General Motors has left bankruptcy behind. The MSM is greeting GM’s graduation with guarded not to say advertiser-sponsored optimism. Meanwhile, the populist backlash has begun. Yesterday, for the first time, I heard a “civilian” refer to GM as “Government Motors.” And then, another. Even if you discount the protest as right wing rhetoric (I was listening to Fox Talk), it’s clear that General Motors is becoming a lightning rod for anti-government sentiment. With tax hikes looming and the federal deficit ballooning, the public is starting to see the “new” General Motors as a symbol of federal impudence, intransigence and impotence. In fact, GM could be President Obama’s Iraq: the Gordian knot that strangles his political fortunes. To fully understand the futility of this financial folly, consider Cadillac.
Cadillac is supposed to be the ne plus ultra of automotive brands: the “standard of the world.” Since its pre-War heyday, Cadillac’s brand management has rivaled Neville Chamberlain’s foreign policy for craven expediency. Cadillac has been a deeply damaged division for decades. In 2007, TTAC’s Paul Niedermeyer charted Cadillac’s decline and fall in gory detail. Since then, the brand’s rep has retreated even further into its last redoubt: the consumer’s imagination.
“We all use the expression ‘the Cadillac of toasters’ or ‘the Cadillac of something else,’” deposed Car and Driver Editor Csaba Csere reassures the Detroit News. “It still means ‘the best of’ to a lot of people.” News flash: my thirty-something appliance guy calls KitchenAid the “Lexus of dishwashers,” without apparent irony. Cadillac’s brand expectations have been unrealized for so long that even the idea of Cadillac as the ultimate object of desire is rapidly disappearing.
This transition reflects reality. At best, Cadillac’s current cars are competitive (CTS, Escalade). At worst, they’re pathetic (STS, DTS, BLS). Somewhere in between, they’re inappropriate (SRX, EXT, forthcoming CTS SportsWagon and Converj plug-in hybrid). None of these Cadillac models are class-leading—never mind world-beating.
Cadillac’s mid-year sales stats tell the tale. At 33,043 units, they’re neck and neck with Acura (32,637), trailing Lexus (44,942) and getting crushed by Mercedes and BMW (65,160 and 75,443 respectively). Meanwhile, Audi’s in hot pursuit (28,347).
Equally disheartening for fans of the Cadillac brand, the automaker’s margins are nowhere near those of its competitors. Cadillac is discounting heavily to move the metal—sending exactly the wrong message about the brand’s inherent “value,” eroding Caddy’s cachet to ever-lower levels. Not to put too fine a point on it, they’re in a death spiral.
There’s only way for Cadillac to recapture faded glory. Cut the crap and build the best. The best no-holds-barred luxury cars. Stylish, no excuses vehicles, meticulously engineered, rock solid. And then they have to create a dealer network that kisses customers’ asses like none before.
Never. Gonna. Happen.
Even if we assume Cadillac’s rebirth could happen—that GM could find the courage to cull Caddy’s cancerous cars and trucks, that it could summon the creative and financial resources needed to be the best of the best—the U.S. government can’t let it happen. It’s the wrong image.
America is not as class-bound as, say, any other country on Earth. But using tax money to cater to high society’s personal transportation needs is about politically palatable as a tax cut for the top two percent of income earners. And that’s before we talk about the product-related demands of the Democratic party’s environmental oath of allegiance. Simply put, you don’t put “the people’s money” into a company that builds leather-lined luxury land yachts sold at ritzy palaces of automotive art.
So why not just let Caddy go? Surrender the top of the market to the Axis of Axles, retreat into the mass and mid-market (with some upscale Chevys badged Buicks) and call it good? Other than the inevitable Cadillac dealer backlash, there’s one main reason the company can’t eliminate Cadillac from their rancid roster: corporate psychology.
Old GM was once the standard of the world: the world’s largest car manufacturer and the planet’s most profitable company. Cadillac represents Old GM’s zenith, its ability to put the world to shame. Like the U.K., GM is not ready to face Empire’s end. Even if Cadillac’s become hopelessly tarnished, even if its crown has been stolen by foreign usurpers, you can’t sell the Crown Jewels! For GM, losing Caddy would be tantamount to admitting defeat.
