealers are trying to draw in customers with lightly equipped 'loss leader' vehicles (such as the base Altima at $16,800) at very low prices.

Nissan understands that many Maximas are sold because drivers of other vehicles see them on the road and in parking lots and like them. Many Maximas are also sold to folks who have driven Maximas, like them, and eagerly await each new generation. Nissan also knows that the Maxima does not look or sound as good on TV or in newspaper ads as it does in person. Dealers simply do what they thinks will draw potential buyers to their lots, and know that, even though they came to see less expensive vehicles, some will see the Maxima and become interested.

Because of all those reasons (and more), I would not expect to see many Maxima ads.

JSROOKS

I agree it is a double edge sword because it's great not having a car that is over populated on the streets, but I just want to make sure they never cancel the Maxima name which I am sure they won't. I just think it's funny on all the mid cycle refreshes how much they changed the altima and sentra to resemble to Maxima's accents.

boatguy272

Cmon,,,, the Altima even got factory remote start before the Max.

I agree with JS ,,,, can be mistaken for each other at a quick glance now

JSROOKS

Exactly and to my knowledge when I had my 07 Altima that was the first car to have push button start for any Nissan brand car. So while they may "say" Maxima is their flagship I am pretty sure Altima is because its distributed to the masses.

maxud

There are many different ways to look at it. You can say that they use Altima to beta-test the technology before they put it in a serious car like Maxima lol.
There have been many threads on the car development, and that it takes time to put all of the components together. So that by the time the car is released, its using 2-3 year old technology.
With the age of high tech in cars, seemingly every day you see a new feature being introduced. My 2009 which had a lot of technology for 2009, seems hopelessly obsolete now.
Of course the ball is Nissan's court to select and fast track technology into new/refresh car releases. As much as I would like to think that Nissan cares what we think, the reality is that they don't give a sh*t. You either like the car or you don't, everything else (like remote start or start button) is a cherry on the top.

JSROOKS

That is quite apparent with the average Infotainment center they threw in this thing.

robtroxel

I see what you are saying but selfishly, I like having a car that you don't see eveyday. While there is a similiar look to the Nissan products I feel the Mirano is a close cousin in looks to the Maxima. I do still grit my jaws that the Maxima does not have a power height adjustment on the Pax seat and for some of us, getting in and out of the car is sometimes not too easy. All that said, the Maxima clearly outclassed the Acura TLX we were considering. You can't even get a heated steering wheel on that model! All in all we are pleased with the car after 15 months of ownership.

lightonthehill

I notice that a few here have caught on to Nissan's testing of some new features on the Altima, and after all the bugs are out, then they use these new things in the Maxima. An excellent example was the new CVT Nissan tested in the Altima in preparation for putting it in the 8th gen Maxima with the 2015 model. It had serious problems. So serious that Nissan actually cancelled the 2015 Maxima, and released the 8th gen as the 2016 after finding fixes for the problematic CVT that gave the Altima a bad name for a few years.

In other cases, things got into the Altima first because they were developed just before the release of a new generation of the Altima, so didn't get into the Maxima until a new generation Maxima was released.

Someone mentioned the 'relationship' between the Maxima and the Murano. That relationship is so close that much of the content of the Owners Manual serves both vehicles.

Although many folks have looked into their crystal ***** over the years and pronounced the Maxima's death, the reality is that, if the Maxima is dropped, it will not be because of shortcomings of the Maxima, but because of the very strong public movement away from sedans and toward SUVs.

I have never had any problem confusing the Altima with the Maxima, probably because I have owned nothing but Maximas for over thirty years, and have spent way too much time drooling over my Maximas.

I was first disappointed when MONTE told me that Nissan was lengthening the period between new generations of many of its vehicles, but I like this 8th gen design so much that I don't mind waiting until 2022 or 2023 for the 9th gen. This 8th gen will be like several recent Maxima generations, in that it will grow more popular as time passes.

FanaticMadMax

I don't think it's poor marketing, it much as where certain model is selling well will get the most advertising. You have to keep in mind that the Maxima is priced at starting of over 32k for it, and a lot of cars out there are priced around 22-high 29k for it. Also the market has change drastically that a lot of buyers are not going for sporty sedan or cars, there are getting into crossover. As you have noticed almost every manufacture are producing a new model that are crossover..