At a press conference held this morning in Detroit, General Motors announced that it will kill the Pontiac brand and reduce its US dealership network by half. An updated Viability Plan presented explains how GM "will accelerates the timeline for a number of important actions and makes deeper cuts in several key areas of it's operations." Full Article
Will somebody explain how having less dealers sells more cars? The dealers are independent of GM anyway, what does one have to do with the other?
Well, the problem is GM is selling LESS cars.. so they need fewer dealers. Right now each dealer has a ton of inventory on their lots and those vehicles still belong to GM. But they are also trying to shed those extra brands. That way they can focus more on their core brands that make money. Many of those brands have their own dealerships.
Pontiac has some unique models like the Solstice, the Vibe, G8... GM should kill GMC before Pontiac. What's the difference between a GMC Sierra and a Chevy Silverado? Yukon and Tahoe? Suburban and Suburban??? Finally one great car from Pontiac -- G8, and they they kill Pontiac. And they're now talking about rebadging the G8 as a Camaro SS SEDAN...! omg...
Profit is the answer. GM stated that the Pontiac brand sells fairly well, but they don't make a good profit margin on it. Tom
The number of GM dealers was OK back in the days when GM had 50% US market share. Now that those days are gone and will not return, each dealer sells insufficient numbers of cars to make an adequate profit to cover fixed expenses. With too many dealers, there's also too much intrabrand price competition. However GM will have to pay its Pontiac dealers big $$$s to shut that brand down, just as they did when the Oldsmobile brand was retired.
The problem facing the dealers is how to sell fractions of a car. If three dealers can only sell one car....... In essence that's the entire issue. If you walk into a (starving) GM dealer, is there any possibility of high pressure sales tactics? (You certainly asked the most popular question of the day).
The G8 is the Australian SS Commodore, it is made here at Elizabeth South Australia. I'm sure GM-H wont care what badge they put on it, Chev, Pontiac, etc. They would even put a Ford badge on it I reckon, if it resulted in more sales. They put Toyota badges on some Commodores back in the 90s!
Isn't it better to make half a loaf then no loaf at all? Plus somebody said GM still owns the unsolf vehicles on dealers lot? Doesn't the dealer pay a floorplanning charge on those cars? I would still think this is all the dealers problem and not GM?
They are going to have to kill those big SUVs anyways when the carbon emission standards get stricter. That will happen soon.
i kinda thought they would keep pontiac. they've got a lot of units on the road in the upper midwest. i forget how different the car culture is up there.
This will be a sad day for one of my friends. He was the chief engineer on the GTO, and as a consequence is known in some circles as the father of Detroit muscle cars. Tim Allen keeps a boat in our marina, and I often see the two of them talking about cars. I have never been a muscle car fan, so I try to avoid those conversations. Tom
It comes down to dealership structure. GM has been trying to get down to two sales channels. You would have Chevrolet / Cadillac dealers and Buick / Pontiac / GMC dealers. For the B/P/G dealerships: Buick = Upscale cars Pontiac = Sporty cars GMC = Trucks & SUV's It is easier to keep the GMC brand than try to brand SUV's and trucks as Buicks As Pat said, the Pontiac G8 is simply a rebadged Holden. It appears that it will be rebadged as a Chevrolet and be sold to police departments to replace the Impala. The Ford Crown Victoria is due to be phased out shorts and Chrysler is declaring bankruptcy. That leaves GM the entire RWD police car market if they decided to use the G8. Pontiac G8 may live on as police squad car - [VE Holden Commodore] - MotorAuthority - Car news, reviews, spy shots
Before I was kind of ambiguous about GM's Success but according to autoblog A dealer offered to buy pontiac and GM refused. The dealer was also going to buy a plant that GM has shuttered. Basically GM said no to money. In my book beggars can't be choosers and when you are knocking on "death's doorstep" you take what you can get. By the Dealer purchasing Pontiac, it would save American jobs (the plant is in the US), save the other dealers money (if Pontiac shuts down what ever money dealers invested is pretty much gone) and save pontiac. Can some explain to me why GM is getting American Tax dollars again, when GM clearly doesn't care about Americans?
We really need the details to know if this is a viable offer or a stunt. How much was being offered and for what? GM is getting quite a beating, but I would not want to blame them for rejecting something unworkable.
I could see shutting down Buick and GMC; but Pontiac? They're killing the one line that caters to the youth market.
I just talked to this man a couple of days ago, and he was very philosophical about Pontiac. His comment was "You know, that was only one small part of all the things I have been involved with." He was also the chief engineer on the Delorean. Tom
Very true that the dealer needs to prove viability, but straight off the line saying no? It wasn't like GM sat down with the Dealer and looked over his proposal then declined, that I can understand. I really think GM doesn't want to be made out to be a fool. Have someone else succeed with pontiac where they failed. Lotus seems to be selling their plans pretty much to anyone at this point, maybe the new Pontiac's could be based on them and return to their true sports car roots. With a slimmed down company (much smaller overhead) Pontiac won't have to be a huge seller to be profitable.
