I agree on reliability and it is NOT GM's problem right now. We went to buy A MAXX.... It's what the wife wanted. I wanted her to have the last style Impala and the HHR's weren't out yet. I travel alot and REQUEST GM cars as rentals. I am a Chevy guy. My favorite rental is the V6-G6 or the Malibu with the V6. Those things haul ass. Every time I see a new Impala I want to rip the Imp badges off of it. What a slug. I had an HHR on a trip to Wichita. I found a few things odd about the styling but they grew on me. Pretty sure it is built on the same chassis as the Cobalt. That thing hauled ass and got good mileage. And when it came time to have to haul shit. It has a lot of room. We had three vehicles there. This one, a Dodge quad cab with the TINY engine and a Dodge Magnum with the V6. We might have lined them up on an airport road and if we did, the HHR might have whooped the others off the start. The truck might have caught up, eventually but the Magnum probably never stood a chance. My wife drove the MAXX, Malibu, Impala and Cobalt Sedan. In the end she chose teh Cobalt. Surprised the hell out of me. She's damn near 6 foot tall and for a tiny car it has a lot of room. And it hauls as and gets 34ish mpg. It's an 05 and she has miled the hell out of it already. Never had a problem. 16k for a brand new loaded up econo box is hard to beat. And if Mama's happy, everyone's happy. I agree that they could cut back on the overlap. They also need to become trendsetters once again. When they popped out the 88-98 truck style it was the newest, hottest thing on the market. They've been playing catch up ever since. Anyone seen the new Tundra. Toyota is playing for keeps.
If GM wants me to buy any of their cars they need to build a real car with V8 RWD and my choice of transmissions,I want a full size car with two doors and a manual trans if desired. You wont catch me owning any of the wimpy econobox FWD death traps that all the manufactures make and if they want me to buy one of the trucks I want a real truck instead of the overglorified cars with a bed that are made now. I was in a car wreck many years ago and a 71 delta 88 saved my life so I need a full frame car to feel safe and gas mileage is not that big of concern but I know those are a thing of the past and no manufacture will make what I like so I will be driving old cars untill I die. Jeff
My son and I were just talking about this yesterday. I think all of the big 3 need to go back to giving people options when they order a vehicle, not just the out of the box options. Hell, you can't get a 2wd short silverado with anything bigger than a 5.3 engine in it. They also need to go back to the styling ideas that were out of the box, not the cookie cutter cars and trucks you see today. Hell, half the time you can't tell the difference between an Impala and a Malibu. The Impala should be Chevy's flagship like it used to be, available in 2dr and 4dr models. They need to catch a clue that not everybody wants a damn 4dr car, or a damn v6 or 4cyl. (not that they aren't good engines) Come on now, how many guys would love to have a 2dr Impala with a 6L. or a 7.4L in it just to haul you and the misses around in? Or the HHR with a nice small block sitting under the hood. Not everybody is a granola trying to get back to nature in their Subarus. just my .02 Larry
It's the American mindset they want leather interiors and 6 disc DVD players in their cars when they don't have a piece of leather or stereo in their house. I like Rambler's rubber floor mats and especially the rubber ball on the firewall windshield washer. And why cover truck doors in plastic when a piece of tin like mid '60's looks better? But do away with the glued in headliners that peel after ten years.
funny you bring up the malibu maxx as your example. i agree with you on the styling, it's way off target for me also. a good friend of mine is the general manager at a chevrolet dealership. when i was picking up my hhr a couple of weeks ago we were discussing this car. he says he can't get enough of them. when he gets one in, new or used, in it won't last 3 days. i can't relate to the unreliable comment, all the gm cars i've owned ,past and present, have been extremely reliable.
I was a GM guy all my life, in 03' I bought a Nissan. From 1988 thru my 98' Chev truck not a one made it past 60K miles with out major powertrain problems. I will not go back. Besides My Nissan now has 68K miles with NO problems and I wonder if it has more Made In USA parts than my previous Chev and it was at least assembled in the USA. I think corperate greed is killing everything in America and some of the shitty attitudes of our workers is not helping out.
