From the ArcaMax Publishing, Automotive Newsletter:
http://www.arcamax.com/news/automotive/s-554078-652027
In about ten days, we'll learn more about GM's hideous "restructuring"
plan - which the government expects to have in its lap by early June.
One thing, though, is pretty clear: Performance cars are on the
"euthanize" list. No rumor - a sad fact. GM has confirmed that there
will be no more SS Impala over at Chevrolet - and the supercharged
Cobalt SS will be gradually faded out, beginning with the sedan
version later this year followed by total extinction (coupes too) the
next. Cobalt will return to being exclusively an econo-box and GM will
quit trying to compete in the import sport-compact segment entirely.
The SS version of the HHR is also history - and of course, Pontiac
(and all its performance-themed cars like the G8, GXP and Solstice) is
finis.
GM has even confirmed that there will be no high-performance "V"
iteration of the Cadillac STS sedan - and the rumor is that other
Cadillac "V" models, like the CTS-V and XLR-V, could be dropped as
well.
The biggest potential bombshell, of course, is the prospect that GM
will have to cancel the Chevy Camaro, too. Its presence in the lineup
is hugely impolitic right now, with GM shaking the proverbial tin cup
and hoping taxpayers will dig deep. Selling a completely frivolous
steroidal muscle coupe works just fine when, you know, the cars
actually sell. But right now such cars are as popular as Dick Cheney
and GM management will fold at the first hint of a public thrashing by
some posturing pol in DC, let alone the full weight of Congress (or
some back-room arm twisting by President Obama; remember what happened
to Wagoner).
Things do not auger well. Ford's much more established Mustang - a car
similar to Camaro but which has deeper roots in the marketplace as
well as continuity going for it (GM dropped Camaro in 2002, so it now
has to try to rebuild the franchise from scratch in the worst possible
climate imaginable) isn't selling. The Dodge Challenger - another
reanimated '70s-era muscle car - is the 2009 equivalent of the
Studebaker Avanti of the '60s: The final defiant salvo of a doomed and
sinking battleship just before it rolls over and disappears forever.
One wonders, though - what exactly will GM sell once it no longer
sells anything with balls (besides Corvette)? Economy cars and
hybrids? The Japanese dominate those segments, with new entrants from
Korea (and soon, India and China) coming in strong seconds and thirds.
Why has GM chosen to go after the segments and markets where it has
been least successful rather than fine-tune what it has historically
excelled at? Yes, I mean larger cars (and trucks) as well as
performance-oriented stuff.
Answer? Because GM is is still sucking the pipe - and has come to
believe the BS emanating out all corners that its woes are due to the
lack of frugal and efficient little transportation models and its
parallel fixation on severing all ties with rude gas hogs. Bunk.
Those kind of cars (the gas hogs) were hot commodities - and earned GM
big time profits. Toyota and Honda, et al, desperately wanted in on
this action, too. What did the Jim Jones on it all was almost
overnight $4 gas followed by the sudden collapse of the debt-finance
driven economy. The American consumer is tapped out and terrified. He
is broke and cannot afford a new car - any car. (Even Toyota,
much-touted purveyor of "efficient" cars, experienced its first yearly
net loss in decades and in some cases sales are off 30 percent or
more.)
None of the jabbering jaberwockies out there want to touch the third
rail - the real issue, the Thing Behind it All. And that is the fact
that millions of people no longer have inflated home equity lines to
tap, but do have a pocket full of maxxed out credit cards, 40 percent
less in their 401ks - and are scared white that their job (if the
still have a job) will be outsourced or right-sized or otherwise
disappeared in the very near future - probably funded by their own tax
dollars.
So, signing up for a $30k car loan is not high on most people's
agendas right now.
Which means that no matter how they re-arrange the deck chairs on the
Titanic, until the buying power (that is, the actual wealth) of the
average American recovers, neither will GM - nor anyone else. Those
fancy all-electric Volts that GM has on deck for next year? They're
going to sit unsold on dealership lots (the few remaining) right
alongside the piled up inventories of unsold Tahoes and Camaros. Wait
and see. You can can thank "free trade" for it, too.
But of course, no one wants to talk honestly about that. The free
trade Kool Aid has been coursing through our veins for 20 years now.
Thus, the slow dying process will continue through to its inexorable
conclusion - with much denial along the way.
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