Dodge Cars to Lose the Cross-Hair Grilles in 2012

According to multiple industry reports, the cross-hair grille that has been a trademark of Dodge and Ram vehicles since the early 1990’s is will soon be no more. Very soon the grille styling will only remain on with Ram, but according to Ralph Gilles Dodge will head in a new direction now different direction, possibly as early as 2012.

In 2009 Chrysler LLC decided to seperate the Dodge car and truck lineups into two seperate brands, leaving the cars on the Dodge side and moving the Dodge Ram pickup to the new RAM brand. Gilles said that the decision to keep the grille intact on RAM trucks was a “no brainer” and did not hint about what the new direction he could foresee the Dodge cars taking.

Interestingly enough, Ralph Gilles, who started his career as an automotive designer, is the only designer to head a major car brand. He joined Chrysler in 1992 and is currently the President and CEO of the Dodge Car Brand and Senior Vice President of Design at Chrysler Group. Perhaps his most famous piece of work was the styling he designed for the 2005 Chrysler 300. We’re very interested to see the new direction that he takes the Dodge car lineup, especially considering his background!