CARBIZ

The Act of God will come when the Court orders the contract cancelled. Then the UAW has a choice: strike and possibly bankrupting General Motors and throwing tens of thousands more of their brothers/sisters out of work, or reach a compromise and save both Delphi and GM. We are living in interesting times.

Mustang, you are right on the money, except for one thing: in the 1950s, there were just as many players as now: Studebaker, Packard, Hudson, Nash, and others were all around. Most of them were gone by the early 1960s. It was the 1960s that were GM's hayday. When one model line of Chevrolet could sell more than a million units (1965).

This has been said before, but why isn't the press all over the fact that Toyota and Honda missed the last 10 years of trucks sales? The press pisses all over GM for "missing" the hybrid/gas mileage thing, yet what did they do by buying Daewoo? The Aveo may not be as great on gas as a Civic, but it is a start. I admit this Delphi thing has me concerned, but one would have to give the Board some credit for seeing this thing coming. I believe this is all playing out for the upcoming 2007 UAW talks. The Board can't reveal their bankruptcy plans, quite obviously, because then the media would trumpet that the Board thinks GM is going to go bankrupt. DAMNED IF YOU DO, DAMNED IF YOU DON'T.

Petra: read today's Sun pg 10: GM built 940,044 vehicles in Oshawa (2003) plus another 50,964 at the CAMI plant. Toyota built 227,543 vehicles.

Canada hasn't lost anything to NAFTA and Detroit didn't have to pay tarrifs due to the Auto Pact , but Japan did. The GST was supposed to pay off our debt, remember?

Nobody cared when Philco, Electrohome, RCA, Admiral and all the rest disappeared either.................

Fly, you crack me up....my co workers thought you were serious!

Diesels sell in Europe because they are paying $1.50 and more per litre. Even in Canada, at .85 a litre, it doesn't make sense - yet. Kudos to Chrysler if they are positioning themselves for another spike in gas prices. I personally hope we don't see a return to $1.30 like we saw in September, but I do think sub-dollar prices are a thing of the past. Chrysler is getting smart if they are aligning their products more with Europe than with Detroit. Canadians are buying vehicles that are more like European vehicles anyway. Just look at how many Smart Cars, Echos, etc. you see on the road.

GM hasn't had 50% market share in Canada for a very long time, not for more than 15 to 20 years. Actually, in Canada, I am not sure if GM ever had 50% - mid 40s, maybe. In the GTA, GM is at 16% market share, tied with Toyota. PolishKris, you should be concerned because it is your generation that is all going to work for Wal-Mart because all the industrial jobs will be gone. Toyota can set up shop, ship most of its parts from Japan, assemble the vehicle here, call it North American built and circumvent NAFTA. On a personal note, I simply resent Japanese trade practices. Nothing particular against Toyota, they are just following what any good business would, backed by MITI in Japan, as are Hitachi, Nippon and others. It is Washington and Ottawa who are the idiots. Until they wake up and realize our workers are being used as door mats by Japan Inc. more factories will close and more jobs will be gone. I would like to think that the service industries (banking, IT, insurance, etc.) will pick up the slack, but a country that can't BUILD anything will certainly be at a disadvantage politically, if not economically.

Despite all the sudden press GM is getting about the job losses in Oshawa, the general public still isn't connecting the dots. PolishKris' attitude is indicative of the mood of the people. Do they care if someone who has been working in Oshawa for 15 years gets laid off? Again, the math: 3,900 jobs lost in Oshawa and Toyota picks up 900. Ontario's economy is probably as dependent on the auto industry as Michigan's is, yet people buy their shiny new Toyotas and believe they are buying an import on par with a Chevy. Forget about the history, forget about the billions GM has pumped into the Ontario economy for the past 75 years.

I saw a late '80s Corolla last night when I was out with my dog. They are rare as hell around here, due to rust. Anyway, I remember thinking 15 years ago that the Corolla was just an ugly, boxy car - who would buy one? Fast forward to the present: nobody would say that the Corolla of today is ugly or boxy. Some would argue that it is vanilla or boring, but not ugly. Therein lies the trouble. Even a 2006 Elantra isn't ugly any more. So not only is GM not leading the industry with ground breaking designs (IMO, Chrysler, NIssan and Mazda are doing that), but they aren't surrounded by ugly competitors. Perhaps Wagoner is on the right track. GM will have to get used to 15-20% market share (like in Europe and South America) and will become just another nameplate amongst dozens of others. In my youth, we would never have considered an import. Toyotas and Datsuns were virtually non-existent. VW was for hippies. Audi? BMW? Nobody had heard of them. Now, in my neighborhood, everyone drives an import. Around here, Japanese and German cars account for 80% of what I see parked on the street. Many of us here on C&G lament the passing of GMs great, heady days. Look back to the late '60s Rivieras, the first generation Monte Carlo, almost any year Camaro, the late '60s Bonnevilles, the list goes on.... Those days are over. People only 10 years younger than me grew up with Toyotas and Hondas because their parents had bad experiences with the Big Three in the '80s and have now sworn off them. So now GM has cars that are designed and built as well as their Japanese competition, but they just don't have that extra something that makes people want to drive one. I hope Lutz knows what that something is, because I have to admit that even me - a diehard GM fan, is growing tired of waiting for that KO punch.

