Current Santa Fe Owners Love the New Square Look
During an episode of The AutoGuide Show brought to you by eBay Motors, we got to sit down and talk to Mike Evanoff, Product Planning, Hyundai Motor North America. The center of our discussion is the new 2024 Hyundai Santa Fe.
Completely redesigned, the new model looks absolutely nothing like the vehicle it replaces. The new Santa Fe has a much boxier shape, a design the brand utilized to increase passenger and cargo space.
What Do Owner’s Think?
When changing something as popular as the current Santa Fe, a question needs to be asked whether current and/or prospective owners would accept the new look. That’s exactly what we did in our sit down with Evanoff.
“Obviously we did a lot of research as we do with all our vehicles," he stated, “in our research for this generation of Santa Fe, we invited intenders for the segment, owners not only of the current Santa Fe, but owners of other SUVs in the competitive set field.”
When it came to whether SUV shoppers would accept the new look or not, the results were positive. “The (new) Santa Fe, it scored very well overall,” said Evanoff, “but I will say specifically, current Santa Fe owners scored it a bit higher than all the (other) respondents.” Later he reiterated “based on our data and what we saw, the current Santa Fe owners were very open to it and welcome the changes.”
Risks of Radical Changes
With such a dramatic redesign, it’s tough to fully predict how the public will receive it. As Evanoff said, “(customers) could be a little nervous and thinking, wow it’s a big departure from what they’re used to.”
It’s always safe to assume with any new car, some will love it, and some will hate it. But it’s the majority of potential customers that matter, and that’s who Hyundai wanted to target with the new generation Santa Fe.
Based on the initial focus groups, it looks like the brand has gone the right direction with the new SUV. The real answer though, will come after the model goes on sale later this year.
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A 20+ year industry veteran, Mike rejoins the AutoGuide team as the Managing Editor. He started his career at a young age working at dealerships, car rentals, and used car advertisers. He then found his true passion, automotive writing. After contributing to multiple websites for several years, he spent the next six years working at the head office of an automotive OEM, before returning back to the field he loves. He is a member of the Automobile Journalists Association of Canada (AJAC), and Midwest Automotive Media Association (MAMA). He's the recipient of a feature writing of the year award and multiple video of the year awards.
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