As for future decisions, I wish GM would work to partner more with Hyundai instead of Daewoo, Suzuki and Isuzu.

The future seems to be in producing good cars in Korea for the U.S. market and selling high-end cars in China. Japan, at least for now, doesn't seem to be the source of affordable products or a good market to sell U.S.-made products.

I know GM has a lot of UAW labor cost problems, but it sure seems like GM could repeat the magic of the 50's and 60's by building a factory and staffing it with 18-23 year olds fresh out of school and tired of working for $10 an hour at Best Buy.

Time will tell.......

Joe

You're kind of missing the point and still assuming that price is the primary decision factor in new car purchases--it's a complex mix of many factors: economy, price, image, performance, reliability, practicality, features, fun, etc. It isn't that Buick is overlooking a market, but rather choosing not to target it for a reason. I certainly didn't want to spend a lot of money on my new car, but I was willing to spend as much as necessary in order to get a car that really lit my fires. A used Toyota Corolla would have gotten me from point A to point B just as well as my new luxury car, but I spent more to get a car I loved and it was worth every penny. I don't even think about the price anymore. That is 100% value proposition in action. A more expensive car was worth it to me despite the fact that a cheap car could do most of the same things for a lot less money. The big car offered me what I wanted beyond simple dollars and cents.

Also, where are these kids getting the money for new cars? High school students buying new cars? Really? That seems like an infintessimally small market relative to the guys shopping for a $30,000 car (check out this article to see new-car buyer demographics). In fact, younger people are buying fewer new cars than ever. Spending more money to chase a small and still shrinking market with small profit margins is probably a bad idea. In your experience, if your buddies wanted Buicks, they'd be driving Buicks. They didn't want Buicks, didn't see the value in buying a Buick (of course image and reputation are factors), and I bet making them cheaper wouldn't have changed their minds. An extra $40/month on a 60-month loan wasn't the dealbreaker.

We need to look at it from the manufacturer's point of view and what works best to make money. GM has finally realized that trying to make all brands all things to all people is what got them in this pickle in the first place. For the past 30 years, every single division had a bunch of badge-engineered cars that were pretty much the same. Even over the past 10 years, just about every GM brand had a small car, at least one mid-sized FWD sedan with a V6, a minivan, and a TrailBlazer-based SUV. When Cadillac started selling Avalanches, you knew things were getting out of hand (thank God for rappers and pro athletes, right Cadillac?). When you spread your R&D and marketing dollars across so many product lines, you get a bunch of mediocre cars instead of one great one, which is what we got. How big a piece of crap was the Buick Terrazza? Did anyone even buy one?

The GM hierarchy was successful because there were dilenations between the brands that showed a marked step up. There's just no reason Chevy and Buick should both offer inexpensive cars economy cars to teenagers (especially since they're both GM--why compete with yourself?). You want an inexpensive GM car, you shop at the Chevy store, and you aspire to a Buick when you've attained some level of success. If price was all there was to it, why build Cadillacs at all? If teenagers are where all the money is, why isn't everyone building Honda Civic clones with fart pipe mufflers?

The point is, Buicks aren't Chevys and shouldn't be priced like Chevys. Anyone remember the Cadillac Cimarron? That's what you get when you go down market with an up-market brand and try to make an inexpensive high-end car. It doesn't make more money, it kills the goose that lays the golden egg when your hard-earned market positioning is absolutely destroyed. That Cimarron chased more Cadillac Seville buyers out of showrooms than it lured Chevy buyers in, and ultimately cost GM millions. If cheap was all people wanted, why wasn't it a smashing success? Because it is, and always has been, about value (which /= inexpensive). As I said, you can't discount your way to profitability.

Take the VW Phaeton as another example. In all regards a wonderful car (nice enough to have become a $180,000 Bentley). Except that pesky VW badge on the trunk and asking guys who spent $100,000+ on a new car to have their car serviced in the same facility with Bob's smoking 1979 Rabbit diesel and the sales experience delivered by the same 25-year-old salesperson selling $20,000 Jettas. It just didn't work. Buick's customers don't want that, either.

