Island Chevrolet’s general sales manager doesn’t like transplanted products. (Yes, I know: any car on The Big Island is an import. But you know what I mean.) So James Severtson commissioned a Chevrolet Suburban-bodied monster truck to kill, crush and destroy a Honda Accord. On the first attempt, the Hawaiian Rebel blew a hydraulic hose and leaked vital fluid. The Honda was non-plussed. After several hours, take two. Wheelman Ryan Kepiki attempted to surmount a Hyundai Excel. The AP reports that “Kepiki drove over the cars’ hoods, destroying the windshields to the seeming delight of the rush-hour crowd. Severtson said the dealership had been planning the crush-fest for a while.” Appreantly, the Bush bailoutfest was a “happy coincidence.” “We’d like to send the message that the best way to support your country is to buy an American vehicle today,” Severtson said.
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The Darwin theory is indeed alive and well.
Why didnt the dealer line up some Aveos(Avii?) and pull the same stunt?
Further proof that”The Heartbeat of America” caters to the lowest common denominator, as if any further proof was needed…
As anyone in Hawaii (such as me) can tell you, Toyota and Honda own the local market. They can crush all the ‘imports’ they want, but nothing’s going to change.
Wow, such clever marketing.
What a moron.
Boycott the Little 3, it is the only means of destroying these taxpayer gulping monsters.
The country would be better off without the Little 3, at least in their current form.
And we have lots of companies that build military equipment so that is not a rational to keep these dinasours.
I’d boycott whatever the morons like this try to sell me.
Isnt thier point irrelevant because they had to buy the cars in the first place?
If you want to play the “Buy American” card it’s got to be a 2 sided contract: I buy the American made car and you deliver a vehicle that is just as reliable as a Toyota.
But … my last Detroit model, a 2000 Chevy Malibu suffered a transmission failure at 54K and a year later needed expensive repair of a leaking intake manifold gasket (Dexcool related). I traded it in on a Hyundai.
If I wanted to “Buy American,” should I buy one of the models raced in Nascar? The Dodge Charger and Chevy Impala are built in Canada. The Ford Fusion is built in Mexico. Only the Toyota Camry is built in the USA. Ironically, the Mazda6 (corporate twin to the Ford Fusion) is built in the USA.
Great job by the local dealer. imports are absolutely ruining America. Be rid of them! It’s about time someone stands up to these Starbucks sipping, NY Times reading anti-Americans!
I also live on the big island of Hawaii and I can tell you that Island Chevrolet “In Hilo” has had cars on there lot so long that I think the tires are going flat.The next thing I will look for is the rust that will overcome them,then on to forest,that is a dumping ground over here.I did happen by on Friday and seen the dog and pony show that took place,The only thing lower then a car dealer is whale shit!cheap stunt.
Bridge2far :
imports are absolutely ruining America. Be rid of them! It’s about time someone stands up to these Starbucks sipping, NY Times reading anti-Americans!
Wow.
I’m one of those “patriot” buyers. Sure my vehicle might have been manufactured in Mexico or Canada, but if an American flag had been made in one of those countries I wouldn’t treat it any different than one made here in the States. In fact, I’d wave it just as high. Like it or not what we drive is a symbol. You can’t look at the posts on this site and NOT come to that same conclusion. Just about everyone here has an opinion of domestic and import drivers and their vehicles. I own a Chrysler product and I own it proudly because when the vast majority of people see it they perceive it as an AMERICAN car.
@ reclusive_in_nature:
So…you’re more interested in appearing to buy American than in actually buying American? And you think this makes you “one of those ‘patriot’ buyers?” Have you considered running for public office?
(Me, I can never decide whether the Honda assembled in Ohio or the Ford assembled in Mexico is the American car. Ah, screw it, I have a Mazda made in Japan and a Ford made in Ohio.)
That makes as much sense as the environmental leftists that have trashed new SUVs.
This just goes to show what appeals to the ignorant.
I predicted stuff like this, and if GM or Chrysler go tits-up, it’s only going to get much worse…
I’m one of those “patriot” buyers. Sure my vehicle might have been manufactured in Mexico or Canada, but if an American flag had been made in one of those countries I wouldn’t treat it any different than one made here in the States. In fact, I’d wave it just as high.
Huh?
This is going to sound a bit hard, but that’s pretty shallow thinking. If the economic impact of your purchase matters to you, or at least matters more than meeting your precise needs, then you’re doing your country a disservice by buying something that pumps dollars out of your economy.
