How to Get Your Man to Buy This Car: Dodge Avenger Review
Craig Reiss
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Your husband needs a new car. Something with muscle that he’ll have fun with, but that he also can take you out to dinner in. Something sporty, but sophisticated, too. While he’s dreaming about a James Bond roadster, your budgeting allows for something a bit more practical. Enter the Dodge Avenger. You like the price–the top of the line model starts at about $25,000. And it’s got that classic muscle car feel but with modern comforts. So, how do you get him to say yes?
Here are seven easy things to say that will get him from skeptic to advocate.
1. “Just get in and drive and tell me you’re not surprised.” I drove the Avenger with little anticipation that I’d like it, let alone be impressed. In less time than a typical test drive, I was thinking that I could drive this car happily. It was more car in every way than I thought it would be. I wasn’t expecting that.
2. “It looks like a 1970 Dodge Challenger.” The Avenger has a manly look. Period. Classic lines give it a wide stance, and standing still, it looks like it should move. It is plainly more macho than it’s Marvel Comics superhero name would imply, and if you kicked off the muffler, it would sound even more macho.
3. “It’s smaller than muscle cars used to be. It will fit in the garage without you having to get rid of half that stuff you keep in there.” The Avenger is a somewhat streamlined version of the Dodge Charger, but it holds its lines in proportion so it doesn’t scream that it’s the shrunken-head version of its bigger brothers. Once he’s seated inside the car, he’ll forget about all that. The interior is nearly a perfect size: Comfortable without being fat-man wide and roomy. And the seat-heaters are the best I’ve come across, putting more heat against the back than the seat, loosening him up rather giving him swamp butt. Yeah, baby!
The Avenger’s tachometer takes center stage on the instrument panel–a reminder that the driving experience is the point of this car4. “It’s to the right.” That’s the answer you give when he says, “Where’s the speedometer?” This could seal the deal. Any guy who drives a muscle car doesn’t check his speed. He drives by the sound of the engine at peak RPMs. And so Dodge put the tachometer where other cars put the speedometer. You check your speed on the smaller gauge to the right. He’ll think that’s cool once he gets over his male-pattern-blindness and, with your gentle help, locates it.
5. “How fast is it going?” You say that after he guns it from a dead stop and you’ve just counted one-thousand-one to one-thousand-four. The V-6 engine has plenty of power for this size car and the acceleration is smooth, and while it could stand a little more power, it gets up to speed deceptively quickly. He may not be at 60 in that four-second count, but he’ll be closer to it than he thinks. Have him try it again using the manual shift option. I’ll be surprised if he isn’t issuing those guttural “huh” or “hmmm” primate sounds while he’s doing this.
The six speed transmission offers a manual shift mode, too6. “Did you even feel any g-force in that turn?” The Avenger handles far better than I expected. In fact, as I drove it I kept stepping up how hard I took turns and how fast I took curves just to see if I could find its limit. I didn’t. It was the biggest surprise of all.
7. “Look in the trunk.” He’s going to have visions of what he can do with that truly cavernous space. It’s big enough to fit an 8-point buck without having to tie down the trunk lid. One last piece of advice: Whatever he says he could do with all that trunk room, just tell him he’s right and go for the close.
Then, on your first drive in your new Avenger tell him, “No way, dude, you’re in the passenger seat,” and enjoy your new car.
Disclosure: Dodge provided the Avenger for this test drive; opinions expressed are all mine.