Alfa Romeos are known as a poor man’s Ferrari. A car built with Italian soul, and passion, that anybody can drive. Well, unless you live here in North America, where the brand hasn’t existed in quite some time. Plagued by temperamental build quality (hey, you wanted Italian passion right?), and poor service from an even worst dealer network, Alfa didn’t last a chance in a country were “it better get me to work” means a hell of a lot more than “it better set my soul a’ fire when I drive it.”

Nonetheless, Alfa Romeo has been plotting a return to the states for quite some time. Now that they are owned by parent company FIAT it seems that most of their issues have been resolved. Hey it’s 2008, if you can’t build a reliable car by now, then maybe you should get out of the business.

Alfa Romeo’s newest offerings are real delectable too, with a lot of their smaller cars taking a good slice of the public’s attention. Cars like the 159 sedan and the little Mito hatchback would do good competing against the BMW 3-series and Audi A3’s of the world.

Still, it seems no matter how hard they try, it’s just not in the cards for the near future. With a previous goal to relaunch the brand in 2010 being set back to 2011 (and later for all we know…) due to what the company calls the “broadening global financial crisis”, our guess is as good as our as to when we will see these sexy cars back on U.S. roads.

Above: Thought this was funny, but fitting at the same time….

-Source: Automotive News

-Photo: Unknown