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I figure that if Delphi has a union strike it’ll quickly throw GM into bankruptcy protection. Ford is in a similar situation with Tower. Not good. Not good at all.
posted by Garble at 10:40 AM
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11 Comments:
As you can tell, it comes down to a simple matter of saving money. I can save GM and Ford with two simple steps. First, stop with all the bullshit advertising! The first half of 2005 GM spent 215 million dollars on advertising, and Ford spent a sickening 768 million on ads! Now step back a minute and let all that sink in. Hello, you assholes, can't you see where the money is going? The two companies combined spent nearly a billion dollars in half of a year! They're bitching about having to pay benefits and retirements, dumbasses, look where all your money is going. It's a small wonder you idiots don't have any money. So what does the average 30 second writhing shit fest of ads contain? Telling employees that they can get a car from the company they work at for cheaper than the average asshole would pay. You have to be denser than lead to not realize that. Stop wasting money on things people already know. Second, design some cars that don't suck already! GM has the most piss-poor line up of cars in the history of the world. They are all incredibly boring and are the aesthetic equal of a bag of monkey turds. Drop the 30 year old names of the cars, people don't want to drive around in something that makes them feel like they need to go pick up their social security check. Impala and Monte Carlo and all that shit is so old now, get over it. And Ford, your cars are getting better, they just need to be flashier, get the crusty old ladies with sand in their vaginas out of the design room, and I think you will make it. It's so simple. So so simple.
That's it? The only person with anything to say on this issue is cohort and all he can come up with is advertising and his normal complaints that GM doesn't make enough cars for the fast and the furious?
215 million in advertising is 17 million a month. Across the entire US? Including print? and TV? Does that really seem like a lot to you? Also, do you think that maybe the add copy for metro Detroit is a little different that what you see somewhere else? I wonder if they concentrate on employees for a reason in Detroit? No, can’t be.
You asked a question and I'll try to answer it briefly. Delphi has to expand their business to sell to companies other than GM, they were working on that but didn't get there fast enough. GM has to sell more cars and that means new, better product. Cohort's wrong, but he's a great example of what we're fighting. People have a negative opinion about our brands and nameplates that isn’t accurate. If you look at warranty costs, JD-Power results and other measures of quality and durability GM is doing well and continues to put a lot of energy into improving even more. (We’re ahead of Mitsubishi btw). We’ve recently launched the G6, the Equinox, the STS, the CTS-V, the XLR, the Solstice, the Lucerne and the Lacrosse, plus others. We’re in the middle of launching the new Tahoe/Suburban and it’s so much better than the previous model I can’t believe it. It’s also costs less than the previous model. I just hope that the people running this situation know all of the details and can pull it off. I also hope that the rank and file at Delphi don't get so angry they decide to strike and take everyone down with them.
Now what’s your plan? Got anything other than one line complaints? Got Anything at all?
It's not my job. And I never said I had a solution. And for the record, Cohort is right. GM vehicles look like they were built by fisher-price, especially on the inside. And I love how you say WE just put out the G6, Equinox, blah, blah. Like you designed them yourself.
Garble, all that money I mentioned is JUST on the t.v. Imagine what it would be if newspapers, magazines, brochures, all that extra shit was factored in. That's a lot. Factor that in over a period of, say, 5 years, and you've got a shitload of wasted money. And you didn't bother to refute that the commercials are pointless and a waste of time. Useless, useless, useless. If GM is going SOOO well with their quality, then why are CONSISTENTLY, across EVERY article I've EVER read, ALWAYS last place?? Haha the new Suburban/Tahoe is the ugliest thing this side of the Mississippi. All GM is doing is taking the same rancid shit and re-packaging it with a different wrapper. Look at the van that replaced the Venture! Talk about a piece of shit. It's worse than the model it replaced, and it's a hell of a lot uglier too. Give me a Town and Country any day.
Lots of good discussion going on here. It’s too bad that I’m tuning in late. I’ll try to address all of the point’s raises above. This will probably be long.
Jack
I want to congratulate Jack. It’s rare that a person admits that they’re completely unequipped to hold even a semi-informed opinion about a difficult situation. Congratulations on facing your limitations head on. Also, I say “We” when referring to GM because I work there. I’m not trying to take credit for everything the company does. I didn’t mean to confuse you.
Simon, I’m sorry you don’t like your parent’s car. The Equinox is much more of a large car than it is a small truck. It’s has a BFI construction, front wheel drive, and multi-link rear end. The squeak and rattle issues… yeah, not great there. I’m surprised that you didn’t like the ride and handling though. Customer feedback has been strong on that. Were you expecting it to ride and handle more like a truck? As for the Torrent, if anyone who makes those decisions had asked for my opinion I would have suggested that we not create the torrent and use that extra money to make the Equinox better and hire someone full time to tell Pontiac dealers: “I’m sorry but the “Driving excitement brand” doesn’t get a grocery-getter-cross-over SUV. If you want that type of car sell them the Buick Rendezvous.” So yeah, I agree with you and on that.
Cohort, I don’t know where you’re reading articles on quality, but here’s some actual data.
http://www.cartest.ca/2005_most_reliable_vehicles.htm
Top 5: Lexus, Porsche, Lincoln, Buick, Cadillac
Bottom 5: Kia, VW, Mini, Land Rover, Isuzu
The industry average score was 237 Problems per hundred Vehicle.
Chevy was slightly better with 232PPH, Ford scored 231PPH and Toyota had 194PPH.
The advertising point is a little outside of my experience. I can tell you that 215million isn’t a very large percentage of our gross revenue and that you have to advertise to improve sales. Look at it this way GM sold about 4million cars and trucks last year. That’s about 50 bucks a vehicle in advertising. That’s why I said it didn’t seem like a lot of money. But that argument boils down to “GM is Big”. It doesn’t really address your point head on. I guess I don’t have any direct information to refute your claim that it’s too much money. It’s a good question and I’m curious. Where did you get that? Did they talk about what the industry average is? I’d definitely like to know more.
How would you measure the effect of TV adds? With all the money involved I’m sure there’s a way. We just need to find it.
I think you’re dead wrong about the new Full sized SUV. The styling is conservative, but let’s sees how they sell. Functionally they’re so much better than the previous model and that was pretty good. I think they’re going to kick ass in the market and to be honest, you’re not really the target buyer.
You’re right about our minivans though. They aren’t competitive. Why did we need 4 different versions of the same thing? Couldn’t the extra money be used to make 2 good ones? But we didn’t do that and that’s why we’re shutting down the plant (Doraville) that makes them. No one was buying and it cost the company a ton of money. I’d call it a product failure. But that’s just my opinion. The people (UAW) getting laid off didn’t have a lot to do with it. They’re just getting screwed. As for the big wigs; They don’t really publicize information on firings but from everything I head they canned and/or demoted the people in charge of that particular project.
How is it that most people can get a point across in ten or twelve words and it takes Tim 7,438?
That why they invented caller I.D.
Simon, you missed one part of your improvement plan, …we can't really do anything except wait for the higher-ups to make and implement a plan that will work. After they say “”Go do this” people at my level have to go and get the job done. Next time I come home I should have a new Tahoe to play with. I’ll try and bring it your place. About all I have for this one for now. I totally agree with you about car commercials. They should feature cars.
Look me up, I'd like to see it.
I'll have to make sure the vehicle is flawless first.
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