Originally posted by: iamwiz82
Originally posted by: arcas
Once again, Toyota and Nissan (and I wouldn't be surprised to see good numbers from Honda) are showing Detroit how to run a auto manufacturing business. Toyota reported 21% higher sales from a year ago (a record). Even Toyota's truck division saw a nearly 5% increase in sales.
GM's 7.7% drop in overall vehicle sales (17.2% drop if you consider only their trucks and SUVs) has little to do with UAW or increased pension costs. This is simply a complete failure on the part of GM's management to (a) forecast economic conditions and (b) accurately predict buyer's likes and dislikes. Anybody think GM's new line of big SUVs is going to turn the company around? Let's see a show of hands...Didn't think so. This strategy is further proof that GM's brass just doesn't get it. Or maybe their economists are predicting oil will drop back down to $35/barrel...
The reason that they continue to build big SUVs is because they have no choice now. It's not like 3 years ago when these designs were being created someone said "Gas is going to be at $2.50 a gallon!" No, they assumed that it would hover slightly above what it was at the time, around $1.40. You can't just change a production run when you are talking about vehicles like this. A commitment is made and it is pretty much binding.
Not only that, GM is forced to create vehicles that are in the same price-range as Japanese counterparts, but they can't put the same quality into it because of overhead, as described above.
And if you think GM was the only one not to predict rising gas prices, you are wrong. Everyone is releasing bigger vehicles designed around forecasts made a few years ago because they are too far along to stop now.
Completely agree on your first comment.
And I agree that GM THINKS they need to compete with the Japanese companies on price. But that part of the reason why GM will lose, and they will most likely die in the process. Why do American car manufacturers need to price competatively to Japanese companies?? German automakers charge quite a bit more for their vehicles, and same goes for Japanese luxury divisions like Lexus, and yet American's eat them up like candy.
In fact, I'd go so far as to say that the current car buyer who is buying NEW, would be more likely to gravitate toward the more expensive cars. Since a) they are already into money or they wouldn't be buying brand new, and b) because American's have the misconceived beliefs that the more it costs, the better it is.
American's don't buy GM because they aren't making vehicles that are appealing. Especially now that a lot of people are turning away from the SUV trend. Pretty plain and simple IMO. Pontiac is supposed to be their exciting division? And the GTO is what they give us to replace the Trans Am/Firebird?? The Aztec is supposed to be some form of hip SUV?? The redesign of the Grand Prix is repulsive. And what do they do with the one vehicle that always sold well, the Grand Am? They give us the G6. Everything about Pontiac stinks. The only car in GM's lineup that is exciting is the Vette.
I miss the GM risk takers of yesteryear. The engineers that thought it would be cool to strap a super charger to the magnificent 4.3 liter V6 and have both a Truck and SUV that can blow away sports cars at the track. The people who didn't care that the Camaro and Firebird only sold as many cars combined as the Mustang did by itself, it was still profitable. The GM that would concentrate on the things they were good at to begin with. The more GM tries to compete with Japanese companies, the quicker it will see its demise. There were plenty of American's that wanted what GM sold, and not the Jap Crap that other consumers wanted. They were good at what they did, and now their trying to be what they aren't, and they will lose
Now if a consumer is going to buy used any way, like most smart consumers do - then granted they will go with Japanese companies. Once again, this is the smart consumer, who knows that they will get great resale value on their car when they sell it. I don't know why GM vehicles have the worst resale value of any car, and I don't think GM cares about that either since they don't make any more money from those people. And I think thats part of the problem too.
