Product is there, but no ones looking.

[porkfriedrice]

"Don't worry SPE, it's just a figure of speech, due to a well known corporation's identity. We wouldn't use Aunt Jemima's just like we wouldn't drive a GM vehicle."
Its a quote from Fred's House of Pancakes Main Forum.


Why do you hate GM so much? I understand its a joke but I find it kind of sad that people are making jokes about their own domestic company. (assuming we are all american) I'm actually of chinese decent but thats beside the point. Dont you in the beginning, of this thread, encourage accptance and understanding? Yet so hypocritically you are so clearly biased against GM, and i assume the rest of the domestics. I dont find it that funny that a citizen would laugh so much at products made by fellow countrymen for you. I understand GM as well as the other Domestic car companies (counting DaimlerCrysler as if i didntn it would be much of an 'others' would it be?) has had had quality issues in the past, but dont you think it warrents another look by now. If people always blindly followed (or neglected) a brand like this, thenthe japanese would never have gotten where they are now in the automotive industry. I guess acceptance is a one way street eh?

look at this article, its also in my sig now. this data was contributed by JD Power and associates.
http://money.cnn.com/2006/01/23/Auto...cars/index.htm
Keep in mind though it is a bit dated and only shows american and japanese. (Oldsmobile is there, but DaimlerCrysler i guess isnt counted as american anymore.) It shows that out of the top ten above average in quality 6 are american and 5 are japanese. looks pretty balanced to me. All of Ford was in there with Lincoln, Murcury, and Ford, and GM had Buick, Cadillac, and Chevy. The rest of GM follwed beneath the industry average with Saturn, Oldsmobile, GMC and Pontiac. The bottom six are Japanese. (depending on what you count Mazda, which Ford own i think a 15 percent share of.) Again, this is a bit dated, but the Americans are getting better all the time and Toyota might even be slipping from its vaunted quality standpoint. (how many Toyota recalls this year compared to Ford or GM?) Also Oldsmobile and Isuzu are gone now i believe so that would bring more domestics above the industry average, especially factoring in that Saturn almost has an entirely new product line, (and it will soon, if you care to know.) I am constantly amazed by the sheer ignorance surrounding the domestic auto industry. Thought like this are commonly demonstrated everywhere I look. Its your own country! At least bother to look below the surface before you immedietly bash damestic cars like it had the plague. Actually, I think the amercan people would actually be more sympathetic to the plague than its own auto industry. its a sad day for the american race to see such rampant anti-american orientation. Its amazing what a change of mind set can do.

[TonyPSchaefer]

I see, PFR.
It wasn't until I read your entire signature that I understood. You are in 8th grade and that makes a difference.

Socrates is quoted as having said, "Children know nothing of adulthood while adults know everything of childhood."

This is not a slam against you. I quote this only to frame the discussions you are having with people who are twice and thrice your experience. I didn't say 'age', I said 'experience.'

You see, there was a time when people were thoroughly brand loyal. There was a time when a company took care of their employees. There was a time when an employee could spend 40 years with a company, move up the corporate ladder and retire with a pension plan and a gold watch.

Those days are over and many members of this board have lived through that transition. It was not a "golden era" by any means.

You speak of the brand loyalty of Americans; I speak of the loyalty shown to employees by American companies. You speak of "buying American"; I speak of outsourcing and off-shoring jobs. You argue that we are opposed to GM; I offer that we are opposed to "American" companies who smelt their parts and assemble their products overseas while laying off tens of thousands of hard-working Americans.

There is also the "perception" of quality. American vehicle manufacturers will admit that there were quality issues a while back. Shoot, even while Ford proclaimed "Quality is Job One" (you might not remember these commercials) they were fraught with quality issues. And now they are saying, "we have high quality and reliability." Let me explain to you that this is not something earned overnight. Reliability is not determined on the way home from the dealer; reliability is earned over 150,000 miles, thousands of daily commutes, a few trips across the country, and a couple new homes.

When I was shopping for a new car, I performed one very simple experiment: I counted the brands of old cars on the road. You know, the cars that people either can't or don't want to get rid of. The cars that line the used-car lots, the cars that people who can't afford a lot of repairs buy. It was basically a tie between Toyota and Honda.

Now, I haven't even gotten into some of the intentional and really bad decisions made by GM. You claim that you have watched, "Who Killed the Electric Car." There are a few things you need to pay really close attention to. For example, when Bill Clinton is joking about the 5 year-old boy who is going to dedicate his life to inventing a high-mileage vehicle, everyone laughed at least a little. I mean everyone. Except the American car manufacturers. Now you haven't been in any Executive Board Meetings or any business meetings for that matter but I'm sure that by now you understand the importance of non-verbal communication.

I'm sure you are thinking that I didn't answer your question. In several years, you'll understand.

[skruse]

Al Gore does a graphic comparison in the Extra Features section of An Inconvenient Truth. The US (GM, Ford) lag w-a-y behind other manufacturers for efficiency (mpg). According to Gore, the US cannot sell US vehicles in the growing China market because US vehicles do not meet efficiency standards.

