My first car was an early generation MX3. As well has been incredibly fun to drive and also practical (it had a rear hatch), it was practically indestructible. I literally spent no effort to maintain it. Additionally, Mazda (at the time) had the interesting idea of introducing cars a low price and then increasing the price every year. This kept the resale price high.

I suspect that historically Mazda made a mistake of pricing their cars too low. The Toyota Corolla appealed to NA buyers because it was seen as a "good" car. Mazda cars, in comparison, were seen as "cheap" cars.