Several Things. 1. Chapter 11, then dump the union. 2. Provide health care for it's employees. Note I said care not insurance. 3. Get some designers with balls. 4. Focus. If you want to bring out something retro, go all the way ala Mustang, T-bird. The Camaro wusses out. 5. Pride. If you are even going to bother to continue the Cadillac line. Then make it the best damn luxury car in the world. Don't pretend with all the plastic and refitted cheap body styles. Grow some hair. Kick the sh&t outta the Europeon cars as well as the damn Japanese. 6. Pride again. Remember who you are and hold your head up. Along with Ford, this company invented cars. You are General Motors for God's sake and you let Toyota make a better full size pick-up? You fags! 7. Tariffs, tariffs, tariffs, tariffs, tariffs......... Support politicians with the eggs to stand up for our country's heritage. Protectionism isn't a dirty word it's a son-of-a-bitchin' obligation! 8. Pray.
Quit building crap that appeals to only middle aged housewives. I'm looking for a new car and I went to the Pontiac dealer to look at a G6 convertible. I bought my son a G6 coupe to go to college in and its actually a nice car. But when I go to any GM dealer all I see is 4 doors and mini-vans or whatever they call them now. At least Ford has the Mustang GT. Also they have to do something about quality. My son's G6 is a riot to drive, but parts keep falling off it. We've replaced both sunvisors, one seat back release, one front wheel ABS sensor, one windshield wiper arm and an exterior temperature sensor. Now the front end shakes, I think it's a warped rotor. I've got a Nissan Titan pickup and an Infiniti M35 and neither one has been back to the dealer for anything.
Well, working at GM, I have a few comments from the inside out. First, we are making huge strides in quality. So much, in fact, that Buick models have surpassed Lexus models in national surveys. This is not an "across the board" quality statement, but there are newer pockets of this attention to quality. Last program I was on, there were three full-sized models (mock-ups) devoted to insuring consistent quality builds. Over 2 million in just those three properties. GM knows where it needs to invest in product development and is doing so. BUT, there are a few outdated things that will continue to set GM back, IMHO. One is the dealer network. Why are there GMC/Buick dealerships? Why not an "all-GM" dealership to consolidate your overhead (dealer) network? OR, leapfrog your competition, and offer web-based car construction/deliveries or test drives? People are fed up with haggling at dealers anyway. Why keep forcing that dealer experience down everyone's throat? Toyota will probably eliminate them in five years anyway, so here's our chance to do something progressive before our competition does. The UAW/Delphi situation will be a cloud over GM's head until is it resolved, and teh costs are assumed by GM, or some other way. GM is now in contract talks with the UAW, though I can't see where the UAW has any leverage to ask for any concessions. GM has cut back considerably in the last several years. Many programs are now being engineered overseas for the sake of "globalizing" anyway, and workforce has been cut to reflect that-both blue and white collar. The other point from an "old-school" mentality is that my superiors do not allow us to present our ideas as a "business case" and follow through on them. We are enabled to create ideas, then we discuss them, get everybody pumped up, someone says "that's cool!", and there a feel-good moment in the room. What we need instead is a good idea, followed up with the financial realities of getting that idea tooled, what material it would be made of, and how many we would project to sell. No idea make you money just because "that's cool" these days. There are too many expenses involved. We need to sell 30,000 solid, usable ideas, not 5 "really cool" ones per year to make money. That's from the logical side of how I work at GM. On the flip side of that, there does need to be a streamlining of cars offered, and one people WANT to get into. Yes, we are getting into that. Look at the new CTS. F__cker is HOT. a coupe will be offered with a 400hP motor. We did a prototype of a V-12 making over 600 with AWD. Sexy, lemme tell you. Another is to have GM stop fighting proposed increases to CAFE (mpg ratings). GM has to get off its collective ass and make an economical drivetrain, whether it's hydrogen, corn-based, or baby harp seal spleen. No ifs and or buts. The variations between many "trim levels" also needs to be eliminated. I challenge anyone to tell the difference between the base model Buick Lacrosse and the uplevel one. You cannot tell the visual difference. Anyway, those are my observations, but as usual, nobody listens to the guy on the working floor. When my name is hung on the Ren Cen, maybe I'll tell you how it all shook out. I'm at work doing OT right now. Yes, for a next-generation, really cool Hummer.