Sadly, facing reality is the one thing that GM—Old or New—cannot do. All of which means that New GM is not about reinvention. It’s about revisionism. We made a few mistakes, got a bit big for our britches, got battered and bruised by the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. But we’re good. And soon we’ll be better, better than we ever were. Cadillac will rise again!
Cadillac’s survival, its planned model expansion and move down market, highlights the fact that GM still suffers from the worst kind of hubris: taxpayer-funded hubris.
67 Comments on “General Motors Zombie Watch 11: Cadillac Must Die...”
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The simple mantra for GM (or any other business for that matter) should be, “Will this decision make money for my company?”. This criteria should be used for each brand and then again for each automobile within that brand. I don’t see any way that Cadillac is viable using that criteria.
At this point it is impossible to make Cadillac into an aspirational brand again. That history is dead and buried.
Wow, So many good points in here. I would have to agree that Cadillacs future is that of “American Luxury” (ala Lincoln) and no longer rooted in “Top of Class”.
Back when we used to argue about which brands to keep/cull at GM, I used to argue that GM needs to be just Chevrolet. They can’t keep 4 balls in the air, and have not been able to do so for generations.
Theoretically it makes sense to have more than one brand – IF focus can be maintained. But focus can’t be maintained.
Not to nitpick, but wasn’t there already a “Cadillac must die” editorial as part of the GM Death Watch series? I digress.
Considering that many are of the opinion that Cadillac and Chevrolet are the only two “good” brands GM has left, getting rid of half of that (while Buick continues to live and breathe) seems a bit short-sighted.
The issue is whether the Cadillac brand CAN be restored to its former glory. At the end of the day if Caddy can make low volume/high profit ultra luxury cars that are once again “the standard of the world”, is anybody really going to care if only a few people can afford them or that it took tax dollars the get the ball rolling? Political correctness (or political mettling) aside, if (and I know this is a big ‘if’) GM can right its ship to the point of being able to repay the debt, I don’t know if the “how they did it” is going to matter much.
Of course it’s too late now, but maybe new GM should have been just Cadillac and GMC. Just think, how many people would pony up for an Aveo if it were renamed Calais. Cadillac no longer has the suds to compete in its own market, but there is certainly enough cachet there to cash in on the low end of the market. Cynical, I know, but the way Cadillac has been chasing volume over quality for the last 35 years, it would be the logical conclusion.
And if Mulally’s guys have any brains at all, they will take advantage of this opportunity and build a REAL flagship Lincoln.
Well thought out and presented editorial.
Dithering with Cadillac and Buick will drag Government Motors down when they should be focusing on Chevrolet.
A while ago Acura was running an ad where they listed all their luxury competitors..BMW, Audi, Volvo (yeah), Mercedes… and no Cadillac. No Lincoln.
Yeah, you might be able to fix them. Be a lot easier to start a new brand though.
America is not as class-bound as, say, any other country on Earth.
Really?
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2172.html
The CIA disagrees with you on this one. The GINI coefficient is the best proxy for class divisions amongst countries, and the U.S. is about average, doing far worse than many European countries, in particular Scandinavia. And there is less inter-generational class mobility in the U.S. than in Europe as well.
Beside that, agree re: Cadillac.
In the near term they won’t have the funds to fix Cadillac. There’s no point in pursuing the very top of the market, but solid competitors for the 5 and 7 would be nice.
Until GM is rolling in cash again (assuming this ever happens), the best we can hope for is that they don’t debase it as a result.
jpcavanaugh’s suggestion nauseated me…
many are of the opinion that Cadillac and Chevrolet are the only two “good” brands GM has left
I used to be one of the “many” who believed this, but Robert’s argument is compelling on all fronts.
Is it possible that granting GM “two good brands” is really just an emotional concession after stripping away everything else? Maybe it is time to accept reality and just change the company’s name to Chevrolet.
Think about it. The success of, and even the name, General Motors came from a consolidation of multiple car lines, at a time when there were too many of them. Sound familiar? Why cling to Cadillac now?
It’s not like there are too many choices here.
GM is and will always be Obamas Iraq. It is nothing but an incredible waste of taxpayers money to “save” it and the UAW. As the B&B in this forum already knows, GM was an absolute failure for years before Obama the economic genius was voted in for hope and change by a 52.7% popular vote.
