Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Fiat bridge, no longer Fiat bridge in Beirut

Source
How about that for a move! Fiat is no longer part of Saad and Trad - it was so famous that the bridge next to the dealership was called the "Fiat bridge" - and has moved to Gargour Automotive Co. who are the same people who handle Jeep, Dodge, Chrysler (hence the association since Fiat-Chrysler did a merger). Interestingly, Gargour Automotive is not T. Gargour et Fils which is the Mercedes and Smart dealer in Lebanon. The confusion can be easy though since both are commonly known as "Gargour" among the Lebanese population.
Saad and Trad have been very gentleman-y in the handover, stating: "The strategic decision of Saad & Trad to concentrate on the upper luxury segment complemented the vision of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA Group) to consolidate its core brands under one distributor in Lebanon, in order to facilitate communications, global target agreements as well as after sales synergies."
However, now that the Fiat bridge is no longer the Fiat bridge, dubbing it "Lamborghini bridge", "Jaguar bridge" or "Bentley bridge" (which are the upper-segment brands imported by Saad and Trad) seems too uppity and posh - the agency being also the representatives of McLaren does not help either.
For anyone interested, the official appellation is the bridge of "Pierre Gemayel Boulevard". Not sure though anyone knows it by that name.
So there, Fiat bridge no longer Fiat bridge.