When was the last time you got stuck behind a BMW on a two-lane country road?
It may be purely anecdotal, but besides perhaps Porsche, Ferrari and a few other exotic brands, BMW is one of the only carmakers we can think of that brews passion into everything it produces. You certainly can't say that about Buick. Heck, we've even heard General Motors executives gripe about the way the average Buick driver moseys down the asphalt.
Hint: If you want to attract avid drivers, you have to make cars that feel "alive," not like sofas with four wheels.
That's what BMW does best, and we daresay that if BMW were charged with a Buick makeover--or a Toyota makeover, for that matter--the resulting products would be much more exciting. Heck, it's not really surprising that it took close to forever for Ford to replace the BMW 7 Series motor in the flagship Range Rover; the backstory is that BMW sold Land Rover to Ford, but in the interim had transformed the Range Rover into pretty much the best sport utility vehicle (SUV) on the road. Why mess with a good thing? Ford left the vehicle alone until just recently, as this year it will get a version of a Jaguar V-8. (Jaguar is also owned by Ford.)
Not that BMW really wants the mission of transforming other carmakers' products: It has enough on its plate. In fact, in the lucrative sedan market, where the competition with BMW's 3, 5, and 7 Series cars is increasingly heated, remade product from Nissan's Infiniti, Toyota Motor's Lexus, Honda Motor's Acura, Volkswagen's Audi and DaimlerChrysler's Mercedes-Benz and Chrysler (yes! with the 300 is making BMW work harder than ever to fight for its well-earned reputation for making "the ultimate driving machine."
In fact, through the first quarter of 2005 both 3 Series and 5 Series sales are down (the 3 Series is being replaced by an updated model, so some of its current decline can be attributed to the old-model phase out). But Mercedes, too, has lower numbers for the C- and E-Class. What's not down is the Chrysler 300, nearly 50,000 of which have sold so far this year; sales that dwarf every other $30,000-and-up luxury sedan on the market.
That's not surprising; the 300 split the luxury/near-luxury market wide-open by offering mid-size sedan roominess with V-8 horsepower (in the 300C) and V-6 fuel economy. Oh--we almost forgot--the 300 gets a suspension cribbed for the splendid Mercedes E-Class. All that makes even the $32,000 300C a bargain and cars of similar size, like the $45,400 BMW 530i--the subject of this review--seem expensive.
That doesn't exactly close the case, though. BMW's interior is superb, its handling is excellent, its ergonomics are just about as Teutonically perfected as imaginable and, although this car isn't as powerful as some of its competition, its in-line six-cylinder engine is one of the smoothest-accelerating motors ever produced. In short, the reason you're never stuck behind a BMW driver is because cars like the 530i are thrilling to drive.