Good for you, but our company owns a Toyota store and a GM store and I can tell you from real world, every day experience: Toyota has just as many bodies buried, they just manage to bury them a little deeper. And have you ever seen a Jetta or Gold with two headlights working? Electrical problems galore. I have had people 6 months into their Jetta leases trying to get out of them. Resale value? Compare transaction prices (which the industry jealously guards), but we sell both Toyota and GM. Let me spell this out again: Actual selling price of a 2004 Cavalier $12,999, plus freight taxes and fees. a/c automatic, Cd. In our market (Toronto) you were looking at $16,410 "on the road." The same 2004 Corolla was going to set you back $18,700 plus freight, taxes and fees, for just a hair under $23,000. What is the true resale value of a 20001 Cavalier today (remembering, too, that it is a dropped nameplate now): $5-6,000. And a 2001 Corolla? $11,000. Magic? Wow! You lost $7,500 on the Cavalier and $7,700 on the Corolla. Factor in higher insurance and maintenance (no Dexcool or Dexron in a Corolla) and the numbers will get farther apart. Redbook, black book, blue book - all BS. Dealers, who deal in the real world every day, don't even use them any more.

McGuinty fell all over himself to help Toyota add a new plant in Woodstock that will hire a lousy 900 people, then loses 4,000 jobs in Oshawa/St. Catherines. HELLO? IS ANYBODY AWAKE IN QUEENS PARK? The Oakville Ford plant is practically a museum. But keep on buying your Toyotas, people.

The problem with the Solstice, Impala or any of GM's entries is that GM is juggling too many balls in the air. Not enough money or attention to go around and it is beginning to show. The Solstice is a great car and it will sell to those who either were sick of the Miata or who won't buy imports. If what the critics are saying is true about the Solstice, then shame on GM for not getting it right the first time. Having said that, the Civic is not revolutionary, just evolutionary. Although we can all laugh at the '97 Malibu in hindsight - at the time it was quite a departure for GM. Just ride in a '97 Lumina for comparison. Polish Kris, don't be fooled by all the Civics you see around. In 2004, the Cavalier/Sunfire twins still outsold the vaunted Civic. The reason you see so many Civics around here is twofold: a) Honda has nothing else to sell B) "new Canadians" don't buy American cars. GM knows it. Ford knows it.

The trouble is, the rest of the world has moved on, but America (as portrayed by the Big 2 1/2) hasn't. All over the world there are cool, amazing vehicles - some even being designed and built by American companies, but even if they are brought to America (as in the Maxx platform) they are "dumbed down" for the American market. Maybe American consumes were stupid once. Honda, Nissan and others have proven what American consumers want now. It is time for GM to stop treating North America as an island unto itself and start giving the people what they want: exciting designs and vehicles that handle and perform flawlessly. The Japanese already figured it out. This little SUV and other Opal/Vauxhall designs proves that GM CAN do it. JUST BRING THE DAMNED THINGS HERE. AND DON'T WATER THEM DOWN!!!

If Ralph Nader can do it, anybody can.

