GM's LaNeve: "Buick and GMC Are Very Profitable Brands"
And if you believe that, you’ll believe GM’s Marketing Maven Mark LaNeve’s denial that the Presidential Task Force on Automobiles (PTFOA) is pressuring GM to axe GMC and Pontiac. “The strategy we laid out for you [in February] is still the strategy,” LaNeve, GM’s vice president of vehicle sales, service and marketing, said today in an interview with Automotive News. “Are we working it, tweaking it, examining every aspect of it? Yes, but nothing has changed with our strategy.” In fact, reports that “GMC is going away are just unfounded, unsubstantiated and untrue.” OK, so either Bloomberg‘s “people” got it wrong or LaNeve’s lying (gasp!). And here’s one from left field: maybe the PTFOA has cut LaNeve out of the loop. After all, they cut off his former boss at the knees. Given LaNeve’s part in the destruction of eight GM brands, and his assertion today that Buick and GMC are profitable—very profitable—what possible use does GM’s current masters have for such a spectacularly lousy manager?
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Freedmike: I'm sure that GM would prefer something like that. However, they're well past the time that they could do such an experiment. Simply put, they're out of money, out of time, and out of luck. They don't have four or five years to wait and find out if GMC can survive solely as a purveyor of luxed-out sport-utes. The other problem with your idea: if the "Glock of Damocles" (to borrow a phrase) is hanging over Pontiac, and Buick has a small lineup to begin with (if Buick survives in the US), and GMC is to be made a niche player, too, then what sales volume will support the BPG dealer network? They'd all go bankrupt themselves.
It is NOT LaNeve's job to be a cheerleader and paint a rosy picture. These techniques may have worked in another era, but not anymore. It is his job to know what works NOW and in the near future. Maybe we've arrived at a place in time that requires real leaders. You know, the kind of guys that just get the job done.
"GMC makes no sense, and never did." Back in Ye Olden Tymes, GMC was Pontiac's truck division. They were mostly built in Pontiac, used Pontiac V8s in the late '50s, and supposedly the bowling-ball-sized water pump on the GMC V6 came from that first-gen Pontiac V8. All of that went away in 1967, when the GMC factory was repurposed to make the larger trucks while Chevy factories made the light-duty trucks for both brands. The V6 in the pickups basically went away after 1969, and the quad headlights went away after 1972.