The saddest sight I personally witnessed at Pebble Beach was not a crunched Lamborghini being pulled onto a flatbed. It was the auction for the “Quadrifoglio Collection” of vintage Alfa Romeos. I’d inspected most of these historic cars before they rolled across the stage and, while I’m no expert, they seemed as fine an assemblage of the Italian brand’s best racers and road cars as you’d find anywhere. My assumption was that they’d fetch a good price. This assumption was wrong.
In fact, I was surprised to see that Alfa Romeo even held an event at Pebble Beach. There are so many sad Stellantis brands that it’s easy to get fixated on Maserati or Fiat and forget that the company has a third failing Italian marque. I’m not sure what future Alfa has, but the view from Monterey ain’t great.
That’s ignoring that the brand’s cars are built outside of the United States and thus susceptible to higher tariffs. The EU and the United States have come to an agreement, but the agreement is still going to be extremely negative towards European cars. Audi, in particular, is raising prices by thousands of dollars on everything as it tries to stay afloat.
Could an Alfa EV help? Probably not, especially because America’s garages are so overstuffed with junk that there’s no room for them.
A Brand Has To Stand For Something
Auction houses seem to love a featured collection. When you’re in the room at an event like the RM Sotheby’s Monterey event last week, there can be a sense of FOMO as a series of cars from one brand or one collection start to go for a high price. Your Autopian crew was there on Friday to see the first car that gaveled at RM, which is one of those tiny Ferrari toy car replica things. It sold for about what I paid for my Subaru Forester.
The next auction was the “La Bella Macchina’ sculpture, a giant copper bust of a man driving an unnamed car. If you were curious, “La Bella Macchina” is Italian for “No one said that this is clearly a 1959 pontoon-fendered Ferrari 250 TestaRossa with Enzo Ferrari behind the wheel. No one even said the word Ferrari. Please stop saying the word Ferrari, we don’t want to get sued.” That sculpture went for $66,000, or about what I’ve paid for every car I’ve ever owned combined.
Although it was early, the room felt hot. There was an energy, and many seemed to be expecting something great to happen. Eventually, the payoff would come in the form of a Volkswagen Beetle that sold for over $300,000. My reading of the overall RM auction was that most cars did pretty well, and a few did extremely well. Any fear that the market was soft seems to have been allayed.
The one big exception was the Alfas. There were 11 lots in total, all sold with no reserve, and they ended up hundreds of thousands of dollars short of the pre-auction estimates. The first lot was a 1970 Alfa Romeo 1750 GTAm-spec car ready to return to vintage racing. Even if you grant that some of these estimates can run a little high, it sold for $53,760, compared to an expected range of $80-120k. The next lot went for $550,000, compared to the $700-$900k estimate. Lot 116, another 1750 GTAm, didn’t even hit half of the low end of the predicted $200-$250k estimate. Perhaps sensing what was going on, the lowest-priced lot was pulled from the auction.
At one point, the auctioneers yanked the legendary Peter Brock on stage to talk about the provenance of the 1968 Alfa Romeo T33/2 ‘Daytona’ historic race car. An absolutely beautiful Autodelta creation I’d drooled over earlier that day, it didn’t take much from Brock to convince me of the importance of this car. Mario Andretti drove it at Daytona! What else do you need to know?
A lot, apparently. The T33/2 was predicted to sell for $1.7-$2.0 million. Even with the Brock bump, it only went for $1.16 million. Again, I’m not an expert, and there may be something particularly off about these specific Alfas, but I neither saw nor heard anything to indicate that. So far as I can tell, of the 11 cars, only two met their estimates and only one exceeded them.
That’s not good for a brand. That same night, someone paid more for a fake Porsche single-seat toy race car than they did for a fully-functioning racing Alfa Romeo. Anything Porsche, Ferrari, and even Jaguar seemed to snag a good price. Across town, Alfa Romeo had an event for the North American debut of the Alfa Romeo 33 Stradale. That little Italian supercar looks fantastic, and I’m genuinely interested in it. Is anyone else? I had no idea this event happened. I saw the car nowhere, and I didn’t hear a single person talk about it.
You can have a brand with no history and be successful. There are no vintage Teslas on display at these auctions, or being put on golf course greens, but plenty of them on the street. A brand like Alfa Romeo, which offers no products that are truly exemplary, needs its history. It needs people to care. The vibes seem to be, sadly, that many people do not. The RM Auction is just one data point, but in a place where people gather to spend a week entirely focused on cars, the people who are supposed to care seemed mostly disinterested.