I beg to differ: I do blame the media. They cannot get through a single article on any GM product without negatively comparing it to something Japanese. The Toronto Star has even started referring to Toyota as the "#1 auto manufacturer by market valuation." WTF! Although true, why would they buck the normal method of by volume of units? Or GM's tailgate problem on 900,000 units being front page news, yet Toyota's suspension problems on 800,000 trucks (a far greater proportion of sales and a far more serious problem) being buried in the business section? How about an article about the "new" Freestar where the "journalist" takes along a woman who had 2 Windstars and hated them? Most (certainly not all) journalists rank rate vehicles based on what they themselves want to drive - and we all know what snobs they are turning out to be. Gotta have a 5 spd or 6 spd automatic! Why? The article said so. What, the Malibu doesn't come in a standard shift? Must be a bad car! No soft touchy plastic on the dash of an Impala? Who gives a crap? The journalists are comparing everything to an Audi, for Gawd's sake! Any idiot can see the Cobalt is twice the car as the Corolla, but you wouldn't know that from the gushing reviews of the Corolla. And I would know, I drive Corollas and Cobalts all the time! I've used this analogy time and time again: The New York Movie Critics have tirelessly voted Citizen Kane as the "greatest American movie" ever made. Fine. HOw many people have gone out and rented or bought the DVD, only to realize it is one of the driest, darkest POS ever made? But that is what the movie critics like - hardly indicative of what the American public would want to watch if they had a choice. Now before you jump all over that remark, the American car buying public DOESN'T have a choice. They are being bombarded with bullshit and misinformation all over the dial. The internet is only making things worse. I see it all the time: fresh off the plane from wherever, they don't have a clue what car to buy, but every damned article they read shouts TOYOTA. What do they know? They buy the car because that is what they are told to. Look at VW, as another example. Their cars are crappy - have been for many years. They break down, they are tempermental and a fortune to maintain; however, the media loves them because they handle and peform great. JD Powers reflects how badly VW's fortunes have fallen, yet you ask people and they will say that VWs are a great car? Why, because that is what they were told! Of course, GM isn't faultless in this mess, but I work in the trenches and I have to deal with people who are being bombarded with messages that GM builds unattractive, gas guzzling vehicles (the National Post just passed this quote along from DesRosier Marketing today). What disappoints me most is that GM has been unable (dare I say unwilling?) to combat this problem of perception versus reality.

The idea has merits, however. As gas hits $4 a gallon, there are a lot of cute vehicles under the Opel and Vauxhall nameplates that would sell here, especially in Canada. My buddies in Sao Paulo are driving a Chevy Astra - what a fun, great looking car. Why can't we have something like that here?

Strange way to show support! I am almost getting tired of this arguing. If you cannot see that spending $30,000 on the second largest purchase you will ever make, and sending that money to Japan, is going to damage the American economy then, sir, you need a lesson in economics. For the record, I am in favor of Free Trade, except that Japan doesn't practice it. The U.S. buys something like 17 million vehicles a year. Even if we conservatively work out the average price at $20,000 per unit (and I am sure that number is very low, considering all the trucks sold!), that works out to be 340 BILLION dollars every year. Even if half that money leaves the U.S. in the form of profits and parts bought from Japan, that is a lot of money. Add that to the current U.S current account deficit and you have a real formula for disaster! I just shake my head at all this. I am Canadian and I can see quite clearly how dangerous it is to by Japanese. Just look at what they did to the electronics industry 30 years ago. If you can't see that this is a relentless, unerring juggernaut, aided and abetted by the U.S. media, well....history will prove me right.

GM lays off 3,800 in Oshawa while Toyota hires 800 in Woodstock. This is what we have been talking about - GM, Ford and Chrysler still employ many times more than Japan Inc, yet the consumer still doesn't get it. KEEP BUYING THOSE TOYOTAS, KIDS. WE CAN ALL GO WORK FOR WAL-MART

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ Did anybody expect anything different from them?

I'd move. That many experiences is obscene.

Don't feel like a sucker. Half the time these deals are just smoke and mirrors. Know this: in the summer there will be deals to clear out the previous year's models and before Christmas there will be deals to get through a slow period of the year. As a general rule, the best time to BUY is June/July (the deals could get better in August, but there won't be a lot left) and the best time to LEASE is December (the residuals drop in January or Feb., so get in before that happens). There, Car Buying 101. Besides, never buy a DVD player, TV or VCR and see it on sale for $50 less a week later? Make your decision when to buy, do it and move on.....

Hell, you can roll a Corvette if you try hard enough. North America is gripped with victim insanity and our stupid liablilty laws (plus lawyers too eager to lend a hand) only make it worse. Just like all the states that won't lease cars because the leasing company becomes liable in a lawsuit. Stupid, just stupid.

How about a $19,300 ($C!!) that we were selling a few months ago? Even now, a base Uplander will SELL for $22,000 or so, plus the usual freight, taxes and fees. The Odyssey and Sienna are nearly ten grand more! And has anybody noticed how all the manufacturers have snuck up their freight charges? Just a year or so ago, most freight charges were $950 or so, now most of the trucks are up over $1,100 and I noticed that Honda and Toyota are following suit. Clever, very clever. "Sir, the advetised price is $19,999, plus freight of $8,500." Can that really be so far fetched?