My How You’ve Grown
Automotive history is full of shiny diamonds that originally hit dealer lots looking a lot more like coal before the market forced them to refresh and try harder to draw consumer attention away from superior competition. When Jeep dropped pictures of the latest Compass refresh coming our way for 2022, the classy modern interior trim and large high-res screen on the dash reminded us that this particular rock has spent a long time in the tumbler before anyone started labeling it desirable.
When the soft-roading trucklet debuted at the tail end of the dark ages of the DaimlerChrysler era, we were confident the Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4 weren’t going to lose any sleep atop the sales charts. The interior’s main ingredient seemed to be melted Legos if the cheerful colors were replaced with various hues of sausage casing brown and the radio display lost a resolution race to a Tamagotchi. Something to be proud of, it was not.
