Real-world pals of The Cap”n & Wife know we dig our Hyundai Santa Fe. Great truck, great price.
And next year, Hyundai is upsizing and upgrading the Santa Fe. Photos of the new Fe are starting to come out, and I like what I see.
But there”s a problem. The new Santa Fe is not going to be crafted by our hard-working friends in Korea. It”s going to be made at Hyundai”s new plant outside of Montgomery, Alabama.
Now, I know it”s possible to make good cars in America, at least if the company making them isn”t an American car company. And I know Alabamians have been making Mercedes minivans for several years [editor"s note: for any of you who may own a Mercedes M-Class and believe yourself to be driving a high-performance German SUV, you"re actually driving a minivan made in Alabama. Deal with it].
But I also know the history of car plants opening in the Deep South. Nissan had a hell of a time getting their Mississippi plant to produce anything other than rolling scrap metal, and I can”t imagine the workforce in “Bama is much ahead of its neighbor.
So I”ll pass on the “07 Santa Fe. Maybe I”ll take a look at an “08 if the quality numbers from the Montgomery plant look good after a couple of years” worth of production. But for now, the only thing I want to buy that”s made in Alabama is a plate of Dreamland ribs.
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