With profit margins being what they are, GM would definitely rather sell 1 $30K car over 2 $15K cars. They probably make more money. Otherwise, why did they virtually abandon their economy car lines in favor of trucks? I guarantee one Lucerne has more profit in it than 2 Cobalts, especially after discounts and rebates. Skyking is right in saying that GM is hobbled by legacy costs--they can't build small cars nearly as profitably as Hyundai who pays their workers $5/hour. The inexpensive car market is extremely cutthroat with margins sometimes in the $100s of dollars (not thousands). Buick has no business there.

Matt,

As for high school grads getting new cars, the secret is in the financing. For years, the motto at Mitsubishi dealers was "if you have a pulse, you get a loan."

There is several down-side aspects to this, as Mitsubishi finance has found out the hard way. The biggest are that you get about double the repos (4-6% instead of the usual 1-3%) and you get a lot of trashed-out cars coming back from people who couldn't afford an oil change or to fix a broken tail light. That results in a lower perception of your cars, and it hits your resale value.

There are some rumors that other makes with their own finance companies are trying this gimmick of "pulse=car" and I'm sure they will get the same results.

It is tempting for car companies to do this; for several years, GMAC has made a much bigger profit than the manufacture of cars at GM. Sad, huh? You have to make the cars at little to no profit so you can clean up on the loan.

Some of what Matt stated got me thinking....

Who bought GS and GSX's new? Who bought GNs and GNXs for that matter? I would think that having an exciting car would bring folks into the showrooms...but will they buy? What will they buy? Does the lure product entice folks to buy something that is more suitable for them from the same brand / dealer?

I just can't believe that there is a big lure to a Buick dealer when there are 2 sedans and a crossover. Of course, if you want those, or are making a comparison with competing brands, it doesn't hurt to look. If you don't fit into what is sold at that dealership though, you are pretty much out of luck.

Things were very different if you look back at say the '50s. You could get a car line (e.g. Special, Century, Super, and Roadmaster) with multiple variations. So, if you had a Special budget, you could decide whether you needed 2 or 4 doors, sedan or sportier hardtop, convertible or wagon. If you wanted a bit more performance, but still in a Buick, you looked at the Century. If you wanted luxury / opulence without going to Cadillac or Lincoln, you opted for the Roadmaster. The problem today is that GM is saying we still have (most of) those, but unless you can get to a full line dealer with a good selection of a variety of models, you won't get the choice that GM has to offer. Locally, we have more of the dealership groups, whereby an ownership group has all the dealerships (big three and imports) all in one relative location...so if Joe's Buick doesn't cut it for you, you can go 100 yards (perhaps they even have a golf cart to move you) to go to Joe's Honda or Joe's Toyota. Joe still makes the money if he makes a sale, any sale, so he perhaps doesn't care as much what brand you buy. I believe my local dealer (I haven't been there since the amalgamation and renovations though) is now pretty much a full line GM dealer, as they were Chev / Cadillac and Pontiac / Buick / GMC that combined...I don't know if they have Saturn or the other brands though.

So, the end result is that someone may not step into a Buick dealership at all since they don't think the dealer has something to offer them or the customer thinks their time is too valuable to go to 18 different dealers, particularly with online research available these days.

Anyway, that's probably enough blathering for now. At least for me, having a family, so long as the Enclave stays in production, I'll have a new Buick that seems to offer me some value (i.e. meets my needs).

I wonder about that GM Hierarchy concept and how long it worked as has been described here. In the 50's Dad went from a Plymouth to a series of used Buicks. He had a 55 when he bought a new Olds 98 in 1960. Later, when I was 13 or so the 55 Buick came back with us and we became a 2 car family.

My brothers loved that Olds. And I'll admit, it could burn the treads right off the right side tire. But I loved the Buick, with the stick shift and airplane control heater levers. It may not have burned rubber but moving it was so much sweeter with that 3 speed whine.

Later Dad went for a 65 Electra as our good car, and bought a 66 Delta 88 for the kids to drive. But I drove the Buick. And my brother drove the Olds. We each loved the brand at that point and here-in lies my point.

Dad was vascilating between GM marquees on and off. Who knew he secretly desired a Merceedes Benz in the end? But my brothers today love Oldsmobiles, while I stick by my Buicks. At least I can still buy a new one, but both my brothers switched to fords when the Oldsmobile line died.

So maybe the hierarch worked for several generations but I suspect by the time the baby boomers came along, people were getting hooked on the brand they first drove. Show me a Chevy guy and I'll show you someone who won't know a Buick if he tripped over it. And from that perspective only, Jstbecause has a point. That being; if there's any fact to this, then a younger generation that cannot experience a Buick first, will not want a Buick later.