Though there are plans for new products, key products are delayed, and the current lineup is pretty sad. There are two uninteresting crossovers and one super sedan that’s maybe great, but now a little too long in the tooth (and selling at a steep discount). It’s not the brand’s fault, but post-Sergio Stellantis leadership clearly hasn’t given Alfa much attention. What’s the company offering in the meantime? Custom spec’d cars and a factory-backed restoration business. That’s not likely to be enough.
Want further proof that people in America are not moved by the brand? In Europe, Alfa Romeo is up by more than 33%. Over here? Through the first six months of 2025, the brand hasn’t been able to sell even 3,200 cars, with every single model down by more than 25%. It’s been more than a decade, but Alfa still hasn’t gained any real traction here.
My best interaction with an Alfa all week? I was walking back to the car after the Concours and spotted a gentleman with a clean Alfa 164LS. One of my all-time favorite cars. He spotted me checking out his ride, and he engaged that glorious-sounding Busso V6 to drive over and talk to me. He handed me a card with his number and a picture of the car. It’s for sale. Any reasonable offer accepted. How long before someone is saying that on behalf of the entire brand?
The EU Is Trying To Introduce Legislation To Retroactively Diminish Tariffs
Everything about this tariff situation feels extremely off-the-cuff, and in place of carefully crafted trade deals, we’ve got a bunch of memos. The latest memo involves the EU, and negotiators for Europe seem to have brought the import rate for cars down to 15% from 27.5%, which is still terrible for Europe, but less terrible.
According to Reuters, that rate can also be applied retroactively if it can get legislation to reduce tariffs on American industrial and agricultural goods introduced quickly:
EU trade commissioner Maros Sefcovic said it was the European Commission’s “firm intention” to make proposals by the end of this month, meaning the U.S. car tariff reduction would apply from August 1.
A senior Trump administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said European carmakers could see relief from the current U.S. tariffs within “hopefully weeks.”
“As soon as they’re able to introduce that legislation – and I don’t mean pass it and fully implement it, but really introduce it – then we will be in a position to provide that relief. And I will say that both sides are very interested in moving quickly,” they said.
If you’re an American carmaker with products being produced in Mexico and Canada, you’re probably wondering why all of your competitors are getting a better deal than you are.
Audi’s Prices Are Rising By Up To $4,700 Because Of Tariffs: Report
There was a moment where Audi seemed like the brand to be in the United States, but that moment has passed. Sales are down, and now, to keep from losing all its profits, Audi is going to have to raise prices, per Automotive News, who reports:
The electric Q4 E-tron compact crossover will see the smallest price increase, $800 or 1.6 percent, to $51,895, while pricing will rise by $4,700, or 3.7 percent, to $131,295 for the low-volume S8 large sedan, Audi said Aug. 21.
The starting price on Audi’s entry model, the A3 compact sedan, is rising $1,900, or 4.8 percent, to $41,395.
The Q7 large crossover now starts at $63,295, up $1,500, while the closely related Q8 crossover now starts at $76,895, up $1,200. All prices include shipping.
Lower-volume performance models received some of the highest increases. The starting prices of both the RS 6 Avant wagon and RS 7 sedan rose $4,100.
If you work in the cattle industry, the expected increases in costs might be offset by increased wages. Or maybe you own a company that’s a supplier to the cattle industry. Then times are good. For everyone else, my sense is that you’re going to see everything get more expensive and not have the wages to match. Price increases for cars are coming, probably for the 2026 model year cars. Just you wait.
De-Cluttering Garages Could Be The Key To EV Adoption
Autopian contributor and EV expert Sam Abuelsamid’s other gig is doing research for a company called Telemetry, and he’s got a report out showing a bunch of reasons why people aren’t buying electric cars, and stuffed garages seem to be a big reason:
“90% of all houses can add a 240-volt outlet near where cars could be parked,” notes Telemetry Vice President of Market Research Sam Abuelsamid. “Parking behavior, namely whether homeowners use a private garage for parking or storage, will likely become a key factor in EV adoption. Today, garage-use intent is potentially a greater factor for in-house charging ability than the house’s capacity to add 240-volt outlets.”
Citing research from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, an estimated 42% of homeowners park near existing electrical access that can be modified to work with a Level 2 charger. However, this number rises to 68% if homeowners change their parking behavior, most likely by clearing a space in their garage.
Therefore, for many potential EV drivers, the challenge of installing home EV chargers isn’t just technical or cost-related, but behavioral: too many Americans use their garages for storage.
