The comparison of domestic/foreign automaker to indie/publisher isn't even relevant. Foreign automakers can establish a brand that reflects the quality of their product. Indies cannot establish a brand that reflects quality since the contributors are dynamic and there is no one there to establish standards. (Sure an individual indie author can establish a brand, but that doesn't reflect all indie authors.)

As much bickering there is over the quality of the work that publishers publish, people are forgetting that they are still gatekeepers. I'm fairly certain that most people would find that a handful of publishers dominate their bookshelves if they took the time to look. They would also discover that many publishers don't have a presence on their bookshelves. The publishers in either list will vary from person to person because quality reflects both quantitative things (e.g. appropriate use of spelling and grammar) and qualitative things (e.g. style of prose). That is to say that one person will think that a certain company publishes tripe because it lacks any intellectual insight, while another person will think that another publisher is garbage because the plots don't engage the reader. So think of the gatekeepers guarding a series of gates, each one allowing certain authors through. Some authors will be denied access through any gate, but some authors will be granted access through one of the gates. Once they pass through the gate, they will have an imprint stamped on their forehead. That imprint allows readers to decide (to some degree) what they want to read.