I do recogonize that for each Division of GM to produce a similar sized car in each price range is a recipe for disaster as the lines wind up in competition. But when the lines competed at first the cars were really individuals. Lately they have just been a conglomeration of parts with different skin panels.

Hey, here's an idea, build one car in each size and price range and rotate the badges....One year it's a Chevy, the next year it's a Pontiac etc.

As the story goes, both my Parents had Buicks as their first cars, don't really know why. My Aunt always had Fords, just to spite my Dad, and she bought a new '64 Riviera and had troubles with it, including the windows not working in the rain at Pikes Peak, she immediately went back to Ford, and then when my parents bought a '71 Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser wagon, 2bbl 455 with no A/C!, the '70 Estate wagon with A/C was too expensive for them at the time, my Aunt bought a Olds 98, which they had longer, I think she might have even bought another, but eventually went back to a wannabe new t-bird, as she had always wanted one back in the day. So at least Chris, my Brother, and I and my Parents are all still driving Buicks, except for my Company Cars which lately have been Cadillacs, I'd rather drive my "new" Riviera, with 169K miles than a new Caddy, isn't that something to say about Buicks?
Oh, well, hopefully someday, they in their great wisdom at GM will come up with something that is as good as the has been Buicks and not give it up, we can only hope!
This is my opinion not that of my employer, I have to say that.

Roberta,

Your feelings DO say a lot about where Buick is now, and unfortunately, I don't think GM knows it has happened or how they got there.

Gone, it seems, are the days when a car model was developed with two-door models along with four doors. And forget about a four-door hardtop!

Nowdays, GM (as well as Ford and Chrysler) seem to spend a lot of time talking about introducing ONE new car, when they used to introduce new or freshened car lines EVERY year.

And, of course, when introducing a name no one has heard of, we MUST kill off a name with a 40+ year legacy (Lesabre vs. Lacrosse). I can't help but wonder why, if Chevy can produce their previous generation pickup at the same time they produce their latest generation pickup, why Buick didn't keep the Lesabre and Park Avenue in production longer while introducing the Lacrosse to the public?

Oh well, at least Buick is selling well in China......

Speaking of killing names, there seems to be no consistency within GM--they want both tradition and to seem "new" and cutting edge. Chevy killed the Impala and Monte Carlo in favor of the Lumina, then killed the Lumina to bring back the Impala and Monte Carlo for its "traditional" buyers. Buick killed the old LeSabre and Park Avenue names in favor of Lacrosse and Lucerne. Cadillac has made their cars virtually undeciperhable--XLR, CTS, STS, DTS, XTC or GTX or USB or whatever that smaller SUV is called--I honestly don't know. I read six different car magazines every month and often don't have a clue what domestic luxury cars are called when I see them on the street (I just call the XLR the Cadillac Corvette and the STS a Seville and the Cadillac Avalanche a crime against nature).

Those crappy alpha-numeric names aren't helping anyone attach themselves to the brand. I don't care if it's more "Euro", GM isn't building European cars. What the heck does "Lacrosse" give Buick's image except a term that our Canadian friends can snicker at?

The Europeans, whom the luxury brands are ostensibly trying to copy, at least have some logic in their naming systems. A Mercedes-Benz S420 is a large sedan with a 4.2 liter engine. A BMW 540i is a mid-sized sedan with a 4.0 liter engine. Put an "x" in there before the "i", and it means that it has AWD. Both of them have been doing it that way for decades and haven't felt the need to change with the times because of marketing.

At least they're not as bad as the bumbling idiots running Lincoln. Identify one Lincoln model name besides the Navigator or Town Car. Bet you can't.

I'm in marketing, but I don't have an MBA like the guys making these decisions. Maybe I'm the rube and buyers are really responding to these moronic letters and numbers...

Matt,

It reminds me of the stupidity of naming non-existing ingredients in products back in the late 50s and 60s.

Breath mints would have something called ZL-7 or XL-2 or something stupid. Consumers saw cartoon stomachs with a Rolaids or Tums dropped into it, and suddenly the arrows going in every direction went away and the cartoon man started smiling.

Of course, real words (or semi-real words) don't mean anything either. Just what IS an Aveo??? The first time I saw it, I thought it ryhmed with Beano.... Maybe I should be glad they didn't call it a Chevette? I used to call those Shove-its.