There are many reasons that domestic car makers are in trouble. Legacy costs are one of the biggest expenses which drag them down compared to Toyota, Honda etc. Styling is another negative, the cookie cutter look is pretty lame. The GTO could have been successful IF they would have given it some identity to the past. The new Camaro will suffer the same fate! It will be marketed to compete with the Mustang and Challenger but the idiots at Chevy will have it priced 3 to 5 thousand more than the competition. The Camaro's styling is not retro enough to capture the market shared with Ford and Dodge. I'd bet Mustang and Challenger will out sell Camaro by a wide margin. My biggest complaint is how GM packages it's products. Why can't they market their vehicles wtih choices? I would own a new pickup IF I had a choice. A SWB regular cab truck with the Trailblazer SS engine. Then an option list that I could actually choose the EXACT item I want. NONE OF the FOLLOWING: heated seats, steering wheel control buttons, plastic tailgate protector, power door locks that I can't control, whatever other electronic junk that is unnecessary. I guess there need to be a box on the order form for JUNK DELETE! Seems the bean counters have more control than real car people. Let US choose what we want!
I dont care what they do, I still wont buy a new car. GM should be ashamed of themselves for calling those new pieces of crap Malibu and Impala.
Exactly... Build me something I could get excited about, and I'd buy it. Like a Australian Ute, with taxi cab interior, rubber mats, delete everything ( Onstar, Airbags, Abs, Etc...), but with a badass Vette motor. Yeah, I know... It cant and wont happen. Thats why I build my own vehicles...
wow...a lot of great responses! For the record last year was the first time in 40 years that I ever bought a new vehicle. I bought a GMC sierra truck. So far a year into the truck and I am happy. I hope to have the truck for at least 10 years. Hopefully it will hold up. The wife either wants the new Camaro when it comes out or the new Challenger. She has a Pontiac G6 right now and that hunk of crap has been nothing but small problem after small problem. She wants that car to get stolen so bad...hahaha.
My dad work in die design for GM and for the last few years they were putting every thing they had into the new trucks. They were hoping they would help them get back on top i guess. but he said he had all these guys working on the trucks so i think the other cars sufferd. the 88-98 truck is by far the best looking full size ever produced but i went ahead and bought a new 3500 dually. my first new car and the discount i get its worth getting so i can have one depenable car. Cadillac is making some cool shit right now. i guess you have to like that squared off style. but from what my dad tells me there going to be doing that style with the other brands. cars started lacking imagination in 1974 so this is nothing new. No matter what we say. They are just going to keep doing what the "dumb" public wants.
I honestly have not even took the time to look at the Chevy cars of late... I recently bought two GM vehicles tho and I believe that qualifies me to at least comment. 1 was a 2003 Buick Lesabre with 26K on it. I wanted a new car but honestly they do not make a car like that new anymore...And I feel that is part of the problem. The Lucerne is that car's replacement...problem is it is about twice the price and not even as nice. It has a real narrow width interior and the styling equivalent of the 58 Studebaker in the beauty dept. The second one is a new 2006 Chevy Silverado work truk with 4.3 V6 and a/c-tilt-cruise etc in a long bed 1/2 ton. This on the other hand ,was in my opinion- a very good deal for the consumer....[me]Ha! It will do what I need and deliver 23 MPG doing it and it cost me 13,000 outright- new. I feel the most effective thing GM can do would be this- Also the same problem exists in most corporations so GM is not alone in this malady... They should fire the CEO who is now in charge of "saving the money" that they reward him so highly for doing... In effect he is cheapening the components and the end resulting vehicle in a manner that even with styling"improvements" cannot equal their predecessors at all..... The arguement of too many choices is also valid...its a hard fact we have to acknowledge but Americans need a basic transportation car and truck that remains virtually the same in construction and operation....... Much like the theory of the early VW beetle. This may be argued but I do not think that we as Americans can really afford what they think we want any more!!
