Ford vs GM manufacturing capacity

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Yes, the cars that GM is making for nobody are some of their best cars ever. Sad. However the market is the master here. Maybe the pendulum will swing back, and cars will be popular again?

Very hard to justify spending billions on new product development when the buyers are so fickle.
 
Yes … the Impala has a sharp front end … they could of updated the plain Jane rear … after all, that's what other drivers (consumers) stare at in traffic …
 
The new Impala is nice looking and GM's reliability has gotten a lot better (with the exception of a few models). That said, the trend unfortunately has gone to SUV's / Trucks.

I read an article a little while ago that explained that folks liked the utility, extra space and sitting higher up on the road. After having a couple of SUV's and a Van I can tell you I would never go back to a car again for these same reasons. Also because when the snow is deep here there are tons of stuck cars on the side streets when the SUV's and most vans are just fine.

For those that prefer a car or haven't found the need / preference for an SUV/Van the Koreans and Japanese seem to have this market nailed down after decades of stealing marketshare away from the big 3 which had really poor offerings or poor reliability during this same time (for the most part).
 
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GM had a large assembly plant nearby here that made big SUVs (Chevy Trailblazer, GMC Envoy, etc) and in the mid-2000s, SUVs sales were declining and gas prices were up, so GM shut it down. It employed around 2500 people at that time. Today, SUVs are hugely popular - look at Ford's short-term plans. They're getting rid of almost all of their "cars". Are plant closures the smartest thing ? Maybe not.... For the cities or towns they are in, they can be disastrous but the folks at the top of GM, Ford, etc don't give a ***'s [censored] about that whatsoever.

I grew up in Lima OH where Ford has an engine plant. I remember when sales slowed or they had to make an engine model changeover (back then, that took months). The employees were simply "laid off" and rec'd 90% of their pay to sit at home, go on vacation, fish, etc. This is different, I realize, because these folks knew they were going back to work after a brief shutdown. Could GM decrease production with fewer working employees while the excess were laid off ? They couldn't do that for years, of course, but it might be doable. Some folks might move on and even if they did, they'd still have dibs on a job as production increased and they were needed back. Maybe it's not practical to operate with (too many) fewer employees.
 
I have been told for years the real money was in truck sales .

Really sad to see GM & Ford abandon the sedan market . That is what this sounds like .
 
Originally Posted by WyrTwister
I have been told for years the real money was in truck sales .

Really sad to see GM & Ford abandon the sedan market . That is what this sounds like .


What it sounds like is not enough sedan sales for Ford or GM. How is that abandoning?
 
My bet is that they won't completely abandon sedans. I think they'll focus on trucks and use some of the proceeds to develop a range of practical electric vehicles. Then, when the market is ready, they'll introduce them. They were burned badly in the situation of 2007 and were caught unprepared. I suspect they've learned lessons from that and will hedge their bets in product development, even if those products don't just yet hit the road. I also think we'll see some of those technologies show up in the trucks. Jeep, for example, is full tilt on developing a plug in hybrid Wrangler.

The other factor is that we're on the verge of a revolution in vehicle propulsion and they need to make a major shift to prepare for it if they are to survive. New competitors are ready to appear, so there is a great deal of unknown ahead. Again, I think they are preparing for all of this.

I'd love to be a fly on the wall in these board rooms. These are exciting times!
 
Sitting in the dental waiting area .. game show host says "a new car" !!!!

Look up and it's a frog looking KIA ...

Welcome to 2019 ...
 
Originally Posted by WyrTwister
Really sad to see GM & Ford abandon the sedan market . That is what this sounds like .


Why is it sad? Consumers are abandoning sedans. Just like they abandoned hatches and wagons (ok, morphed into the CUV but you get the drift).

When the perennial kings - Honda Accord and Toyota Camry are having trouble selling them (well documented) you know the segment is not long for this world.
 
Originally Posted by hallstevenson
GM had a large assembly plant nearby here that made big SUVs (Chevy Trailblazer, GMC Envoy, etc) and in the mid-2000s, SUVs sales were declining and gas prices were up, so GM shut it down. It employed around 2500 people at that time. Today, SUVs are hugely popular - look at Ford's short-term plans. They're getting rid of almost all of their "cars". Are plant closures the smartest thing ? Maybe not.... For the cities or towns they are in, they can be disastrous but the folks at the top of GM, Ford, etc don't give a ***'s [censored] about that whatsoever.

I grew up in Lima OH where Ford has an engine plant. I remember when sales slowed or they had to make an engine model changeover (back then, that took months). The employees were simply "laid off" and rec'd 90% of their pay to sit at home, go on vacation, fish, etc. This is different, I realize, because these folks knew they were going back to work after a brief shutdown. Could GM decrease production with fewer working employees while the excess were laid off ? They couldn't do that for years, of course, but it might be doable. Some folks might move on and even if they did, they'd still have dibs on a job as production increased and they were needed back. Maybe it's not practical to operate with (too many) fewer employees.



It does not work like this. Companies will only employ the bear minimum needed to reach production goals. Like I said fewer consumers are buying vehicles and the truck market in the US has overtaken the sedan market. Fewer vehicles are bought and factories are becoming more automated.

Car manufactures have to downsize their work force and the demand for vehicles in the US is not coming back. It is better this way because when the new millennials get in a car they are not driving they are in their phone's.
 
Are these assembly lines capable of producing other vehicles? A lot of modern assembly lines have multiple models coming off the same line.
 
GM sedan fanboys sound like my customers.
They talk big but never buy. Why else would these cars get discontinued???

With all the GM news lately I noticed how old and tired the GM emblem looks.
Took me right back to the 70's
 
Originally Posted by KGMtech
Yes, the cars that GM is making for nobody are some of their best cars ever.

-1
 
The automation part I don't dispute at all. The Ford engine plant used to employ 2000-3000 people when I was younger. Today, it's in the 600-700 employees (production workers, to be clear) and they produce more engines on a daily basis than they ever did in the past.

It does seem like vehicle assembly plants still need lots of people as they can't automate these processes anywhere near as much. Yes, they have a lot of equipment that assists workers (folks aren't lifting a door, holding it place, while another person secures it, etc) but there's still a lot of people involved.
 
I remember 30 years ago my uncle bought a Chevy Celebrity wagon and said he doesn't know why sedans exist anymore since wagons have superior utility. Ironically his next car was a Camry sedan. Funny to see how the market evolved in those 30 years
 
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