And yes, I can name a Lincoln other than the Town Car and Navigator....it is the MKXZLQKUYT....with magic ZL-7 of course!

I have felt the same way for a long time now. They should just leave names on cars never mind these stupid letter combinations. There are probably 3 or 4 Lucernes. I have no freekin idea which letter combination is the best of all of them. Therefore, I am not even planning on buying a car until I know what the hell I am buying. If I do not know, how is anyone looking at the car going to know what the hell it is. It could be a Buick or a jap car.

Another pet peeve: What is with all of these little pictures on the dash? I do not like the fact that they show something that looks like a half circle with lines out from it and it means lights, etc, etc, etc. Just put the thing in English words. It is a lot faster than trying to figure out all of the little stupid pictures.

Just my peeves.

Stevo

Stevo,

You would probably like the Buick Allure, then.

Take a look, and be sure to have your speakers turned up and enjoy the music:

http://www.gm.ca/gm/english/vehicles/buick/allure/feature01

Well, I assume the Allure must be the Canadian version of the LaCrosse. Still screwed up as far as I am concerned. Too many symbols, and letters for the different models of the Allure. Some pictures show portholes and some do not. More confusion. Bring back the model separation with different bodys and names.

All in all, it looks nice for a little car. It reminds me of the Regal GSE my wife had about 10 years ago 1999 I think.

Stevo

Stevo, you might have to press "1" first.

Joe, it looks like a Lacrosse. Can't they come up with anything different????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Well with all this discussion about names, I only have this to say. 'Invicta', ahhh, dashing, passion, boldness. 'LeSabre', ooohhhh, bold, daring, spirited. 'Electra 225', wow!, class, adventure, luxury. 'LaCrosse', what the f#*@^ is that?? Some wimpy European stick and ball game???? How the hell does that relate to Buick. Need I go on? I think you get the picture. All cookie cutter four door sedans. UUUGGGHHH!!!

Sky, they had to rename the Lacrosse in Canada because "lacrosse" is a slang term for, erm, not being the master of one's own domain (a clean-ish Seinfeld reference--Google it for clarification).

All,

The Allure IS the Lacrosse in Canada. It seems, uh, they, uh, found out after the Lacrosse name was selected, that, uh, it has a........different meaning in French slang. And it ain't nice!

As for advertising messages go, I sure could be a lot more allured into buying an Allure than I could be crossed into buying a Lacrosse.

Wonder what the next Buick is going to be called.....the Rugby?

Stevo,
So you're telling us you're not destined to work a cash register at McDonalds anytime soon??

Oh, if you dislike pressing "1" first, you may find some of this bars marquee messages humorous. http://www.casadice.com/signs/
WARNING: Even though these are photos of a sign on a public road, some wording is harsh. If you're easily offended, don't bother looking.

Talking about cash registers, give the modern generation some additional change after their register tells them how much to give you back after making your purchase. I do it on purpose just to see them get that look of fear and bewilderment in their eyes.

You know, I remember when they started this crap and added the picture of a cigarette on the lighter. That was a little too much.

Did the other chapter from the Burg do the Mars thing? I heard it was called off.

Stevo

Wow, that guy at Casa D'ice really tells it like it is and doesn't pull any punches.

I hate to interrupt a good rant with the facts, but I believe "Invicta" is from Latin, "Electra" from Greek, and "LeSabre" from French. And yes, the Allure is the same vehicle because of Quebecois slang, but GM knew that before the vehicle launched and decided to only change the name in part of the market.

He certainly seems to enjoy putting his stupid on display...

I think Buick should have kept LeSabre, Invicta & Electra. Those were the best names they had so far...............

Well I have really got things going this time, I like doing that from time to time.

I have got relations down in the McKeesport/Duquesne/Monroeville/South Side area. I do not remember this place unless it is a fairly new name. We used to go to a bar in a K-Mart Plaza down there that had a lot of hub caps hanging on the walls. Same Place..? I do not know.I'll be down that way sometime in November, I will have to look around.

stevo

It's on RT 30 near the K-Mart plaza at the corner of RT 30 and 48. I've never been inside, but I get a real kick out of his signs. I'm waiting for the sign that says "Please read this entire sign as the message has recently changed".

I haven't heard about the tour...you'd have to ask them.