DC follows Ford, GM in offering rear-seat entertainment

DaimlerChrysler Corp. is the latest Automaker to get into the rear seat entertainment business.

Rear Seat Video - the new product offered by Mopar, DC's parts and accessories division - plays VHS tapes and features an overhead 6.4-in. liquid crystal display screen.

The system is designed to fit into Plymouth Voyagers, Dodge Caravans and Chrysler Town & Country minivans. It adapts to video cameras, CD players and home video game units.

General Motors Corp. was first to offer rear entertainment systems. Ford Motor Co.'s Visteon subsidiary, came out with their version this summer.

DaimlerChrysler's goes on sale this month at a suggested retail price of $1,350 plus installation.

It's ironic that DaimlerChrysler follows GM and Ford in introducing the minivan entertainment system in as much as Chrysler invented the minivan in 1983.

Then again, the company has a lot of minivans out there into which the entertainment systems could potentially go. DaimlerChysler sells over 600,000 minivans worldwide every year and owns about 40% of the North American market.

"Offering entertainment systems brings even more versatility to what is already the world's best-selling minivans," says James P. Holden, DC's new president.

Attendees of the upcoming NACE International Autobody Congress and Exposition can leave the cloaks and daggers at home, even though one of the keynote speakers is the nation's former top spy.

Ex-CIA Director Robert Gates will address the convention Dec. 3 at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta.

But if a political operative rather than a spy operative is more to your liking, check out NACE's Dec. 4 keynote speaker. He's George Stephanopoulos, former top aide to President Bill Clinton.

The NACE show runs Dec. 2-5. It's billed as the industry's most important event for the collision repair business.