So now does GM become the defacto gov’t producer of gov’t only fleet vehicles? Will it become the people’s car for gov’t workers? So yes, why should taxpayers be paying for a premiere brand of Cadillac for a socialist business model?
Heck, isn’t the Toyota Camry recently declared the most American car now plus it is highly visible in that all-American thing called NASCAR.
Yes, GM is indeed Obamas Iraq.
Great editorial.
Cadillac was on a roll with GM’s plans to use the Zeta platform as the basis for a flagship, as well as the ’sub-CTS’ 3 Series fighter. But now?
I agree. If the ‘new’ GM is just going to go backward on those plans (from RWD to F/AWD and gunning for the Lexus ES350?…I thought that was Buick’s job?) it might be time to just lock up the shop and save your money and resources on making Chevy a better brand.
I’ll say again…I see bad things in Cadillac’s future.
There’s no point in pursuing the very top of the market, but solid competitors for the 5 and 7 would be nice.
Nice, yes. But conducive to survival?
GM needs to be re-born as Chevrolet, and then follow the Hyundai model for building a brand. Start with 4 or 5 core models (ie: Cobalt, Malibu, CUV, truck), then slowly start (re)introducing sports cars and luxury cars as conditions permit.
The world can live without Cadillac for a little while, whereas GM might not be able to live with it.
I agree, hibernation might be the best place for the Cadillac brand for the time being. Bump the Escalade over to GMC if it’s still making money, and heck why not throw the CTS over to Buick.
But while it’s holed up in its den, transform it into an ultra-high-end skunkworks-like operation, like Bugatti is to Volkswagen – a place for advanced R&D and extremely limited-production cars. Use this to build up a buzz until GM gets back on its feet, then start mass-producing these things, but only a few models and keep the brand pure (no half-assed station wagons on stilts like the SRX).
This is all a fantasy though, because as stated above, “Cadillac” doesn’t stand for much of anything anymore, aside from a certain nostalgic, Springsteen-esque feeling. I don’t know if this radical brand repair would even be effective in the face of this fact.
Caddy, Chevy, Boo-yick, GiMiC….new f&#king GM indeed. It’s all one big-ass happy family nightmare.
The best thing – the only thing – we taxpayers can do now is exercise our freedom of choice and simply NOT buy a GM vehicle. Not now, not ever, not even a used GM vehicle. Basically, f*@k ‘em.
In the end the truth of the market will out…last the largesse of Uncle Sugar. F&#k ‘em indeed.
GM will never EVER kill Cadillac. Period. Even in as much need of a redo as the brand is, GM looks at Caddy as the crown jewel. The history of the brand resonates within GM and GM’s people more than the decades of rebadged Oldsmobiles and failures like the Cimmaron and Catera. Cadillac will continue to limp along as a near luxury brand, or as the highest level of American luxury, but will likely only play a bit part on the world stage for the rest of its existence. Really Cadillac isn’t as bad off as Lincoln, and is far better off as a luxury brand than Chrysler. Of course I know that’s not good enough, but it’s probably the best we’re going to get.
@ AKM
Unless I am missing something, GINI measures distribution, not mobility. So Belarus and Belgium have almost identical GINIs. One would not expect a low GINI in a country where entrepreneurship is encouraged.
And that’s why I like the Nobel M400.
Buying a new Cadillac is like eating roadkill cattle at a fine steakhouse. Nothing really wrong with the meal, it just feels wrong.
Good article.
It won’t matter-this ship will sink again when political expediency pops holes in the tax funded support bags.
Time for “GM death of a Zombie” watch?
Bunter
Luxury branding, at least until recently and with the credit crunch, had nothing to do with income and ability to afford a really nice car. Where I work, I see secretaries driving Lexus SUVs. Low down payment leases ruined the idea of exclusivity–the raison d etre of luxury cars–with the possible exception of the exotics. But for all the “common folk” I see driving Merc, Audi, BMW, and Lexus, I rarely see anyone driving a Cadillac. The brand just doesn’t have the popular cache. I’m not saying they don’t make worthwhile cars–it’s just that I’ve not owned one, nor do I know anyone who does. But, that’s the point, I guess.