I don’t have a garage, but my garage-use intent is to fill it with old Volvos.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
Florence + The Machine is an all-time great band name, so I have to feature their new track “Everybody Scream” to close out the week. This is immediately going on my Halloween playlist for this year.
The Big Question
You can save one Italian Stellantis brand in North America, which one is it? Fiat, Alfa, or Maserati?
Top Photo: Alfa Romeo
lol, I have open driveway spaces on the side of my garage, I suppose I could install a charger there. the interior is full of classics and even then I need about 5 more spaces.
That being said, Fiat is the more likely of the three to make profitable products for the US. They would likely be imports of small truckish things as the Fiat 500 blobs resizing to try to fit all needs is played out. But there is some compelling stuff in Latin America that would not be the worst to add to the Fiat sales lots.
For all the Alfas you’re buying?
I am not opposed to owning one. none have currently compelled me to want to own one yet. Though a good deal on a 500 Abarth with a stick, and who knows? I would then need a 6th garage space I suppose, though I would likely treat that like I do with the metric motorcycle I have and leave it out on the road to hop on and go get groceries or take the kiddo to get ice cream without having to play vehicle tetris.
My garage is filled with bikes, since if I leave them outside they tend to go walkabout and I don’t see them again. I parked the car in the garage once and that was so tight it wasn’t worth it.
I got 5 garage bays being occupied by 3 cars, 2 trucks , 2 quads, 2 dirtbikes and a snowmobile. Am i using the space well enough for whatever company is doing this study?
My garage contains my two cars, shop vac, bucket of sand and dedicated extinguisher (plus an Element E100), tools, car cleaning supplies and CCTV cameras.
Thazzit.
I think Alfa Romeo needs to share it’s platforms within the brand to stay afloat.
Maybe one of the crossovers could be a Dodge or Chrysler? Give it an aggressive name, after some kind of stinging insect.
The Wasp, or Yellow Jacket. Maybe the Bee? I can’t think of any other stinging insects.
That would definitely sell well.
yep, yep, works well.
End Maserati is my offer.
If you’re lucky enough to have a garage it’s for anything you want.
My garage has some over flow and room for my vehicle.
Go 33.
I’ll save Alfa with… a brilliant crossover marketing strategy with Little Caesars.
You serve people wanting that classic taste of Italy with something authentically Italian — a deep dish pizza, and let’s not forget a cookie dough brownie. Mama mia!
Now before they load up on bread sticks, that’s when you let them know that if they order the stuffed crust next time, they’ll get $500 on the hood of something really Eye-Tally-In: an Alfa Romeo Tonale, with jars of Prego in all the cup holders as a gift.
You need to pronounce it just like your little ol’ grandma would’ve said: “AH-toe-nail!”
Then they roll out of the dealership with a full stomach, an 8-year 16% APR loan on a rebadged Dodge Hornet, and a glove box full of crazy bread. Mark that one as a ‘W’!
Echoing LTD Scott below, I live in a neighborhood almost exclusively consisting of three car garages, and I’d bet only maybe a third have three actual vehicles in them. And these are houses with full basements. My direct neighbor has none in his, they all sit outside.
I’m fortunate enough to have four slots, so I have, yep, four cars in them. Also five motorcycles, it’s nice how little space they take up.
No basements here so that explains some of it. I would love to have a basement. Instead I’m storing car parts in a garden shed.
Where else would they store assorted boxes of things containing unknown items, with a total eBay value under $2000, that they’ve not opened since 2014?
Well, I know for certain he has some sort of workshop in one of the stalls, consisting of benches and whatnot. I’ve seen an indoor golf practice net in one of the others, which I guess I can’t fault him too much for, it’s kind of clever. To each their own, but a driveway full of cars when there’s a three car garage attached to the house is just strange to me.
See, where I am, it’s the garage is being used as a storage unit from when they last moved — 10 plus years ago.
It’s just stacks and stacks and stacks and stacks of boxes and random stuff. Not just one, EVERY garage. EVERY single one.
A compounding issue is maybe the lift motor needs to be replaced, or the springs broke and need replacing, or the roof (or other maintenance) hasn’t been done in 50 plus years and needs replacing.
I think I’m one of TWO entire homes in my entire Boston-area neighborhood that puts CARS in their garage. The other has an R35 GTR that was his legit dream car, and probably plans to be buried in.
My Dad has a car in his garage, but it hasn’t been on the road in 10yrs. Does that count?
Counts as much as the possibly 40 year old spare tire and wheel that was in the garage when I moved in.
