GM ending employee discount promotion.

[spi-ti-tout]

Sometimes the myopia is awful !!
Chrysler was bought out and is owned by German company.
Ford's car designs are taken from the drawing boards of Eureop 2 years later.
GM does the same
Where is this "natural competition" - we live in a multi-national world - yor competition is the producer of the best PRODUCT not hte nearest factory, that ended decades ago.

National competition - the brands on the face of the world, as set nearly a century (or more) ago!
For example , whenever (generalizing to 80% of the world who see cars) someone thinks of Aston Martin, they don't think - "hey, Ford!" do they? They think of British Engineering
Similarly usually when people look at Ford or Chevy on first-hand reaction "it's an American car" - might not be true but "it is American Engineering"
I don't think I need to say this but just to get the point across whenever somebody sees the Corolla/Civic - "it's Japanese!"
Natural competition on the simple first face of the car industry - take a look at it from other peoples POV's because it seems the non-car fans outnumber the car fans 10-1 and look which part is obviously buying more cars.

talk abotu ownage..............
Honda -- inferior - what a load of BS !!!
And the rest is bla bla bla I already knew.....

Matra you n00b, what the hell do you think I put double-inverted commas there for?

Now you're just looking silly.
What are you on about ????

Alright - the GM car industry
Just HOW many brands do GM have under their roof?
About more than 6, right?
All owned by the same people.
So I was just saying that it would be nice to see them split and for other peole to get them and possibly see some stronger competition and bolder designs, and if not that than atleast a change. Having GM as US Car Industry's as far as ownership applies is getting boring and it's time to see some change. Basically Esperante's post said by me.

Yes, thank you. You don't have to tell everybody that was self-directed ()

[piston_burner]

The GM employee discount sale was a great marketing move. I have read reports showing people really are not saving that much more then they did before the sale. GM had heavy rebates out there before this sale. It was more like GM shifted the money around and offered no hassle fixed pricing. That appeals to a lot of new car buyers. I know to many people who sat through 2-3 hour haggle sessions to get price for the car they wanted to buy. The non-fixed price system is a great way for dealers to squeeze buyers and confuse buyers.

Looking at the big picture, GM and Ford face long term issues that will require a lot more then slick sales jobs. It was great to get rid of inventory that had been sitting around, but GM and Ford profits are much smaller then Honda or Toyota. Since GM and Ford have heavy pension plans to deal with they are selling cars just to keep up with that. This is a bad pattern. Money that should going to grow the company are going to try to keep up with pension plans and medical benefits. Combine these issues with making sub standard quality cars for the past 30 years and it is killing Ford and GM.

These days Ford and GM are both making much better cars then they had been. This has been proven in a variety of studies. The problem is when buyers have been burned , they are less likely to come back. Toyota and Honda have been making people happy for last 30 years in North America. This has created a large following of consumers who do not even think twice about buying another Toyota or Honda. I know some people who do not bother to see what else is out on the market. If they need a truck, they buy a Toyota. If they need a station wagon, they buy a Toyota. They need a luxury sedan, they buy a Toyota/Lexus. If you ask them what other brands offer cars they could have bought, they do not know. They are happy just buying Toyota's because they been a great vehicle for them.

Personally, I do not believe in brand loyality. The worst thing a consumer can do is buy products just because it is from a company they feel loyality towards. In a free market economy, the way to get companies to work harder is buy only buying the best products. This forces companies that make junk to get better. This is exactly what has been happening to Ford and GM. I use to be a "Buy American Only" person back in the 1980s. As I studied more about the industry and looked at how Ford, GM, and Chrysler handle things, it become obvious loyal customers where getting screwed and it was their old ways that causing many issues. Lee Iacocca would bash the Japanese in the press and then partner up with them to make cars.

As GM, Ford, and Chrysler abandoned American workers, the Japanese were moving into the United States to open factories. The NUMMI plant in Fremont, California (Located about 20 miles SE of San Francisco) was a Pontiac plant that GM had shutdown after being unable to turn a profit for over a decade there. Toyota told GM, you give us the plant, we will manage it and make cars for us as well as GM. The brass at GM thought Toyota was insane. Twenty years later the NUMMI plant is humming right along making tons of cars and lots of money. Proof it is more about the management style then the workers.

If you look across the United States, Honda, Nissan, Toyota, BMW, Mercedes, Kia, VW, and others are running factories in the United States. Ford, GM, and Chrysler had blamed the workers, but it is clear the leaders of the big three during the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, were more to blame then the workers. It is impossible to blame just managers, but they did play a big role in what has happened.

As far Ford and GM buying up brands, that was good thing. Jagaur needed a large owner to give them the resources they needed. While the Jaguar/Ford mix has been roller coaster ride, many feel Jaguar is better then ever. Ford has benefited from their purchase of Mazda. GM has benefited from their purchased of Subaru.