someone has said get rid of the unions, that is just stupid. Most people that are in respective unions buy American cars, if you get rid of the unions a lot of people would drop GM. GM needs to get rid of there plants in Mexico and Asia. I am a bodyman and work at a Chevy dealer currently. I have worked on Asian cars and European cars as well. Reliabilty goes to the American cars for sure. The Gms are like some of you getting better economy wise because they have to. When an American car is built they only use one referance point to measure the rest of the from. An asian car uses two and a European uses three. Because they only use one point the gaps are not as good and the replacement panels do not fit as well. Also if the Camaro comes back I hope that they do not build it anything like the most recent ones or the vettes.
All the major US Corporations should lobby together to institute a Federal "Eurpoean style" health system that is NOT in any way job related. Hide it in a couple days worth of the Defense Budget, that should be more than enough for the whole budget of it. :rolleyes" That would take a bigload off GM. (That is the first thing Lutz said when he went to GM, by the way, according to an article I read in AutoWeek.) GM should build some Roadrunner formula cars. No, not reproduction Plymouths, but Muscle Cars that seat six six foot tall adults, and still only have only two doors, with radio, carpet, air, spoilers, air dams, butt ticklers, all either optional or unavailable, and price it UNDER the price of a Honda Civic DX. They should make all their four door sedan size cars in two door models, without shortening them or losing the back seat and headroom and not trying to make them look like a Camaro. Make the four door sedans look sporty or luxurious like two door hard tops, but with more doors... They managed to do it in '56 on the full size hard tops, when did they decide people didn't still want that style? Quit with the "Cheap cars have to look ugly and if it looks good it has to have a higher price tag just because cheap has to be ugly" thought line that infected the industry probably in the 60's with the compacts. A beautiful car can be made and sold for the same price as an ugly car. Production "machine" costs don't know what æsthetics are. Don't tie power and suspension options to "styling" options. I don't want to have to haul around a sunroof and an ugly-ass spoiler just because I want the big engine and four wheel disc brakes. Don't build and price ALL the "sports cars" out of financial range of the young and "sporty" market they are aimed at. That SSR would still be selling big time if it was built like and priced like the HHR instead of a "goofy" looking body on a Corvette chassis and sticker. I learned to drive in an Oldsmobile. I've owned several of them. My first job out of highschool was selling Oldsmobiles. There's no way in hell that what the marketing excuse for closing it was (English speaking) people thought it mean't OLD-mobile. They just for the last two decades made really ugly boxy dowdy looking cars. They should do a turn around and start using the brand name "Saturn, by Oldsmobile" for a few years and phase the Olds name back in. I guarantee you my next NEW GM car will be an Olds. When Saturn first started, I went to one of their in-mall showrooms and ashed the knowledgless girl they hired from hotdog on a stick if it was true that they didn't "Deal" price. She said they didn't deal price, the sticker price was what you pay. I then asked if they took trade in's. She said "Yes" I said, if you take trade in's then you deal price, because you deal on the "value" of the trade in! She didn't or couldn't understand the logic of that. I think the "Dealer experience" whether it's private franchise or company stores, will be with us for as long as dealerships, or new car sales business is allowed to have anything what so ever to do whit the used car business. Ya know who, or at least used to publish Kelly Blue Book, and therefore dictate used car prices? GM.
