This apprehension was exacerbated by the silence from the LA office, which eventually extended into a decision not to respond to queries from the media on any subject, either about their business plans or about their product.
Now the company will only say that its intentions haven't changed, but it declines to answer specific questions about the reported issues involving dealers.
To thicken the plot, people inside the Canadian car industry say that the talk about Mitsubishi not coming to Canada is being generated by the people who have the most to lose if the company actually brings its products to market here.
Those people are generally understood to be connected to the Mazda and Volkswagen operations, since they are the firms and dealers who will likely suffer most from the arrival of Mitsubishi's trendy models.
Mitsubishi and VW are seen as the hippest car companies with young people in America right now, and Gagnon expects that attitude to apply in Canada as well.
But VW is already stumbling badly in Canada (mostly because of questionable management decisions from Detroit, which runs the Canadian operation) and so they could be hurt more by Mitsubishi's arrival.
Mazda's doing well now, mostly on the strength of its entry-level Protégé line, but in the US the Ford-controlled importer of Japanese cars is regularly beaten by Mitsubishi in the sales game, since that greater hipness factor also applies here.