My brother in laws family has the answer…mini storage! They’ve made a killing being one of the early companies building and developing climate controlled mini storage.
Audi doesn’t have any competitive products anymore and now they’re raising their already ridiculously optimistic prices? Good luck with that. Audi is a dead brand walking in the US and they’d be better off cutting prices into Acura/Genesis territory because they can’t compete with the top dogs. But hey, that doesn’t make line go up and the investors are foaming at the mouth demanding to hear about how much line went up during the next earnings call, so bombs away, I guess?
I feel kind of bad because I grew up around Audis and they were very influential to me throughout my journey to becoming an enthusiast but they also did this to themselves by sucking the fun out of their portfolio, focusing on anti-designing their cars, and shoving as much heavy, bloated, failure prone tech into their cars as they could fit. It’s a shame, but it was easily avoided and their leadership is ridiculously out of touch.
Unfortunately as a 90s kid I don’t really have a strong emotional attachment to any of the Italian brands listed. I guess if I had to pick one I’d choose Fiat because they’re cheap and cheerful and we need way, way more of that these days.
Audi is interesting to me; they’re almost becoming the Chrysler (as a whole) of luxury cars- they live and die by hit products.
Given that the Audi drivers I encounter near me in Wisconsin: Will shed no tears should they expire. Aholes are worse than BMW idjits and that takes some doing.
Hot Take:
Garages should be used for Whatever the F the owners wants to use it for. A garage door just makes it possible to move in big things. If someone wants to use it as a workshop, man cave, overflow storage, lions, tigers and bears, or hell, even cars that’s completely up to them. And some people can’t afford a house with a garage, and there are even houses now that are being built without them.
I know some of you guys are joking, but others of you just sound very condescending.
Fair enough.
I personally cannot stand the idea to leave my cars outside overnight. Once you’ve had one broken into, even in a nice neighborhood, it kind of stays with you.
Considering cars are typically the second most valuable thing we own, just makes sense to me to keep them safe and cozy.
I envy your ability to park a car in a garage. I’ve lusted for one for over a decade at this point.
Same here. One of my biggest regrets when I bought my condo.
I’ve also gone out to street parked cars in the morning and seen them dinged up by (probably) drunk drivers overnight. [Thank god I don’t live there anymore!]
Oh, agreed. I just think people that like scraping ice off their windshield are bonkers. But hey, it ain’t my windshield.
1st frost is when my brother gets serious about getting that garage cleaned/organized so they can park inside for the MN winter.
I don’t like scraping my windshield, but it seems bonkers to move our bicycles, scooters, kayaks, lawn equipment, work benches, tools (my husband is a contractor– so.many.tools), and other whatnots into the driveway.
Fair!
Amazon has windshield covers for about $10. They also work in the summer to keep the car cooler.
No no, we must always judge others for things like: (1) what we think they should be doing with their garages, (2) what their pickup truck says about their manhood, and (3) why women (referred to by car site commenters almost exclusively as “soccer moms”) are driving large SUVs.
Walking around my neighborhood I’ve noticed that hardly anyone has two cars in their two car garages, and many have zero cars, so this tracks. I have 2 in mine, but mainly because one car has no windows and the other car is required to be garaged by my collector insurance policy. This has forced me to not collect more junk.
I don’t care for anything Fiat, Alfa or Maserati offers so to me if any of them were gone in the US I don’t think I would notice.
https://images-stag.jazelc.com/uploads/theautopian-m2en/Alfa_Romeo_Boned_TMD_TS.jpg
It’s merda on the dancefloor…..
Garages: Our garage is 1 1/2 cars wide, so part is used for storage, part is for parking. But I only park inside during winter time. In nicer weather, the garage becomes more of a staging area for projects. But where to charge isn’t what’s keeping me from going EV. I don’t drive enough miles every year to justify the costs of going EV with a vehicle of comparable size and features.
It’s even BaT – 90’s Spider Voloce’s (sic) are going for nothing. It’s intriguing me.
In Texas, we don’t have basements, so a lot of people use their garages for, yup, storage. I went without a garage for nearly 20 years, so you better believe when I finally bought a house, I keep the garage clear for cars. But my wife and I have had to work hard to keep ourselves from becoming hoarders and make sure to routinely clear out junk so we don’t end up like our neighbors. All around me, nice looking cars sitting out in the driveway while garages filled with STUUUUUUFFFFFFF
That gets fun in hail season.
I have two of my cars and a boat in my garage, but park my EV outside because I’m still paranoid about lithium fires.
It’s easy enough to run a 120 extension cord out and charge it overnight.