If a given Toyota is made in your state, and the Ford is made in Canada and Chevy in Mexico, buying either American car is, effectively, pumping 70-80% of the dollars of your purchase right out of your local economy. Let’s say you spend $20,000 on a new car; if you buy the Toyota, that’s $16,000 in your state, $4000 that goes elsewhere. For either of the domestics, it’s precisely the opposite. Even if you fudge the numbers a little and account for things like R&D and federal tax, the number is still solidly in the Toyota’s favour.
Buying American-made is fine. Buying local-made is best. Buying because a brand’s head office is in a particular country without any thought to where the product is made is not well thought-out. You’ve swallowed the marketing line that the domestics and the UAW have fed you unquestioningly.
What, do you want to pump money out of your local economy just because the various marketing departments told you to?
So…you’re more interested in appearing to buy American than in actually buying American? And you think this makes you “one of those ‘patriot’ buyers?” Have you considered running for public office?
Exactly. I thought the point of “Buy American” was jobs, not using a car as some sort of political symbol. It’s not the nameplate, it’s where it was made. Why should I have loyalty to a company?
And if I bought a foreign-made flag that broke down monthly (like my wife’s POS Buick) then I wouldn’t fly it high.
John
Sorry, but I have to respectfully disagree with some of the opinions posted here.
Buying a car isn’t like buying locally grown organic produce where the money directly stays in your community. When you buy a vehicle, the money doesn’t go to the point of final assembly, it goes to the company HQ, which then allocates money to each plant.
Plant manufacturing generally has the lowest skilled and lowest paying jobs, so when you buy a vehicle with a domestic nameplate, the money first goes to white collar workers like designers, engineers, developers, accountants, and the like who aren’t unionized and are most likely to lose their jobs first.
Although I am against the bailout, I buy domestic vehicles because as an IT professional, I know someone is doing the same job in Detroit, and I choose to support them even though the vehicle may be assembled in Canada or Mexico.
Do you also consider Apple to be a foreign company? Their products are emblazoned with ‘designed by Apple in California’ in 14 pt font, yet the devices are made in China (same as Dell, Intel, Cisco, etc). However, the price premium you pay is for their world-class design and development teams, not manufacturing.
For those who would say that reclusive_in_nature is somehow a victim to marketing, I would rebut that you have fallen for foreign automakers’ marketing lines that vehicle parts engineered, designed, and molded in a foreign country, yet shipped to the US for final assembly are somehow ‘American’.
Not to mention that buying an domestically assembled foreign vehicle is still a net loss for your state because of the massive tax breaks and subsidies that they got to build the plant there.
I lived in Louisiana when Hyundai was looking to put a plant in the South, and my governor at the time was willing to mortgage everything humanly possible to attract them, and Alabama finally offered $253 million taxpayer dollars for 2000 jobs.
It’s sickening to me how the foreign automakers are able to build plants in the US tax free, and get hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars and abatements (which no one would consider as a ‘pre-bailout’), perform little to no engineering or design here, and yet still brainwash people into believing that their products are domestic.
Most people really don’t care where the vehicle is produced. That is evident. Other wise it would all be produced locally. I know that I don’t. I just want something that works the way I want it to when I want. For me and many others GM, Ford and Chrysler have let us down so many times. I for one will never purchase a vehicle from on of these companies until they prove they can. Plus, I want it to be worth at least half of my initial purchase cost when purchasing the next one. The big 2.8 just can’t offer any products that come close.
When you buy a vehicle, the money doesn’t go to the point of final assembly, it goes to the company HQ, which then allocates money to each plant.
The profits go to HQ, the costs are the responsibility to the local assembly. Those costs must be paid, and they’re paid out of vehicle sales and procurement of supplies, which are nominally local. Yes, they do move money around, but they still have to meet those costs. Those costs include trivial little things like wages, parts, utilities, logistics and local taxes, all of which contribute quite a bit to the local economy; more than the thin wedge that goes back to HQ does, anyway.
Your implication is that vehicle costs don’t really matter, and don’t go back to the communities in and around a plant. That’s very, very wrong. Say the Chevy Impala stopped selling, the immediate impact would be people in Oshawa not getting paid because GM would stop employing them. Hence, it’s in the best interests of people in that area to buy as many Impalas as they can.
Plant manufacturing generally has the lowest skilled and lowest paying jobs, so when you buy a vehicle with a domestic nameplate, the money first goes to white collar workers like designers, engineers, developers, accountants, and the like who aren’t unionized and are most likely to lose their jobs first.
Also wrong. There’s no queue of payment at a company that says certain people get paid first: it’s all dumped out of the HRIS in one big, nasty batch.
