HUMMER, Saab, Volvo: Dead Brands Dying

GM has placed HUMMER and Saab under “strategic review.” Which is a fancy way of saying if they could afford to kill them, they would. But thanks to 50 states’ worth of dealer-lovin’ franchise laws and a pile of cash that looks a lot like an asteroid impact crater, they can’t. So they’d like to sell them. But thanks to a global auto industry meltdown– worldwide production is well below 50 percent of capacity– they can’t. So… nothing. Well, your tax dollars hard at work. And soon, Sweden’s. Meanwhile, Automotive News [AN, sub] is confirming common sense, quoting sources familiar with people who know someone who may or may not be involved with the sale but since there isn’t going to be one do we really need to Deep Throat this thing oh what the Hell. To their credit, AN got the HUMMER-Saab-Cadillac channel’s spinmeister to reveal the corporation’s plans for their zombies, now that U.S. taxpayers have a direct stake in their fortunes. Just kidding. “Joanne Krell, a spokeswoman for GM’s Hummer-Saab-Cadillac sales channel, declined to discuss efforts to sell Saab. ‘We are not commenting on the details of the strategic review,’ she said. ‘As soon as we have some details to report, we will.'” As for Ford’s Volvo, everyone and their mother told The Blue Oval Boyz to sell the brand even before the crash of ’07. When Alan Mulally took the reins from Billy Ford, the ex-Boeing exec said no ‘friggin’ way. By the time he admitted to yes way, he couldn’t even get ten-foot poll marks on the brand [see: above]. It’s got to the point where Volvo’s grounded their press fleet. HUMMER, Saab, Volvo, Buick, Saturn, Pontiac, Mercury, Lincoln, GMC– can’t live with ’em, can’t live with ’em.