[Fat Charlie]

A good example is what Dodge has been doing. Their LX body, when it came out, was the Charger, Magnum and 300. Different sheetmetal, different configurations, same car. They dropped the Magnum because of sales and eventually chopped a few inches off to make the Challenger- but introduction was delayed because the 300 was selling so well they didn't want to divert production away from it, as the Challenger was going to be made in a 300 factory... because call it what you will, it's the same car.

But selling the same car multiple times is looked down on, so the Challenger was called the LC body and eventually the Charger was called the LD.

Sometimes they thought ahead. When they rebadged the Liberty (KJ) to sell as a Nitro, they called it the KA body. When they rebadged the Caliber (PM) to sell it as a Jeep, the Compass and Patriot were the MK body. Why they thought two designations for three "models" was better than one or three designations, I don't know. When they slapped a Cherokee label on the Dart (PF), they called it a KL. When the current Grand Cherokee and Durango came out, the Jeep got called a WK (carrying the designation over from the 05-10 body) and the Durango was the WD. Near the top is the Aspen (HG), which didn't even pretend to be different from the HB Durango that it really was. But my favorite is when they took the first generation WK Grand Cherokee, made it look a little boxier and called it the Commander- the XK body.

Basing things on the same platform works really well. Slight changes for branding preferences are okay and can be done successfully, but it'd be nice if they didn't pretend to themselves that every damn flavor were something unique and special. Because if it were, then the bigwigs and the engineers wouldn't be doing their jobs properly.