Quote:
Originally Posted by goblue
What does that leave? If GM can't profitably sell a brand it designs in NA for NA customers - its gone. Hummer and GMC come to mind. GMC made sense when trucks sold well. That era is over. Hummer? Needs to go the way of Land Rover, elite vehicles for people who are not conscious to the cost of fuel. Thats not something GM can handle right now. Sell it.
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Fine...except that Hummer is sold in more places than North America and future Hummers are going to utilize one chassis- and that's supposed to be the T355 replacement, utilized all over the world.
The Arguments behind GMC is that it sells, it's profitable, and that it cost essentially $0 to develop.
I don't know why everyone thinks brands MUST be cut.
GM simply needs better ideas and better products. Nearly every problem with GM can be attributed to bad products. Fewer brands are not going to solve anything if it means that crummy products are still here to stay.
A case can be made for every current brand...and if GM would stick to a plan for more than a week at a time, then they can be made into a sucessful team.
Pontiac-Buick-GMC should be essentially treated like three seperate lines in one brand, since they are all under one roof. The only healthy brand under that roof is GMC, but if GM can cut the bad products and eliminate the overlap while replacing them with fewer REAL competative products, then each brand will survive and maybe flourish.
For some reason, the mindset seems to be that cutting Hummer or Pontiac or Buick will solve all of GM's problems.
It won't. GM is a poorly run company with bad focus. The can't stick to one plan for more than a week. The dealerships and labor unions have too much power. If GM is going to start cutting brands, they might as well cut every automotive brand.
Lutz hasn't come up with a real plan since he has arrived at GM. He's a car guy, but he needs a marketing and focus with knowledge of supply management. Lutz isn't the guy for the job that he has.
Wagoner has pushed GM into reaching a deal with the unions, and the only real big problem that I see is that he hired a gar guy to do an MBA's job.
Oh, and we also need to remember that the American economy is in a slowdown. Gas prices are high. The only cars that are selling well are not only fuel efficient, but CHEAP. People are being careful with their money and they will be careful for at least another year. Just because sales are down doesn't mean that brands need to be cut---it just means that GM needs to cut production.
Just because Pontiac doesn't need an SUV or lame minivan doesn't mean that it should be cut.
GM is a giant clusterf-ck with a lot of bad ideas and even more bad employees.