Lancia to become Italy-only brand?

Lancia is a once-great brand that commanded as much respect and admiration as its Alfa Romeo, Maserati and Ferrari compatriots (notwithstanding its products’ reputation for rusting prematurely).

It’s a marque that gave us poster cars such as the Fulvia HF, Stratos and Delta Integrale – each of which was a rallying great in its day.

However, the progressive decline of the venerable brand has been sad to witness, and the signs were already grim when it started peddling rebadged Chryslers following the Fiat Group’s takeover of the American carmaking conglomerate.

Now comes even bleaker news, with Fiat Group CEO Sergio Marchionne suggesting to Italian newspaper La Repubblica that the Lancia brand will be rationalised down to just one model, and even that will be sold only in its home market.

The news might not have repercussions for us in Australia, seeing as Lancia was discontinued in our market three decades ago, but the brand still has a following here, and models such as the Beta Coupe, Beta HPE and Beta Monte Carlo were a familiar sight on local roads in the 1980s.

Even today there is an active Australian Lancia Register, which conducts a biennial rally at Castlemaine, Victoria, and publishes a newsletter five or six times a year.

Although Australian sales of new Lancias ceased in 1984, models such as the turbocharged Delta Integrale are still being privately imported by enthusiasts, so there is still an awareness among many of what the brand once represented.

Contrast Lancia’s illustrious past with the present day, in which its line-up includes lacklustre offerings such as the Ypsilon, Delta, Flavia (rebadged Chrysler 200 Convertible), Thema (rebadged Chrysler 300) and Voyager (rebadged Chrysler of the same name).

The Delta is now set to be axed owing to slow sales, which would leave the Ypsilon as the only non-Chrysler-based model in the line-up.

There’s also the fact that Fiat and Chrysler are now merging into a single entity, which will see the latter brand having a renewed crack at the European market – and this would leave no place for Lancia-badged versions of its products.

Hence Marchionne’s comment to La Repubblica that “Lancia will become a brand only for the Italian market”, that too, with just the Ypsilon to offer.

It’s hard to see a business case for a one-model range (not even a high-volume one at that) adding up for Lancia in the long run, so it appears only a matter of time before the brand is laid to rest for good.

It would be a genuinely sad end for a true automotive icon.