The essence of luxury is scarcity. The rarer an item is, the more you have to pay for it. Sure, quality of materials, unusual engineering enters into it as well. But scarcity is a key component.
Now consider Mazda.
Last year, the eight models Mazda sells in the U.S. totaled 332,756 cars and crossover utility vehicles. In contrast, Toyota sold 407,739 RAV4s. This means if you drive a Mazda, you won’t see yourself coming and going on every corner like a RAV4, although odds are Mazda would prefer if its bestselling CUV, the CX-5, were seen on every corner.
