Report: The Aston Martin DB9 and Vantage risks no longer being sold in US

Numerous reports hint Aston Martin is facing some troubles in the near future as the small British luxury sports car maker could be forced to stop selling its DB9 and Vantage in the US due to tightening government safety standards.

In a nutshell, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is implementing new side-impact crash regulations and the current Aston Martin DB9 and Vantage are not capable of meeting these new requirements. The new standard is still in the process of being phased in from several years ago with exemptions being made for low-volume automakers. But the cut-off date for those automakers is just next month. Convertibles of any sort have to meet the new requirement by September of 2015.

Though because of the due dates on this new regulation, the DB9 and Vantage–two of Aston’s important models–could be forced to stop selling in the US. Let’s also not forget, the DB9 and Vantage are two of Aston’s oldest models currently still in production. Should the two core models be banned from being sold in the states, that could translate to a 25 percent loss in gross profits with the convertible versions adding to the total loss by 40 percent at the arrival of September 2015, equating to a net 65 percent loss for dealerships in the US. This would force many of the 35 dealers in the US to shutdown.

Aston Martin’s representative for US dealers is currently petitioning the government to grant Aston Martin an exception.

Source: Bloomberg

Chris Chin

Chris Chin is the Editor-In-Chief of egmCarTech and is a regular contributor to Automobile Magazine.

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