Detroit claims it cannot meet California and Chinese standards for fuel efficiency, while Japan and Germany are already there. This makes Ford-GM claims hollow and people are seeing through the marketing. The Northeast States with California and Oregon have a current case before the US Supreme Court. The combination of air quality and fuel efficiency concerns should make this obvious to Detroit, but Detroit has been at the easy feed trough for too long and does not care to look up.

The Saturn Vue and coming PHEVs will help to drive emissions down and fuel economy up. PZEV product is there and sales are strong. Ford-GM need to stop the marketing hyperbole (the current phase is come in to have your tires checked) and get firmly on the air quality - fuel efficiency effort.

Just as many realtors have told me that "no one cares about energy efficiency", it is the same with vehicles. People are making good personal long-term choices - to European and Japanese vehicles.

[Stev0]

You should reread the chart on the article you posted.

Nobody here likes Toyota just because they are Japanese. Nobody here dislikes Ford or GM just because they're American.

I can't speak for anyone else on the Board, but I like Toyota because they make damn good cars (as your chart shows). Compared to Toyota, Ford and GM make really bad cars (as your chart shows) which is why I dislike them. If Chevy made a car that was as reliable as your average Toyota and got the mileage of the Prius, I would seriously consider it. But they don't, which is why I drive what I drive today.

Yes, Buick and Cadillac may make more reliable cars, but they also get horrible gas mileage. Plus (reminding you this is just my opinion) they're really ugly. Unlike my Prius.

[Dr Ed]

Dr. Edwards Deming pitched his management philosophy to American automakers and was laughed out of their offices. After WW II he took the philosophy to the Japanese auto and tech sectors. Now Japan is light-years ahead of us in auto manufacturing and all other tech sectors except nuclear.

Ford finally sought Deming's help in 1981. The next year the Taurus-Sable line was born, Ford's most profitable line ever. But their winning streak did not last because they reverted from their newfound quality philosophy back to the primitive quantity philosophy to satisfy their short-term greed fix. Even today as the Big 3 are rapidly being phased out they still refuse to incorporate even Deming's most basic principles. Currently, Ford makes more money on parts and service than new car sales... and that's by design.

http://www.deming.org/

GM has the same mindset. They were on the right path when they invented the Saturn line, but before the end of the first year of production they quickly converted from their newfound quality philosophy to a mass quantity philosophy. "Turn out the cars as fast as possible. Screw quality." That's the GM mind set. Remember the plywood floors in the Chevette? Remember the plague of problems with the Fiero? The Fiero was so bad the dealers refused to sell them because they were bogging down their repair shops. Did GM fix the Fiero problem? No. Instead of fixing the problem they closed Fiero plants and laid off workers so the market would not be so heavily flooded with Fieros. They continued making the crap car, just in a smaller, more manageable quantity. For years people died from repeatedly being catapulted out of the Lumina on collision because of faulty seatbelt harness. For years GM refused to acknowledge the defect and fix the problem. That's the GM mindset.

Lee Iacoca turned Chrysler around quickly. Finally, a quality American car. On his first day as the new CEO the workers rolled his new car straight off the line. He refused it and demanded another car still being manufactured in the line. They tried to talk him out of taking a car off the line at random. He knew the handpicked car given to him had special attention. He wanted to see what the average Joe was going to get in the other car coming down the line. It was loaded with defects. Lee didn't last very long in that job. Seems the shareholders wanted their quick-fix profits they were accustomed to being generated from rapid, quantity production and sale of parts and service. Quality was just not providing that fast enough for them.

Yes, one can get 100K or even 150K on an American car but it requires frequent, expensive repairs to do that. Americans once thought that was the norm. "Oh, a car is a very complex device and requires lots of repair over time," they would say. Wrong!!! Japanese build cars to last with minimal repair. American cars, by design, are built to self-destruct in three years unless you pay enough money in repair equal to or more than the cost of a new Japanese car.

The Big 3 relied too long on the notion that we believed it was anti-American to buy foreign cars. Well, the people who believed that are either to old to drive, or died in a rollover or from being thrown from a Lumina. Its too late for the Big 3 now. They are spiraling down the drain. Their only hope is a presidential bail out, which will likely occur a few months before the next election. Its not anti-American to buy a Japanese car. Its anti-American to bend over, grab your ankles, and get screwed by the Big 3.

[daniel]

I wanted a hybrid. There were only two to choose from. Both Japanese: Honda and Toyota. Why? Because while Toyota and Honda were putting money into engineering cars that would meet the efficiency standards of the future, GM was putting money into lobbying corrupt lawmakers into lowering those standards.

Four years later, I want an EV. GM had a darn good EV back when I was out of the country, but instead of letting customers buy it, they only leased it, and when the leases were up they took them all back and crushed them. Right now there is no freeway-capable EV you can buy today, but several companies are working on it, and others (including GM) are claiming to be working on it. If the Chevy Volt is the first to hit the dealerships, I will buy one. If a Japanese company is first I'll buy that. Unless I break down and buy one of the high-priced, low-volume, long-waiting-list EVs instead, such as the Tesla or the Tango.

