“We think in some markets Chevrolet dealers will be able to improve their sales and profitability by 20, 30, 40, even 50 percent.” GM’s vice president of U.S. sales made his promise/prediction/delusional rant to GM’s remaining bow tie-branded store owners, as reported by Automotive News [sub]. The remark comes hot on the heels of Chevy supremo Brent Dewar’s pronouncement that the U.S. new car market will grow by 15 percent next year. I suppose LaNeve reckons Chevy stores will capitalize on this fantastic rising tide. “GM expects each surviving dealership to increase sales next year by at least 25 percent over 2009.” Yes, well, will Chevy dealers’ [theoretical] sales increases match the overall market? In other words, NOW how much will they get paid? But wait, there’s more! “Over the next 18 months, GM will boost advertising spending for each division well above amounts in the first half of this year. LaNeve said advertising that starts next month will be a ‘creative breakthrough’ intended to quickly change consumer perceptions.” Hey, wasn’t Cadillac the break on through brand? And wasn’t LaNeve its head? How did that turn out, then?

Holy shit, another GM website? I swear I’ve lost track of GM’s online PR blitz—and I do this for a living. Let’s see . . . GM, GMfactsandfiction, GMeuropefactsandfiction, The Lab, GMreinvention, GM-volt, tellfritz, Fastlane, GMblogs (both YouTube and Twitter), four new eBay California partner sites, and I’m sure there’s more. Well, there’s at least one more: Chevroletvoltage.com. And on this august (August?) website, GM Marketing Maven Maximum Bob Lutz is busy defending GM’s decision to announce that the Volt will get 230 mpg in city driving—deploying his usual combination of condescension, cheerleading, willful ignorance and prevarication.

Remember the “legendary” story about a freshly-minted GM Car Czar peeking under a tarp (the non-financial sort) and saying, “This isn’t the new Corvette!” The Kool-Aid drinkers were awestruck; Bob Lutz was serving notice that GM design wasn’t good enough! In fact, as we pointed out, it wasn’t the new Corvette; Maximum Bob was simply showing his colleagues that he knew the difference between a Corvette and a non-Corvette. Well, here we go again, only this time MB is GM’s Marketing Czar and it’s a reviled Buick ad. Set-up: MB in the FastLane: “That Buick commercial tested very well, which is not the same as saying that it’s an effective ad. I think you will very quickly see a drastic change in the tone and content of our advertising. And if you don’t, it will mean that i have failed.” AdAge: “GM’s new marketing top gun, Bob Lutz, met with the automaker’s brand teams on July 14, spent 10 to 20 minutes critiquing the work for each brand and, in the words of someone in the know, ‘crapped all over the advertising.’ Then he jetted off to the Caribbean island of Montserrat on holiday, leaving some scared individuals in his wake.” Taxpayers/shareholders included.

Ok, today’s QOTD was actually typed yesterday, as Alpha jet-deprived New GM Car Czar Bob Lutz faced the slings and arrows of outrageous internetocracy on Fastlane. Stan:

In my group it is just uncool to drive a GM car -even if they are as good as the imports. Is your marketing studies researching why this is. I could give you an ear full and fit the urban professional demographic. I want to see GM get that desirable one day!

Lutz’s reply (and our quote of the day) after the jump.

The truth is, as I’ve said all along, I have no ambition to run an auto company. I’m not the salesman-in-chief. And GM will rise or fall on the quality of its products — like the taut, athletic design of the new Buick Enclave. Its French-seamed leather and warm wood tones make the Enclave more than transportation. It’s a modern driver’s retreat.

—President Barack Obama at the Television and Radio Correspondents Dinner shortly after unveiling his Oprah-inspired “car company giveaway.”

Based on an Autoweek account it seems that not everyone at GM fears the reaper. Bob Lutz clearly doesn’t, meaning a thousand maximum sycophants are going to have to learn a joke that doesn’t involve the government being here to help. At a recent Automotive Press Association luncheon Lutz characterized the PTFOA’s influence as “benevolent oversight and two-way communication between Washington and the auto industry.” And who doesn’t like a good listener with deep pockets? As Lutz delicately puts it, “jeez, it only took 30 years for somebody to finally figure it out.” So when did Mr “Global Warming’s A Crock Of Shit” become such a fan of soft socialism?

President Obama concludes his remarks on the auto industry:

“But there is something I want everyone to remember. Remember that it is precisely in times like these—in moments of trial and moments of hardship—that Americans rediscover the ingenuity and resilience that makes us who we are. That made the auto industry what it once was. That sent those first mass-produced cars rolling off assembly lines. That built an arsenal of democracy that propelled America to victory in the Second World War. And that powered our economic prowess in the first American century.

Because I know that if we can tap into that same ingenuity and resilience right now; if we can carry one another through this difficult time and do what must be done; then we will look back and say that this was the moment when America’s auto industry shed its old ways, marched into the future, and remade itself, once more, into an engine of opportunity and prosperity, not only in Detroit, and not only in our Midwest, but all across America.”

Ironic counterpoint courtesy of CBS News and several recently laid-off employees of a Western Michigan GM dealership.

I know it’s a bit early in the day for a quote of the day, but I have to go test drive a XXXXXX for the TTAC Ten Worst Awards. Hopefully, Eddy will wake up from his birthday celebrations soon, equipped with enough functional brain cells to continue to feed the beast (that’s you) with fresh autoinfotainment. So before I leave my garret to drive a POS on your behalf, I’d like to leave you with this thought: “the Tesla is really just another example of why gasoline is still king.” These words of wisdom come to us via Ralph Kinney Bennett, who pens paen to petrol for The American. “A gallon of gas weighs about 6.3 pounds and produces roughly 35 kilowatt hours of energy. That’s enough to burn a 100-watt light bulb continuously for more than two weeks. A lead-acid battery could do the same thing without needing a recharge—if it were the size of a desk and weighed a ton. Energy density is the point. We just haven’t come up with a fuel or a device that will safely and economically offer the same calorific value in such a small space as an automobile’s gasoline tank.” OK, lithium ion batteries. OK, range. Specifically, a 911 vs. a Tesla Roadster…

Sr. Farago,

A candidate for Quote of the Day, perhaps. (If nothing else, its context may entertain you.)

“[W]e haven’t told our story very well. I’m not sure the public understands that Detroit is back. We’ve got some high-value, exciting products out there, but I’m not sure that the message has reached a majority of the American public.”

Bob Lutz (or Pete DeLorenzo) this summer? Nope: then GM prexy/COO Robert Stempel, quoted in the October 1989 issue of Car & Driver.

Le plus ça change, le plus c’est la même chose.

–argentla

From Autoblog: “Motor Trend was equally impressed during a recent trip to Chrysler’s Arizona proving grounds where they brought their considerable testing equipment along to add their own cold hard stats to a growing list of platitudes.” [thanks to Steven Wilkinson for the tip]

ZR1 Nurburgring Official 7:26.4 Record Corvette Ru