Only about 30,000 produced. Do you think it was lack of a 6 speed for 2 years, FWD, too big, not 'hot' enough looking, too heavy... why?

 

0 advertising. At least around here ... I always see ads for 3rd Gen TLs ... never saw anything for the CLs.

Which also explains why non car people have no idea what we're driving.....

 

good question, not sure but i think there sexy as hell even now.

 

lack of adequate advertising, marketing to the wrong demographic, not enough differentiation between type-s and premium models... who knows

 

fwd platform

 

FWD, almost BMW 3-series price, 2-door market in the luxury car market isn't very big, interior quality isn't all that great compared to other cars in it's class.

 

ZERO advertising. If I hadn't already been driving a 2.2CL and was pretty down with Acura already I wouldn't have known what the hell the 3.2CL was. When it first came out I may have seen--what--two or three on the road at the most. Nearly a decade later you see them crawling all over the place especially in South Florida.

 

I didn't know what they were when I bought mine. I just thought it was a nice lux-coupe for a DD.

When I stumbled upon AZine and did some looking all my questions were answered.

 

No advertising and most families would prefer a 4-door car.

 

i was shopping for MB, BMW, and Jaguar for my 1st car [but very used ones of course!], then i found this random car called an Acura Tl, but had 2 doors...no, no....wait a C, yeah CL! okay no one knows what the hell it is b/c no marketing and the people that did know about it wanted either RWD/AWD, a more luxurious car, etc. there are better cars, but none more rare!! I'm a simple man, but a car lover and the Acura CL is best thing I ever found!! exclusive, quick, rare, potential!, enough luxury, all options needed, etc.

 

acura's one of the worst recognized car model. plus acuras are basically no different from the honda models. take the 2nd gen cl/tl they're based on the accord and each other.... there's no real differance. no variety. the rsx, imo SHOULD be a honda, it is overseas. the tsx is the euro accord....

acura didn't advertise mainly because they thought the coupe market was dead.... thus the discontinued the cl, and prelude

 

how could the coupe market EVER die......

 

Bland styling, FWD, lack of advertising, etc, everybody's said it already.

 

imo the luxo coupe market was reintroduced by the G35.. so as acura was leaving, the market was filling with infiniti's.

plus fairly bland styling compared to other cars..

 

Being from where it was made I know...well at least the common census (word of mouth from Honda workers in Marysville and dealers) was that it didn't sell well enough and Acura wanted to change their look (no more ricers) so they figured 4 door was the way to go. They wanted to be a more practicle car company and thus the 4 door sedan era began.

CL vanish...RSX vanish then tsx (4 door sedan) and continuation of TL and RL...etc.
Which I have to admit it has worked but I think they have taken away from the true sporty feel from Acura but thats just my opinion. TL-S is the only thing we have now and unless they bring the tsx-s or r or whatever who knows..I hope they bring something fun back.

I've heard rumor of tsx coupe...which I think is kind of stupid..because thats pretty much the rsx all over again. So I highly doubt that.
I miss my Integra type R.

 

I agree and also too big and too heavy for a coupe with already built in following. Oh and the word getting out about the lingering transmission issues.

 

its not an rsx all over again... plus i think its the CL coming back. the TL forums has a thread called 2009 tl/cl... so they're bringing it back...

 

I believe the target market was for 40-50 year olds who wanted a taste of their misspent youth in a luxurious wrapper..... They didn't but it but the demographic of who owns them now is probably causing Acura to shake their heads in wonder...... What a great 1st car it makes....

 

only way i knew was i was looking at first gens due to my friend having one and thinking that they were pretty fuckin hot

 

I meant to say for a coupe without a following. I also owned a first generation CL and I think Acura had a chance to make the 2nd Gen CL something special and they blew it. Don't get me wrong I like the car but if I hadn't owned an Acura previously I know that I wouldn't purchased this car new or used.

 

CL is not coming back.. Acura is not that smart these days.

 

You mean not smart enough to make a car that didn't sell all that well?

 

I doubt that it was was the lack of AD's ( agreed that there wasnt much) or if they thought that the Coupe era was diminishing. There were many other 2dr cars out there that were selling just fine. I think it was more or less a confusing line up for the consumers to follow.

I'm thinking that it was conflicting with their 2DR Accord sales because people started to go BMW due to the price range and that most want to buy the bigger "emblem" when in that price bracket. So they discontinued the CL and started to bolster up their 2dr Accord sales. Maybe this is also the reason why the Prelude was cut off, too many models conflicting with the sales demographics so they streamlined their lineups and stuck with their bread and butters.

Even now I dont think it would be wise to bring in a sport 2dr coupe into the Acura lineup, not unless its high end that competes with the big boys, anything less would probably mess around with the Honda sales again... especially now with the V6's Accords being priced fairly high.

I'd love to see one, for sure, but i just cant seem them doing so unless there's a bigger price/performance gap between Acura and Honda.

