Last Sunday, while taking jars out of the basement, I came across a newspaper from 1992 - appropriately enough, the jars had been wrapped in it.
Inside there was a column proudly called "Motobigos" - and it had everything: fines, ferries for hundreds of cars, fuel, prototypes, and curiosities from across Europe.
Reading it felt like teleporting back to 1992 - automotive was simpler, more analog, and somehow... calmer. It almost brings a tear to the eye. Or maybe that was just dust from the jars.
As I was reading it, I switched into: "all right, let us compare this with today's automotive world" - and I have a few reflections:
Back then people discussed whether a ferry could take 500 cars.
Today we discuss whether production from China will flood us with cars faster than we can unload the ones from Europe.
Back then the problem was that cars for the US market had to be additionally equipped, for example with catalytic converters.
Today the problem is that cars have to meet extremely demanding requirements. And a catalytic converter? That is only the warm-up.
Back then the requirement was:
"it has to work."
Today the requirement is:
"it has to work always, in every condition, and we need confirmation of that in the form of tons of paperwork."
As entertaining and touching as "Motobigos" is, in real life we know that quality cannot be a bigos stew - it has to be a process.
Over these 30+ years, automotive requirements have grown enormously: standards, tests, validation, compliance, documentation, audits, safety, emissions, software... the list never ends.
And now the million-dollar question:
has the quality of cars grown at the same pace?
I will leave each of us to answer that individually.