Nissan

When you talk about the "Big Three" in terms of automakers, most of us here in the United States think of the seminal American companies: Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler. But there is another trio that has become dominant in the marketplace over the last 40 years, and that could be aptly described as the Japanese Big Three: Nissan, Toyota, and Honda. These companies have built their reputations on value for your buying dollar. They are generally economical to drive due to good fuel efficiency, they are moderately priced, and they last a long time. The era of the expectation of a 200,000 mile life span (and beyond) began with the work of these automakers.

The company that we now know as Nissan has been around since it was called the Kwaishinsha Motorcar Co. all the way back in 1918, and it was then subsequently renamed the DAT Company. By the time 1931 rolled around they were mass producing a compact car that they called the Datson. A couple of years later, Nissan acquired DAT and changed the name of the car to Datsun rather than Datson. Datsun gained traction in the United States with the 240Z in the early 1970s, and they have never looked back, dropping the Datsun name in the 1980s and going forward as the Nissan brand that is so popular today.