 

i think they could have pulled off the bland styling, but not having any advertisement was the real CL killer

 

Marketing had a lot to do with it (I think)... They were trying to sell the CL to aging baby boomers and empty nesters... that's not the core demographic here on the CL forum.

The CL is a great car, but it's what I call a "compromise car". Sporty, but not a sportscar, Luxury, but entry level luxury. A great value, but FWD... It's kind of a jack of all trades, master of none... It does everything you need, but really doesn't jump out in any one category...

While I love the styling, I agree that it's bland...

 

It had nothing to do with ricers, and everything to do with sales... When you only sell 16,000 units of a model, that's pretty poor in todays market. Especially when Honda sells over 200K accords a year...

The RSX being discontinued was due more to the "ricer" factor you mention. Since it was a low end vehicle, and very similar to the Civic Si, Acura decided to cut it so that they could "upscale" the Acura brand as a whole... Higher MSRP as a brand keeps out the undesirables...

 

Acura estimated that they would sell only 2700 6spds, but they sold 3511... That's 30 percent more than they estimated... Clearly that was a significant error on their part when they were calculating which demographic was going to buy the CL.

Who would know what would have happened if Acura would have offered the 6spd from the introduction of the CL in 2001?? The 260hp CL and TL were cutting edge cars in 2001, but offerings from other auto makers soon caught up (G35, etc).

There are plenty of coupe sales success stories. The G35c sold well, and Ford sold close to 200K mustangs in 2005. Both of these cars were marketed well...

The automatic transmission problems and lack of accurate marketing targeting were probably two of the biggest factors in the CL not sustaining sales to allow it to continue in the lineup... The Accord coupe and CL were too similar to support both, espeically with the lackluster sales of the CL...

 

I don't think you get get a 260 hp TL in 01.

 

2002 model year sold in 2001.. while the 2001 CL sold in 2000..

 

Nice catch, he said "in 01" not "2001 TL and CL."

I'm never going to get my dream job as a proof reader

 

The "bland" or what I like to call timeless styling was what appealed to me the most. It's when you have cars that have drastic styling is when you run into the issue of your car looking old as hell in a couple of years especially when that manufacturer decides to completely change the look of a model within two years. The Ford Mustang and the 5 Series BMW, just to name a few, are nautorious for drastic style changes from model year to model year.

And you really have to see how everyone else has followed in the direction of the styling ques of Acura's tailight design, which they've used since the mid 90's. Nissan, Toyota, and now Mercedes Benz has been coping Acura's styling ques all the way up to 2008.

If a person isn't a real Acura enthusiast they can't really tell the difference between the first 2.2CL and the last 3.0CL and of course you definately couldn't tell the difference between an Auto 3.2 CL-S and a 6spd 3.2CL-s. I'm driving a 5-year-old car and I still get compliments on my CL-S as if it were brand new.

 

03's were out in early 2002... so the early 03's are now 6 years old... I got my 03 "late" on Oct 4th 2002, and it's #8866 about half way thru the prodution run of 16000...

FYI: There was no 2000 MY CL... only 1999 and then the 2001's....

 

That's what got me to buy it too...

 

That pretty much sums it up, IMHO. I loved my CL-S dearly, but by 2002 5AT's were dropping like flies, the LA Times article brought this out into public knowledge, the 7G Accord V6 coupe made the CL-P completely irrelevant and marginalized the CL-S. Sales dipped; add in the economic and uncertainty factors of the time and it was just not worth taking the assembly line time away from the other models in Marysville.

The 6MT was the CL's swan song.

 

The coupe just didn't sell. Coupe sales didn't really pickup till the G35/Z came out. I mean I see TONS of 02-03 TL's all over the road. It's the same car with 2 more doors. Add the fact it was a US only car with no name recognition.
Acura decided to kill it.

The fact that they kept the accord coupe points to this. Even that doesn't sell well, but it does have the accord name attached to it.

 

yeah, when I saw my first 03 CL i was like damn that is one sexy acura, but had no idea what it was... Now I drive one, and man does the CL get some stares.

 

well RL's got advertising and they didnt do that well either...but they still keep making them :S i think they should have brought back the CL

 

I can agree with the lack of advertising and all that, I also thingk that if people wanted a luxury Acura theyd go for a TL, and if they wanted a cool coupe they had the Integra/RSX. . . and I always have favored the styling of the 1st gen over the 2nd gen. . . but I might be biased :p

 

All the things that made the CL a poor choice when new... bland styling, large size, FWD, big butt, true 2+2 seating, poor resale made it great to buy as a used car.

I always figured if you're going to give up two extra doors you better get some hot styling, potent motor, awesome handling, etc. The CL couldn't necessarily deliver in those areas so people just ignored it. I sold about 15 CLs including a few 6 speeds but I agree that the buyers were white guys in their 50s mostly.

 

Marketed to the 50+ crowd .. no fog lights .. no sub-woofer .. no manual at first (3 and last model year before a manual).