Also, Porkfriedrice, please note that in today's global economy, there is no such thing as an American-made or a Japanese-made car. Both American and Japanese car companies source their parts globally, based on criteria such as price and quality, and assemble their cars globally, based on local wages and the politics of international trade. A car assembled in America has parts from all over the world, and an American name-plate car is as likely to have been assembled overseas as at home. But where the Japanese companies are willing to pay more for quality parts and quality-control in the assembly of cars, accepting a lower profit margin in order to capture market share, and willing to provide the smaller, more-efficient cars that I and many people want, the American companies cut costs to the minimum in order to increase profit margins, and spend the savings on advertising to convince people to buy their inferior cars, and they concentrate on the huge gas-guzzlers that offer more profit per unit. It's a whole different business philosophy.

I want a high-quality car that's efficient and less-polluting, and I'll buy it from whoever sells it. Right now that's only Toyota and Honda, and I judge the Prius to have the edge over the HCH, so for me it's Toyota. GM has the technology to get my business. It just chooses not to build the car I want.

And that's the bottom line: GM has chosen not to build the car I want.

[bulldog]

As a general reference do not just use one report for making a blanket claim. See
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/cars/ty...rison-index.htm
which depicts a very different story from the one JD Powers show. Basically there are a few GM or FOrd models above average, but the majority of the models listed above average are Toyota or Honda.

The problem with both reports are that they are based on surveys. Thus record people's perception of quality rather than true quality. The problem with using people's perception is that it is based on their expectation. If you expect lower quality you are less likely to make a fuss about it. SImple example is that I owned an expensive BMW and had issuess with a few rattles in the interior (had it fixed, etc), something that wouldn't even bother me in the Prius or economy car as an example. Teh funny part is most folsk that drove with me didn't even notice it and when I pointed them towards ti they said it is nothign and I shouldn't worry about it. Expectation and perception does not exquate true scientific fact.

A more accurate way would be to actually record service statistics for every single vehicle. Even if you just use the ones going through the dealers. but I doubt we will get honest stats from the manufacturers and dealers.

WHat I like about the Consumer reports statistics is that they add weight to serious components like driveline, rather than just reporting total number of faults.

Bottomline is that when GM and Ford are consistently ranked high on these surveys things will change. They also need to make sure their product meets the market demand, currently GM offers no small or midsize sedan I would even consider. At least Ford brought out the Fusion, which looks interesting and I'm sure time will tell how well it does. This was a market they had captured with the Taurus many years agao, but never invested in it again.

Hopefully GM and Ford learn their lesson, in that you can't abondon the volume market. People tend to build brand loyalty to what they are familiar with. Both GM and Ford abandonned the midsize truck market and I believe they will pay the price int he full size market a few years down the line. Go look at a Ranger and S10, then compare it to a Tacoma and Frontier. You will see who invested int heir product and who didn't.

[Godiva]

No the product isn't there.

I looked.

I went to the Saturn dealership in Nov. 2004 when I started looking for a car. I went there first because I owned a 1996 Saturn SC2 coupe. They didn't carry a coupe anymore. The closest thing they had was an Ion, which I test drove. I didn't like it. It was too big. To me it was a "grandmother" car. Reminded me of something my 70 year old parents would buy. Everything else was bigger or an SUV. They didn't have anything I wanted to buy.

So I went on the internet to see what else was out there.

I wanted high gas mileage. I found...hybrids. I had my choice. Toyota Prius or Honda Insight or Civic.

I found low emissions.

If found a car that comfortably seated five instead of four and had more trunk space than my old Saturn. (That trunk was a joke.)

The highest mpg and lowest emissions was the Insight or the Prius. The Insight seated two. The Prius...five.

So I bought a 2005 Prius in April of 2005.

I also got a car with the most fabulous transmission I've ever driven. I can't believe how solid the door closes compared to my Saturn. And I'm looking forward to avoiding some of the annoying routine maintenance I had to do on my Saturn. Like replacing the engine clips every few years.

And I got a hatchback. That was the clincher. I used to have hatchbacks. I love them. I don't understand why I can't get an American car with a hatchback. (I can't understand why I can't get an American hybrid that's NOT an SUV.)

No. GM did not have the product I was looking for. Toyota did. So that's what I bought.

GM needs to learn to build the product the public wants, not convince the public that it wants what GM is willing to build.

[daniel]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(bulldog @ Feb 11 2007, 05:09 PM) [snapback]388648[/snapback]</div>

WHat I like about the Consumer reports statistics is that they add weight to serious components like driveline, rather than just reporting total number of faults.
[/b]

Excellent point! There's a big difference between a broken cruise-control stalk and a transmission that won't go into reverse. You can hardly count both equally as simply "one fault."

[Dr Ed]

Consumer Reports data for American autos is not reliable. Although American autos are consistently rated below Japanese cars those data are not the whole picture. The average American auto buyer does not read, and likely has never heard of, Consumer Reports. Therefore, they do not participate in CR's surveys. If they did the American auto ratings would be much worse than they are.