Not buy from GM? That’s a poor strategy. If the issue is tax dollars, how is killing the only chance of recovering those dollars going to help anything? To me this is cynicism of the worst sort. Will the new GM ultimately fail? Probably. It will certainly fail if emotion trumps common sense. That’s true not only for GM, but for the taxpayers on both sides of the border who own most of the company.
Regarding Cadillac, as I’ve said before, some of us really like American cars. It would be a poorer world without the choices they represent. And, as an STS owner, I strongly refute it’s characterizarion as “pathetic”. I have to wonder if we live in the same universe. The car has its faults and I am not blind to them. But tonight as I’m hustling down a country road with a big grin on my face because the car is just so damned much fun, I’ll banish all thought of this editorial and enjoy the moment.
GM almost had something with the Camaro, Corvette and CTS-V. Those really are very nice cars… it’s just that there is so much wasted on whatever else there is. Concentrate on quality, build the quality cars in small numbers.
Other than that…
Um.
Have you driven a Ford lately?
My seat-of-the-pants, second-morning-cup-of-coffee plan for Cadillac:
1) PLEASE, for God’s sake, ditch the alphabet soup monikers… as a car guy, I couldn’t even begin tell you the difference between their current nameplates… they are utterly meaningless.
A simple test: which is more evocative: Coupe de Ville, or CTS? Fleetwood, or SRX? Your grandmother would have a picture in her head of the former; only a car geek would even begin to know or care what the latter is.
2) Ditch the trucks, ditch the CUV. A Cadillac should be long, low, RWD and above all, a CAR. Two doors or four. Enough said.
3) GM should mine its own design history for the Cadillac marque and bring back the best of it in a modern package. They have a legacy that is no one else’s to claim, and there are scores of people who it would really speak to if it was brought into the present. I’m not arguing for the resurgence of tail fins, and we can’t make 500 cubic inch blunderbuss sleds anymore… but can’t we at least have some unapologetic Yankee style? Screw the bleeding edge aerodynamics, make it look cool, cool, cool. No one else is doing it right now… hit ‘em where they ain’t
American culture and design still means something, if not here, then in the rest of the world. Look at the success of the Buick brand in China for an example. Harley-Davidson for another. Look at how people’s eyes light up when they see a nice Cadillac from the 50’s or 60’s roll down the street.
I took a ride in an early 60’s Cad the other day. A striking color-keyed aqua-blue interior. Lots of glass, easy to see out of. Airy, roomy, inviting. An unmistakable, head-turning presence on the road. Serene, quiet and cool as a cucumber.
Now what do we have? Black plastic interiors, gun-slit windows, alien bug-eye headlamps, wanna-be racer pretensions. Hey, that’s all fine, but you can get that flavor in dozens of other rides, so why bother with a Cad?
The current stable of Caddies are ghetto clown cars that will be evocative of nothing but the greed, malfeasance and trash bling culture of the last decade… no one will be nostalgic for any of that in ten years time, trust me.
In closing: Cadillac either needs to claim its own history, or it should become history.
I have long maintained that GM needed to get back to “standard” (Chevrolet) and “deluxe” (Cadillac). The whole range of brands could not be managed and what public awareness that remained was poor. Focus like a spotlight on standard and deluxe.
Cadillac needs a top sedan. It needs to be exclusive and include major components not shared with other GM models making the price worth the extra money. If they can’t support an exclusive top car then put Cadillac on hiatus.
beater : 1) PLEASE, for God’s sake, ditch the alphabet soup monikers… as a car guy, I couldn’t even begin tell you the difference between their current nameplates… they are utterly meaningless.
I totally agree. Once I get beyond A 1,2,3,4 or C, E, and S, I have no idea what is what. This, for me, ruined Acura brand recognition. I understood Legend and Vigor, but I have no idea how to distinguish their current models from their names. It’s just not very intuitive, or compelling.
@TexN -
The simple mantra for GM (or any other business for that matter) should be, “Will this decision make money for my company?”.
This criteria should be used for each brand and then again for each automobile within that brand. I don’t see any way that Cadillac is viable using that criteria.
IMHO, this approach is exactly what destroyed General Motors. Each brand looked to expand its sales without consideration for the other brands within the family.