The real issue is people who have to street park or use parking garages that are not equipped.
I generally stay away from European cars, despite the good pre-owned deals, because there is a reason for the steep depreciation curves. However, with the Giulia, the depreciation curve is so exceptionally severe, and the car so good-looking, that I have been tempted. I don’t need a working dashboard, I can feel my speed, or use a phone app.
Alfa lost any respect I had for it after the failed launch of its cars like 5 years ago or whatever it was. They haven’t earned a spot here because they put out shitty stuff, and we have enough folks from America, putting out shitty stuff. We don’t need to import extra.
I’d save fiat, but be fine if they all were canceled and so would the rest of the country, despite what some might claim.
Garages are for cars, not all the shit that you never use.
What if the shit you never use is cars?
Your project won’t work unless you do!
Life comes at you fast. PCA cars and coffee at the same time as kids soccer.
fellow PCA guy here with a 4 year old!
COTD. Project cars inside, daily drivers outside.
hahaha, I wish I had a magic number calculator and could predict what % of garage space in the US (or world) is used for
In CA it’s:
Storage.Guest House/Office.Yoga Studio/Cabana.Home GymCars/Motorcycles/Bicycles
converted to a bedroom… that seems like a thing in the older single car garage houses near me.
my garage has a pretty good loft for this type of stuff. I am surprised more garages don’t have some sort of storage above the cars. Type and style of garage of course might dictate this to some extent too though.
I build a small loft (16×8) in my shop because I was running out of floor space. Then I stumbled across some nice industrial storage racks that I now have across the back wall, and they hold a LOT of stuff. So much stuff in fact that I need to find 2 more of the racks and I’ll be able to take the loft down – the 2 racks will take the same amount of room as just the stairs to the loft.
My garage was built for a horse & carriage. Most cars these days are too wide.
Garages also might be for all the shit you do use, which are more numerous and easier to steal than cars.
But it’s less fun if we’re not being judgy, I guess.
Nay – Garages are for my workshop and my motorcycles. Cars are waterproof and do just fine in the driveway. Even EVs.
Garages are for storing automobiles.
more for working on them to me.
A storyline that doesn’t get mentioned (at least I never see it) is that Stellantis genuinely seems incapable of managing ANY luxury brand. It’s not just an Alfa thing. See: Alfa, Maserati, DS, and “Wagoneer”. They can’t position a single one of those well. DS had moments of success, but they’re now flirting with selling 1/3 of their peak about a decade ago
I have a non-running car, a partially-assembled Ducati, and my Brammo in the garage, plus all of the tools, the storm shelter, deep freeze, and 4 kayaks. The EV charger is on the wall next to the garage door with a pass-through to get the cord into the driveway to actually plug into the Fiat.
I would save Fiat and make a play for the low end of the market, and fill the unfilled niches with things like the Panda and Abarth 500 and 500e. Go real, real cheap.
Sounds like it’s time to go Alfa shopping.
Interesting study regarding garage space. I have assumed that wiring the garage is a big prohibition for adopting at home level 2 charging. I put one in my garage and even with Massachusetts state incentives, it wasn’t exactly cheap.
Same I had to get an almost 100 ft of 6/3 ran and that cost a good chunk of change. So much for saving anything on gas hah but luckily I can currently charge at work for free for now. Also my state doesn’t not give incentives neither did my great electric provider that is Nipsco.
$1500 for me in rural mass 4 years ago. I doubt its much cheaper now, my sister just got it done, I’ll have to see what it cost her.
I think in newer homes (built post 2000) most circuit panels are in the garage which would lower cost significantly.
When I ran the wire to my 6-20 charger, I was lucky in that my breaker panel was just on the other side of the wall from my carport. So I just had to drill through the concrete block and run wire about 6 feet on either side.
I was lucky that my garage already had a 100A sub-panel that was pretty close to the door, so it only cost about $400 to get the NEMA 14-50 outlet wired in next to the garage door. Then I cut a pass-through mailbox into the garage wall to run the charging cable through so the charger could stay inside and I could charge the car in the driveway.
LOL like people actually use their garage for cars. Most people lucky enough to have a garage fill it with junk and shit and never park a car in it 🙁
Glad I am not one of those people though I do need to get organizing my garage but I can fit 2 cars in my 2 car garage still and my barn can still fit cars and my tractor. Never understood the pack ratness to the point you cannot use certain parts of your house anymore. I had grandparents like that I am assuming that was due to them growing up during the great depression.
Five years ago if you would have said FCA would be in a worse off position than Nissan, I would have laughed.