As the Chinese become a large player in the automotive market, manufactures outside of China need to become bigger and better. We have seen in the past few years Chinese manufactures are buying western companies. It is just a matter of time before the Chinese try to buy a major automotive brand such as BMW, FIAT, etc. It is essential to be a multinational company now.

As far as being more original, that is something consumers love with the exterior but hate with the mechanical side of a car. Companies that manage to build original looking cars with proven parts that can be worked on by the local dealer is what sells. People are buying Scions because they know it is a Toyota inside and it has a unique look on the outside.

It was interesting to see how BMW furnished engines used by McLaren (a supercar buidler), Range Rover (a 4X4 builder), Rolls Royce (a ultra luxury car builder), in addition to their own cars. VW is starting do that with W engine design. The Bugatti Veyron has a W engine, Audi uses a W engine, and ofcourse VW brand of cars has the W engine. This pattern of making great technology and then spreading across brands of all price ranges is the way things are working for now and will likely not change anytime soon.

GM and Ford have been getting better about coming out with more original cars. The new Solstice is fun car. Some may say the new Mustang is not that original, but it is a car that does not look like any other new cars out there. Cadillac's XLR is cool design.

I do not see GM getting bought out buy any company in the next 20 years. I know there has been a wealthy guy trying to buy controlling interest in GM, but odds are GM will remain GM for decades to come. They are working on changing and as long as they keep improving, they will survive. They fell behind because previous managers did not invest in improvements. I do believe of the Western manufactures, the day will come when there are only 5 companies. Toyota, Ford, GM and who will make up the other two, I am not sure.

The success of GM and Ford is not as simple as one item being fixed. They have a lot issues to deal with, but if they do what Toyota and Honda did, focus on making the best car possible in the most effective way possible, the other issues will get fixed. The challnege is that stock holders have to be willing to wait 10 years to see the pay off for building a better car year after year.

[Matra et Alpine]

National competition - the brands on the face of the world, as set nearly a century (or more) ago!

Spi, you picked up on ALL the wrong points
The remionder on ownershipand multinational was coz you called Damiler/Chrysler AMERICAN

Matra you n00b, what the hell do you think I put double-inverted commas there for?

coz you didnt' beleive but some people DO ?
hence the clarification perhaps ????
It seemed odd that the sentence opened with the surpsise of being beaten. erm it's down to quality for the price

Alright - the GM car industry
Just HOW many brands do GM have under their roof?

IF you split GM up then platform sharing becomes very diffcult. Sharing design experience and patents become a COSTLY nightmare.
So you'd end up with 6 inadequately funded development and design houses and all failing to deliver global cars.
What DOES seem to be missing from GM is any real leadership in design across the board. So too may similar and common deliverables rather than ensuring breadth they just seem to populate the spots more densely and as you say "boring" (generally). BUT most folks dont' mind boring as long as it's cheap and efficient - but I'm not sure they hit those buttons either

[Orefus]

OMG! my autos teacher works for GM, i asked him about it, and he gave me some Stock Bonds taht are low crap, and that gm wont go bankrupt. What a teacher... he didint teach us anything! Wow, all he did was make up stories, im gona laugh at him next time i c him!.

[CSL]

GM will probably be bought by DCX or Ford (more likely Ford imo). Or maybe it will recover, who knows?

GM will be bought by no one

[Esperante]

GM will be bought by no one

No, but parts of it might get picked apart by other people. If GM continues in the direction it's going, it will need to sell off something in order to stay alive. It's either sell your dying business and make money or just die and lose money. I'm not saying this is the case that will happen, I'm saying it's what would likey happen if it were closer to bankruptcy.

[piston_burner]

GM could be bought someday. The key will be how they handle their business. If they keep making bad moves and getting out done by the competition, they will eventually be weak and taken over. This will not happen overnight. People use to say Rolls Royce would never be sold, but it did. Rumors were floating around that FIAT was up for sale and that GM might be the one to do it. That rumor died when GM sold off their 30% holding in FIAT. The reality was GM needed money and FIAT was dead weight.

If GE continues to grow, they may turn around and take GM over. If GM is not careful, a Chinese builder may buy them someday.

These are not happy thoughts, but it is possible. The worst thing people can do it to say it will never happen. Time and time again never fails to hold up. Business history is filled with statements of never that in the end failed. When little old Toyota came to America, GM brass said their nothing and never will be a threat to them. Now Toyota is on their way to become the largest builder in the world.

I hope both Ford and GM get their acts together so we do have to go through what the British have gone through. There is basically all the major auto manufactures that were started in Britian are now owned by companies from other parts of the world. It is kind of creepy to think two of the nations who caused the world so much trouble in WWII are now the home to the top manufactures who are buying up British and American companies.