Cadillac pushed downmarket, squeezing Oldsmobile, and Buick, who responded by pushing both upwards towards Caddy and downwards to the cheapest Chevy’s. Chevy unable to go any farther down market pushed upward.
In the short term each brand made more money because each offered more products. In the long run it’s a lot of what has killed the company.
As others have pointed out, though, it’s not just them. I’m probably on my last BMW… there are just too many models now (just try to make a list), and the company has diluted its vital essence. Soon someone’s going to have a really good idea about saving money with parts interchangability, and cheap components. Oh, wait, it already happened with the failing wiring for the light assemblies…
I was reminded of an ancient Mad magazine fake ad, “Cadillac – the Rolls-Royce of Automobiles”.
The Cadillac brand could be revived by eliminating all their current models. Move the CTS to Buick with an appropriate Buick facelift, grill, ect. To beging the transformation bring out only two models. Start with that beautiful 16, of course powered by a reasonable V8, and call it the Fleetwood. Second would be a more conservitive, but stylish, large 4 door sedan called the Sedan Deville. Both cars built to be the “Standard of the World” and priced accordingly. No cash on the hood – ever!
@detroit-iron: you are indeed correct about GINI. Thank you for the precision.
However, social mobility is still lower in the U.S. than in most western countries, according to a study by the London School of Economics:
http://www2.lse.ac.uk/ERD/pressAndInformationOffice/newsAndEvents/archives/2005/LSE_SuttonTrust_report.aspx
The Cadillac thing thru this process has been a head scratcher for me and I think goes to the root of GM’s problems – they just don’t have the talent to properly execute that brand anymore.
They keep Chevy b/c its a product that they can execute (middle of the road, needs to be good but doesn’t need to blow people away) and its a pricepoint they can deliver, Buick and GMC is the same thing (kinda like advanced placement for the smart Chevy guys). Those are brands that fit into a hierarchy that they can execute.
They’ve always wanted Cadillac (and SAAB and Saturn) to be THE BEST, but they just can’t pull it off – just like even at 6′3 I can lay it up but just can’t dunk!
They did a good job with the CTS, but just don’t have the bullets to fully develop the line and should now be spending their time elsewhere.
It’s so simple:
Chevrolet: Good cars.
Buick: FWD and Better cars.
Caddy: RWD and the Best cars.
why do they find that so hard?
I’d love to own a Cadillac — 1933 V-12 dual cowl phaeton thank you very much. Nothing made after 1935, however.
Twotone
Buick and GMC will die before Cadillac and Chevy. All Buicks could become Cadillacs, and all GMCs could become Chevys. Then they could cull the overlap and actually have distinction between the brands.
Any Converj should be named Cimarron II. It’s the dumbest Cadillac product since the EXT pickup truck.
But I will argue about one point: KitchenAid is no Lexus. We now buy $6 hand mixers because we’ve had such poor luck with alleged “Lexus” mixers. Come to think of it, my brief Honda Odyssey ownership experience went the same way.
RF…
I don’t know what has gone wrong with my taste lately, but I earlier proclaimed I LIKED the newest Honda hatch while everyone else on TTAC disliked it.
And I must now admit, I like the newest Caddy wagon.
f course, I have also started hiking up my pants above my stomach and stripes seem to go well with my plaid pants.
Hmmmm.
Cadillac stays, simply because it makes money, or at least loses less money than, say, Buick or Chevy (or Saturn or Hummer or Pontiac or Saab, although those are all gone already). GMC is probably as profitable (or loses no more money) than Cadillac, but that’s it.
Absolutely disagree Bunkie. Taxpayers should never have been forced to foot this bill to begin with. And if you believe “we” will ever see a return on “our” investment”, why, I’ve got some Madoff futures you might wanna consider adding to your 401k.
Better to let this taxpayer subsidized zombie bastard of a company die of its own dis-accord as soon as possible before more taxpayer $billions are utterly wasted. And send a resolute message that the federal government has no goddamned business keeping dying businesses afloat in order to pay off unions and other favored political interests.
This whole thing is total stinking bullshit and everybody knows it. This isn’t emotion, it’s the bare ugly truth.
It is too late to save Cadillac, it is too late to save GM. Pontiac G8 has been selling at the same rate as all of Cadillac. So they killed the one good car they had, and kept the crap (Cadillac).
