Beat ya to it Goodwrench
lol
Quote:
GM says it may kill off one of its brands if sales continue to slide
Posted Date: 3/23/05
General Motors, in the wake of recent events that have shaken the company and Wall Street's confidence in the world's largest automaker, says it may be forced to phase out one of its underperforming brands if sales fail to meet projections, company Vice Chairman Bob Lutz said on Wednesday.
If certain brands continue to slide, "then we would have to take a look at a phase-out. I hope we don't have to do that. What we've got to do is keep the brands we've got," Lutz said.
Sales at both the Buick and Pontiac divisions have sagged considerably in recent years, and are thought to be the most likely candidates for elimination. Lutz said GM is working to correct that with an estimated $3 billion investment in new vehicles such the Buick Lacrosse and Lucerne and the Pontiac G6, Solstice and Torrent. Lutz's comments came during an automotive conference in New York.
Financial analysts have said for years that GM has too many brands, even after the gradual phase-out of Oldsmobile a few years ago. Weaker U.S. sales in general have added to the pressure on the automaker.
An elimination of any one of GM's brands would likely mean plant closings and a shrinking of GM's hourly work force.
-Reuters contributed to this report
Buick will probably get the boot since it only sells geezer mobiles.
Actually, I'd think Pontiac would be just as likely, Lutz was aiming for Buick to become GM's Lexus. And the Solstice (the single most convincing reason for GM not to drop Pontiac) already has a platform twin, if not two... that's not wasted cash.
What can I say? If GM alreay dropped the US's oldest automaker, what's to stop them from doing it again? GM needs to focus it's brands more sharply, like they did in the 50's and 60's. (And like how the Japanese did it). Not every one of their divisions needs an SUV/pickup variant.
At least Cadillac is becoming the standard of the World again.
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Tom
1999 Cavalier Z/24 ATX
1995 Taurus SHO MTX
1999 Chrysler 300M w/PHP
You think they would drop Saturn before they dropped Pontiac/Buick..
Dark blue 2002 Z24, 2.4 Ltr.
lone_wolf wrote:You think they would drop Saturn before they dropped Pontiac/Buick..
Ha! not likely GM is all about fleet sales. I bet alot of saturns are rentals, company cars etc. Saturn is probably actually meeting its sales goals too. Like I said everybody get ready to buy some GM stock its going to be cheap soon.
95 Cobra
Check out my site
spikej wrote:Buick will probably get the boot since it only sells geezer mobiles.
LOL I hope so... I hate those cars. BRING BACK THE GN!
Rob
Sold 2/2/05
^^i hear ya. buick doesnt bring anything new to the table, or exciting at that. If they want an old people car, get a caddy.
-Adam
Yah, i doubt it would be pontiac,,, what would they badge the GTO as then,, a saturn
.
Bring back the buick skylark gsx stage 1 now
then we will see what buick brings to the table
a whole lot of kick ass
lone_wolf wrote:You think they would drop Saturn before they dropped Pontiac/Buick..
GM is dumping a ton of money into saturn right now, and putting alot of faith that cars like the sky are gonna bring it back with a new image
