Buick Requiring Dealers to Invest at Least $300K to Go EV
Buick has big EV plans, and its dealers will be paying a big cost if they want to stay with the brand.
Those who want to stay with the brand will have to invest between $300,000 and $400,000. That's an average, Buick says, and will vary for each dealership.
Buick has said it will have an all-EV lineup by 2030 and will not introduce internal-combustion engine vehicles after 2024.
Dealers that don't want to make the necessary investments in tooling, training, and equipment will be bought out by the brand, which has a hair over 1,960 stores in the U.S.
Buick did not share with AN how many stores have chosen to take the buyout.
[Image: Buick]
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Local dealer is Chevy, GMC, Buick. It's in a small town and he already let Cadillac go so I would think he would welcome a buy out from Buick.
Buick - they Chinese love them so that is why we still have Buick rather than Pontiac which actually outsold Buick in the US before it was killed.
In retrospect, Pontiac was probably better to retain in the NA market it didn't have a totally horrible image with buyers under 50. In New Jersey at least, Buick dealers seem spaced out poorly, with some huge areas with no coverage (which can make the brand invisible) and others with way too much for a now lower-volume brand.
300-400k isn't a huge investment for a dealer but when GMC is combined with almost all of them and they probably outsell Buick 3-1 the proposition diminishes. The problem is can you differentiate an electric Buick enough from another electric GM car enough to justify dealerships and keeping the brand at all?
Project Pinnacle comes to BPG. I wonder if or when GM is going to fold its three distribution channels into one as Chrysler was forced to in 2009. Maybe it will only be two, with Chevrolet and whatever passes for Buick together and Cadillac merging with GMC (actually that makes the most sense to me).