Cadillac = Studebaker 1964. RIP.
If all auto design and engineering were done in Uganda I think Cadillac could re-emerge as the “standard of excellence” and bad taste.
Seriously and of course it will never happen….Cadillac is well regarded in China, along with Buick, Avon, McDonalds and every other bottom feeder brand from America. Could they be the third worlds standard of excellence? At least for a time.
Could they bypass the competition they can never step up to and become an entry level luxury brand, there are certainly enough Chevy and Opel platforms to share.
GM, Old GM, New GM, The New Improved Totally Meaningless GM will go down as as the Woolworths of the Industrial Age.
Why not to buy from GM?
Because if you don’t like the govt. doing stuff like this, helping ensure its an expensive career killer for the politicos behind it will prevent future interventions, that’s why.
So….. a day or so out of Bankruptcy and we’re already sounding the death bells due to sales of shit that’s all happened pre-bankruptcy?
Including canning Caddy? HA! That’s so rich. Where would TTAC be if the big 3 really did go away?
Heh, cancelling a source of millions in revenues, sheesh, why didn’t they think of that? Just stop making everything! Can’t make a loss if you don’t make anything to start with right?
The more correct course of action would most likely be to slug it out and improve the vehicles little by little to justify to the consumer the increased cost of sale. Canning Caddy would do little except hurt the company for essentially no benefit.
Several parts of this editorial are also built on the pre-supposed idea that GM will be entirely Government run forever. This will likely turn out false.
The editorial also compares Caddy sales figures to the import Lux crowd, then fails to take into account how most of them sell FAAAAAR more models and vehicle styles than Caddy. Basic marketing is that if you build something it will probably sell at least a little so selling 4 or 5 1,3,5,7 series, alongside z4s, 3 different SUV’s alongside M class models means BMW better outsell the shitt outta Caddy or they’re doing something VERY wrong. Caddy sells fewest models of all listed Luxury makes. Selling less in this case is not as bad as Mr. Farago makes it seem. IF they sold as much variety as Bimmer and still had those sales, yeah they’d be screwed. As of now they aren’t doing that badly.
My mother grew up in a blue-collar Pennsylvania town in the 40’s. She remembers that when Great-Aunt Mary, who had married into some money, came to visit in her Cadillac, everyone’s head turned. That is the magic GM needs to recapture. I’m not saying it’s easy; even an S class Benz doesn’t turn heads anymore.
I would suggest that Cadillac’s design team be locked in a room with a fully restored ‘66 Fleetwood Brougham. And yes, I agree the whole point should NOT to make something that looks like every other car. Take that ‘66 and do as little changing as possible to legalize the body and interior today. Absolutely every substitution of plastic for metal, fabric or leather must be justified. Drop in an engine unique to Cadillac. Yeah, that means actually taking the time to fix the oil consumption and other issues of the Northstar.
The result will be expensive. It will not appeal to everyone. It will be a low production car. That’s the point. That’s how you re-establish the brand. Only after GM has gotten heads turning again should they start thinking gingerly about another model with slightly broader market appeal.
Take that ‘66 and do as little changing as possible to legalize the body and interior today.
No one wants a retro 66 Caddy. Ok, maybe few want a retro 66 Caddy…
But I do agree that Cadillac (and Lincoln) should stop chasing the Europeans and simply be themselves. Be American, and be proud of it. That’s what made the Chrysler 300 so cool. It was an American creation, fully steeped in American tradition. Big, powerful, stylish. Forget that it looked a bit like a Bentley.
When Caddy and Lincoln stayed true to their roots, the 66 you like so much, they were cool, and life was good. It’s when they chase the Euros, that it all falls apart.
As far as the Northstar, I’ve had one and found it to be a great engine. It consumes (a little) oil because of the aggressive cross-hatching of the cylinder walls. The engineers did this to lubricate the rings. The result, is a little oil is always left at the top of the combustion chamber, and it gets burned. They didn’t have to do this, but decided to design it for reliability at higher RPM’s. That’s all.
The sound of the engine at those higher RPM’s is quite nice.
beater : 1) PLEASE, for God’s sake, ditch the alphabet soup monikers… as a car guy, I couldn’t even begin tell you the difference between their current nameplates… they are utterly meaningless.
