Click On Detroit – July 17, 2006:
The Wall Street Journal has offered its own solution to America’s auto problem by combining the “big two” and creating the “big one,” according to Local 4 business editor Rod Meloni.
“Now is the time for their conservative minds to consider something truly transformational: a merger of General Motors and Ford Motor,” the paper reported.
On the upside, the Journal said a combined Ford and GM would emerge stronger and more able to attack both sets of legacy costs. Together they will attain a staggering 40 percent of North American market share, Local 4 reported.
And by cutting brands such as Buick, Pontiac and Mercury, it will allow the major company to focus on better-selling brands, the station reported.
I think this is all they can do, to compete with cheap labor and such.
Or maybe they could innovate and create new vehicles that people want to buy?
Exactly. brains and style, not size, will determine success.
Seems more likely the Renault — Nissan — GM merger will go ahead. Though that’s kind of the blind leading the rigid leading the incompetent — when it comes to the US market.
Ford may be slow to respond to market pressures; but, compared to GM, at least they seem to notice they’re out there!
Combining two struggling companies wont fix anything! The only way this works is if Honda or Toyota buys them. This is a interesting problem, as Ford and GM plunge, just imagine the impact on the US if they go under??
Why don’t they just merge with LADA and complete the circle of crap?
Sounds somewhat similar to the definition of the term “Dinosaurs Mating“.
I suspect that Congress would not allow this merger because of the reduced competition. Getting bigger is not the solution. IMO they should have never allowed GM to get as big as it has.
Yow! Steve, I believe you’re a Michigander, but you must live in Southern California now, where nobody’s said a good word about a Detroit vehicle since 1945. Surely you owned a big block Detroit V-8 when you were growing up. Do you remember it fondly? I’ve owned Swedish, British, German, Italian and Japanese cars along with at least one model from all the Detroit makers (even including a Rambler once!). Oddly enough, some of my favorites were not among the most reliable. And some of the most reliable I can’t even remember now. Sort of like that tuna on white sandwich I ate sometime last month.
I don’t see why people still consider cars from the big three as crap. I’ve lived in Europe for a number of years and all those rice rockets, hitler mobiles, plastic cars and all other over-engineered European cars never impressed me. They cost more on every front ( insurance, etc ) and what from what I’ve noticed, the more they cost the more problems people have with them. BMWs and Mercedes are the worst cars in my opion. They’re always in the shop.
I’ve switched to Ford in the 80’s and haven’t regretted it since. They may not have all the latest in suspension and performance technology, but at least they’re reliable in -40C weather.
Seems pretty simple to me. 0+0=0
I agree with hobot…. build something people actually want and you might have a chance. I doubt two companies in such touble would even survice the merger.
Seems pretty simple to me. 0+0=0
I agree with hobot…. build something people actually want and you might have a chance. I doubt two companies in such touble would even survive the merger.
“hitler mobiles”
A little over the top, don’t you think?
That’s what they call them in most European countries. Volkswagen was endorsed by Mr. A Hitler as a car for all people Volks = folks and wagen = car
Let the 2 companies go bankrupt, so long as the taxpayers don’t have to foot the bill for all those pensions.
ABCD: Damn straight! And shoot the retirees, too! Goddamn leeches!
There is a better solution – Bring back the Camaro
So why do they need to merge to dump Buick, Pontiac, and Mercury? And Saturn and one of two light truck divisions (Chevy and GMC), too.
#9 – Don – “Surely you owned a big block Detroit V-8 when you were growing up. Do you remember it fondly? I’ve owned Swedish, British, German, Italian and Japanese cars along with at least one model from all the Detroit makers”
I just don’t get it. And your post pointed out to me, once again, that I just don’t get it. One can guess from your list of nations, that the minimum number of cars you’ve possibly owned is 6, and one can assume from your poetix waxing that the real number is far higher. I gather that you like cars.
What is it? Help me understand. It’s a machine that takes you from A to B, helps you haul stuff from B to A, and sucks money out of your pocket. I’m 40. I’ve owned 5 cars. I don’t miss a single one of them. My favorite one is the one I have now. It’s a mini-van. It lets me carry a lot of stuff and gives me better visibility when I drive. Plus, when a woman sees me drive it, she knows I don’t have to overcompensate for any shortcomings 🙂
If I were asked, what was the happiest time of your life, I would answer, the 5 years I lived in Chicago. Why? Those were the years I didn’t own a car.
