The Europeans Show Ford & GM How Losing Money Is Really Done | The Truth About Cars On this note, Smart loses $6,100 on every car it sells, leaving Daimler with $5bn bill | ecomento.com is roughly the right amount for Smart when converting Euros to USD. And to see how poorly Smarts have sold in the US, see Why Toyota doesn't make a commuter hybrid for two? | PriusChat. And, for those who don't know, Smart losing billions for Mercedes isn't new news. See Why Toyota doesn't make a commuter hybrid for two? | PriusChat and How smart is this? DCX lost ?3.9 billion on Smart over four years - Autoblog, for instance.
Because Ford and GM Europe are all held at arms length and are pruned of all good ideas (all these fuel efficiency ideas in their engines didn't come from the land of the gas guzzler) and starved of investment. Result - popular top selling cars with zero profit. Reinvest some of the profits in the factories and you'll make more money. Move all the profits back home and starve investment and you'll continue making a loss. Toyota, Nissan and Honda have factories in the UK and they're very efficient and profitable. Ford have had a factory here since about 100 years ago and they treated their market share with contempt, starved investment and the factories are no where near as efficient as the new Japanese ones. I also think Ford and GM (Vauxhall here, Opel in Europe and Holden in Australia) seemed to forget that despite being an American brand, because they've been here for a hundred years, people almost take them as home grown and are loyal to the brand (think Holden in Australia). As soon as they take that for granted and start selling rebranded rubbish under their badge sales drop. A lot of people buy UK Fords or Vauxhalls because they're made here - or were. As soon as they were made cheaply in Poland, sales dropped. The Aussies are up in arms because Ford Australia are closing shop and sales will drop further once they've closed up fully. If GM started making all their cars in China, I bet US sales would dry up too. It's the same here.
