Despite what a lot of people say Suzuki actually makes really good cars. They are really popular across the ocean but in North America they never really caught on, partially because of the above story, partially because it they never received brand recognition, partially because they were a late comer to North America (I think it was 1985) so they were entering a saturated market with well established brands, and partially because they favoured small basic cars which is not overly popular in North America. Due to the fact that they were so unpopular they depreciate quickly and they fly under most buyers radars so you can get typical Japanese reliability at rock bottom prices. It really is too bad that their cars were not successful because they were good cars.

If they sold them in the U.S., I'd be so on them.  I have a thing for smaller cars, and they seem to be the small car KINGS!  And reliable for that matter.  

Suzuki are good in Australia 

It's actually an interesting story. In the '90s Suzuki made a car called the Suzuki samurai. It was a very reliable car and it looked kind of like a Jeep but with a shorter wheelbase at the time. Now as we know today, physics dictates that SUVs will roll over more than say a sedan, but as these SUVs were getting more popular in the market some compromises were made. As a result these high center of gravity vehicles led to increases reports of high-speed rollovers. Some rumors started that Suzuki had to pay damages to a woman who was paralyzed when the samurai rolled over but the company claimed that the car actually gone off road and hit a driveway. That's when the bad rumors started to spread. When consumer reports started reporting on them on their own closed test courses they've been using the same test setup by about 15 years by this time I think. No matter how many times they're professional drivers drove the samurai it wouldn't tip over, even at 55 mph. The car stayed planted. It wasn't until the course was deliberately changed and steering the car more sharply that the samurai tipped on two wheels. But still did not roll over. When they finally got the car to "roll-over" It was reported as if they only tested it one time and released that footage and only that footage. They also noted in the consumer reports that they had some "not acceptable ratings" and that killed the brand in US. The brand wasn't ever forgiven and even when it was released as a scandal the damage was already done and rippled to their other cars and the final car was rolled out in 2013 I think. Really sad honestly. Isuzu also faced something similar and pulled out due to bad press by 2008ish.

They make smaller vehicles and Americans do not buy small vehicles. The market dried up and they pulled out of the states.

https://carkiller.com/scottykilmer/qa/suzuki/#post-30639

https://carkiller.com/scottykilmer/qa/suzuki-experiences-reliability-and-obtainability/

Some of them are farely reliable but they are cheap cars and the ones in the US were just awful and no one can find parts or someone to work on them these days.

They're popular and well regarded in Europe, my mother has an '06 ignis 1.5L with 291,000km and it's still hammering away.

As has been said, they're very much focused on smaller and city runaround type cars so I can understand why they might have struggled in North America