Different strokes, I understand… But what the hell is it about cars that make everyone so excited about cars?
Merging and partnering with other auto makers doesn’t seem to have helped or taught GM and Ford much. If anything when they have acquired other companies they seem to have a knack for infecting the acquired auto maker with the same “any POS is good enough for America” mindset that got them where they are today. If Hyundai can establish itself in the US in a few years selling what has to be the ugliest lines of cars and SUVs ever made, by making them reliable and providing a good warranty, Detroit SHOULD be able to to do the same. Instead, they continue to hide behind laughable marketing BS, like the J.D. Powers “Initial Quality” awards that don’t fool anyone short of a Alzheimer’s patients or the “Git Er Done” guy on Blue Collar TV. Is there one mainstream sedan made by GM or Ford that ever shows on in Consumer Reports as a good used car buy? They obviously aren’t clueless enough to not notice this, so the only other options would be they are just stupid or stubborn.
I would even buy one of their current POS models if it carried a competitive warranty, just to support an American company. But these guys won’t even step up to the plate and commit to doing it right in the future. They clearly don’t think the product is part of the competition equation.
The once significant British car industry tried to merge its way out of trouble. Result was lots of squabbling factions within the combined organisation, each wedded to a (failed) way of doing things and multiple models addressing the same piece of the market.
The German and French industry remained more separate and still exists. Can’t say about the italians but I suspect state subsidy helped keep it going.
The reason why Toyota has beaten GM as the number 1 car maker is that they make better cars. Don’t give me the cheap labor crap; Toyota makes cars in the US with American workers. They can make better cars because they are better engineers.
American auto makers blew it post WWII. Demming went to each of them and offered to help them (consulting) to improve their quality and effeciency. Each of them turned him down. He went to Japan and they embraced him. He is a hero in Japan.
We had our chance and GM et al still don’t learn from their mistakes fast enough.
In Canada they’ve phased out Mercury already. You cannot get a new, Canadian-model (DRL and metric) Mercury anymore. I don’t think anyone misses it.
(Oh, DRL is Daytime Running Lights … some sort of low beam arrangement that keeps the lights on so people can see you – Government mandated)
Let’s take two failing behemoths, combine the debt and overcapacity, multiply the internal squabling, don’t bother to change the product, and see what happens.
Geez, don’t these people remember the Penn Central?
Neuf said.
Bruce IV — one of my favorite chuckles is Americans who buy cars also targetted for Canadian sales; so, when they start the car up, the DRL is functioning.
So, they think they have to leave the lights on. Meanwhile, there’s usually a switch in the glovebox or wherever that would turns the critters off. I doubt if the super staffers on most dealership sales floors know how to find the switch.
Well, another thing American car makers have to get past is the entire “value added” sticker-item crap.
I just leased a new Dodge Caliber, and love the car. But it’s a hatchback, and didn’t come with a cargo area cover. What kind of idiocy is that? I have to pay the dealer an additional $100 bucks for a roll-up screen to cover my cargo area. I just gave him a couple thousand up front for the damn contract, why couldn’t he at least add the cost of the cargo cover to the lease value?
He didn’t even have it in stock, so I have to wait a week for something the cheapest Korean hatchback has standard.
>Toyota makes cars in the US with American workers.
They make them at non-union plants and they don’t have to pay pensions and health care for people who worked 20-50 years ago.
OK,
heres the plan.
The USA has a tendancy to acknowledge ALL copyrights from every nation.
Our car nation, WONT/CANT use others technology becuase of this. They cant even use EACH OTHERS(USA) propritary tech.
IF, we could take the best tech from Each of the makers WORLD WIDE, we might be able to make a decent car.
Contention:
Aluminium cars are lighter and get better milage.
NOT. As you need more reinforcement to keep it from buckling and tearing. Cars weigh as much now(if not MORE) as they did with Steel.
Smaller engines can give you better milage.
NOT. they can get better, but the weight of the car is greater, and for safty reasons, we need alittle Punch in accelerating to merge/pass/get out of bad situations. Putting a motorcycle engine in a car and expecting it NOT to be over weighted, is like telling us NOT to have 4 persons in a TRACKER, or not to overload it by have more then 300 lbs in the car.
I have an older car that gets 30-35 MPG@70mph even after 20 years, and its an Oldmobile(not a little car).
What is it? Help me understand. It’s a machine that takes you from A to B, helps you haul stuff from B to A, and sucks money out of your pocket.
Sorry. Can’t explain women to you either.