I'm a die hard GM guy, but until they build something appealing to own (I'm not going to spend the bucks for a Caddy) I'll buy something else. My last two "daily" cars have had no style to them whatsoever, along with enough problems to drive me apeshit. I guess I'd rather by a boring import (most likely made here anyway) that will last a long time, than a boring domestic car (probably made in Mexico or Canada) that will have issues before 100K miles. Yeah the domestics have improved, but they still have a ways to go to impress me. Bill
It's been interesting watching the SUV sales curve and the Pickup as "musclecar" in the autoracing realm. It's as though GM has needed another Robt Stremple, w/a Zora Duntov and Bill Mitchem(60's vettes?) guiding the process. Can they design, refine and build the next gen. of Corolla, Civic, Golf? The Chevelles and Novas of old were popular as built. I think they have the resources, and you are right about being hamstrung w/the burden of legacy costs. Lack of vision, poor design execution, seen an Aztec in the last few years? Someone in their design and marketing world reads our thoughts here. Hope they take some cues...
There is one big thing they need to do. First is a few they shouldn't. They shouldn't do away with the brands. As noted, ditching Olds ended up being a mistake. My wife loves Pontiacs. You could market a Pontiac as a Chevy and she isn't going to get enthused about it. Now that gets to what they need to do. They need to make a vehicle and simply improve on it for years and years. That is what made Toyota and Honda successful. People have bought Accords and Camrys (along with Corolla's and Civics) over and over and over again because they are comfortable with them. All of the domestics have to have something "new" every few years. It never gives the cars time to develop a loyalty. That's because those at the top simply can not see long term but have to have instant gratification. Those running GM and Ford are complete and total idiots. Both companies are at a disadvantage as noted because of so many retiree's but that will catch up with Toyota and Honda before long. I had a 94 Caprice Wagon for a long time. It had 200,000 miles on it when I sold it. Crank windows with a 5.7 litre V-8. I wish GM was still selling that car. The Carpice had a good long following. GM made a brilliant move bringing out the S.S. Impala which attracted a younger crowd. Look at how many are still modding these cars. WHat does GM do though? They discontinue it for the instant gratification of trucks. They then bring the name back after a lull in crap boxes. They never should have stopped building them. They should have simply refined them year after year like as noted, Honda and Toyota does. GM andrd doesn't know how to build brand loyalty. Look, we aren't talking about what we want to drive but what the masses do. Ford had a winner in the Taurus. They were good cars and Ford sold a bunch of them. They neglected the brand and letting it get stale and then they killed it. Major stupid move. The main FOrd sedan should still be a Taurus that has had 20 years of refinement and a loyal following. My wife is actually considering a Toyota Prius for the 50-60 mpg. Is GM getting into this market? No. They are coming out with a Camaro that nobody will buy in 5 years if gas gets to $4-$5.00. They are followers and not trend setters also.
There's no historic model recognition left for buyers. From GM or the other American car makers Pontiac Grand Prix startedlife as a "fancy" mid-large size 2 door hardtop "personal sport luxury car". Now it's just a four door sedan. you can't even buy a 2 door with the Grand Prix name on it. That's just wrong. They invented the Grand Am to cover the four door need on that size car. They should have stuck with that formula. It would be easy enough for them to just switch the labels back. "G6 Grand Prix coupe"... see easy. Someone mentioned Impala SS... Again, the SS badge doesn't have any business being on a taxi/patrol/4drsedan. Charger doesn't belong on a taxi/patrol/4drsedan either. If Accord, Acura, Lexus, Mercedes, and BMW can still find a market for 2 door sedans, then GM should too. I think it may be because it's too expensive for them or they haven't figured out how to pass a side impact test with a single long door. it's easier to pass with a short front door and a heavy B pillar right where they aim the side impact projectile. (I thought about this back when I was doing R&D prototyping, and tooling on the SID dummy.)
The Jalopy Journal