I totally agree. Once I get beyond A 1,2,3,4 or C, E, and S, I have no idea what is what. This, for me, ruined Acura brand recognition. I understood Legend and Vigor, but I have no idea how to distinguish their current models from their names. It’s just not very intuitive, or compelling.
Thats the whole point, they’re supposed to be meaningless. To the point where you simply say, I drive an Acura. The theory then goes, a friend also drives and Acura, so does a woman in your office, a neighbor, a saleman, a factory worker, etc. So it appears that many people have Acura’s so I should buy one too.
Otherwise, the old way goes, you have a legend, he a vigor, she a integra, him a coupe, her an enesex – so it appears nobody drives an Acura. So I guess I’ll buy a Lexus
That decision like every other one made today in corporate earth are made by focus groups and costs millions. Because its the right decision.
As far as the Northstar,… It consumes (a little) oil because of the aggressive cross-hatching of the cylinder walls. The engineers did this to lubricate the rings. The result, is a little oil is always left at the top of the combustion chamber, and it gets burned. They didn’t have to do this, but decided to design it for reliability at higher RPM’s. That’s all.
So it must burn oil in order to be reliable. This is flawed logic. Lexus and mercedes as examples both had high revving engines that were reliable and had perfectly working rings that did (and still do) not burn oil.
The Northstar was a technologically advanced engine when it came out for about 8 months. Five years ago it was a dinosaur.
All of which means that New GM is not about reinvention. It’s about revisionism.
And as long as it’s all about revisionism, GM, in all of it’s forms, will continue to set sail for FAIL.
GM revisionism means shuffling a few Buick offerings in place of some Cadillac offerings with the appropriate rebadging in order to sop up the last of the gilded geriatrics, while continuing to push out CUV after bland and non-Caddylike CUV.
Thats the whole point, they’re supposed to be meaningless. To the point where you simply say, I drive an Acura. The theory then goes, a friend also drives and Acura, so does a woman in your office, a neighbor, a saleman, a factory worker, etc. So it appears that many people have Acura’s so I should buy one too.
Otherwise, the old way goes, you have a legend, he a vigor, she a integra, him a coupe, her an enesex – so it appears nobody drives an Acura. So I guess I’ll buy a Lexus
I assume those who were looking for a Legend, Vigor or Integra and instead found a RL, TL and RSX decided to lease a BMW. Or an Infiniti. The G37 sedan and coupe are effectively the successors of the old Legend.
The more correct course of action would most likely be to slug it out and improve the vehicles little by little to justify to the consumer the increased cost of sale. Canning Caddy would do little except hurt the company for essentially no benefit.
Agreed. Hell, look at Hyundai, everyone’s favourite success story; they went from one repugnant vehicle to a line of decent or better cars in less than twenty years. Their current crop of cars serves as a far-superior starting point than Hyundai’s first offering in the American market as well, so to suggest that Cadillac has no chance and must die is ludicrous.
From what I can see, Cadillac’s biggest problem at the moment is that so many continue insisting that it be a luxury car in the most “American” tradition. Modern design is at the point where a comfortable highway experience need not come packaged with acres of sheetmetal and U.S.S. Monitor handling. The German tradition of luxury car design has won out in the hearts and minds of most professionals and other luxury-car buyers around the world, and if Cadillac wants to be taken seriously as a competitive luxury marque then it needs to offer what their chosen target demographic has voted best with their wallets.
If you want a stylish and comfortable luxury car that cares as little about track competence as you do, then GM will be happy to sell you one of its Buicks, before Lexus gets their hooks into you.
Even though the “New GM” has reorganized (and rid itself of some crushing liabilities in the process), it appears that they still haven’t shaken the habits of their old corporate culture.
Until that happens, the “New GM” will turn into the “Old GM, Part Deux” in short order…
Sorry, but reinventing Caddy is Mission Impossible. Caddy’s current vibe is geezers(cars) ganstas(trucks). Serious people under 60 won’t go near them. Ever. Without that demographic, they can’t survive.
“Lexus and mercedes as examples both had high revving engines that were reliable and had perfectly working rings that did (and still do) not burn oil.
Lexus has no oil consumption problems? Really…