If you think that by buying locally you’re supporting domestic engineering and other high-paying white-collar employment, you’re kidding yourself. White collar jobs pay less than union-shop blue-collar everywhere, with the exception of upper- & middle-management and certain very skilled positions, the bulk in engineering. White-collar administrativia is not where GM’s money goes.
Oh, and where do you think those engineering jobs are? Hint: they’re not in America, at least not for anything that isn’t a pickup truck. Excepting production engineering, Ford and GM’s car engineering is offshore (GM-DAT, Opel, Mazda, Volvo, Ford of Europe, etc). Chrysler has more domestic engineers by percentage, but that’s not saying much, is it, given Chrysler’s line-up.
Do you also consider Apple to be a foreign company? Their products are emblazoned with ‘designed by Apple in California’ in 14 pt font, yet the devices are made in China (same as Dell, Intel, Cisco, etc). However, the price premium you pay is for their world-class design and development teams, not manufacturing.
Yes, you’re right. The difference is that, in technology, no one gives a shit where your product is assembled. As far as consumers are concerned Apple is a global company.
It’s only in auto manufacturing that this kind of attitude occurs, and I’m sure it’s only a coincidence that the major manufacturers and their associated union are behind the eight-ball and have been for decades that they’re doing this.
I’ll say it again: using patriotism to hock your product is the last refuge of the desperate; it’s something you fall back to when you have no other virtues to recommend, and only works on–and forgive the harshness in the following comment–very simple people who don’t think very deeply when they make a purchase, and are easily suckered by cheap emotional appeals.
It’s sickening to me how the foreign automakers are able to build plants in the US tax free, and get hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars and abatements (which no one would consider as a ‘pre-bailout’), perform little to no engineering or design here, and yet still brainwash people into believing that their products are domestic.
Do you seriously think GM et al aren’t getting incredible tax breaks from the government? People in Ontario were screaming blue murder when GM. who just that year negotiated tax breaks, R&D grants and union concessions, published their plans to shutter Oshawa Truck. Ford got the same for Oakville Assembly, Toyota for Woodbridge, etc, etc.
Oh, and there was this little grant a few days ago given to GM and Chrysler, perhaps you might have heard of it? It was given despite their engineering and manufacturing efforts departing these shores for decades.
Any manufacturer of size is going to arm-twist local governments into giving them incentives if there’s a chance of significant local employment. It’s not like you get to pick and choose who’s “good” or “bad” for doing so.
Although I am against the bailout, I buy domestic vehicles because as an IT professional, I know someone is doing the same job in Detroit, and I choose to support them even though the vehicle may be assembled in Canada or Mexico.
I’m for the bail-out. My reason is partly altruistic, and partly selfish. On one hand, I think this is a very bad economic climate, and the cratering of a major employer and it’s satellites would be extremely painful. On the “selfish” side is the simple fact I work at a supplier of GM, and live in a province heavily dependent on the automotive sector
I’m also in IT. But quite frankly I don’t care about some other poor bastard doing my job in Detroit. I care about the hundreds (thousands? tens of thousands?) of people who are directly or indirectly employed by local manufacturers. If I buy a vehicle not made in my local economy, I’m effectively choosing not to support it, and putting their, and my, livelihoods at stake.
I’ll of course buy the best product for my dollar, but locality figures into the equation and I know that, for example, buying a Chevy Traverse or Toyota Sienna means nothing for my local economy, while a Ford Flex certainly does.
If this is typical of all GM dealer’s intelligence levels, they deserve to go belly up.
When you buy a vehicle, the money doesn’t go to the point of final assembly, it goes to the company HQ, which then allocates money to each plant.
This is incorrect. Pull an annual report, and it’s very obvious that the money goes largely to the suppliers that provide the parts and assemblies, with another chunk going to the workers who do the assembly.
Those locations with the factories get the lion share of the benefit. Automakers are low margin businesses, even when profitable. Most of the money that comes in the door gets spent on building the product.
R&D is a relatively minor part of every automaker’s spending, usually something less than 5% of revenues. It’s a drop in the bucket compared to the parts and labor that go into building the vehicle.
Your implication is that vehicle costs don’t really matter, and don’t go back to the communities in and around a plant. That’s very, very wrong. Say the Chevy Impala stopped selling, the immediate impact would be people in Oshawa not getting paid because GM would stop employing them. Hence, it’s in the best interests of people in that area to buy as many Impalas as they can.
If any of that were truly the case, then every plant that’s making an unwanted vehicle would have been shut down already instead of making them for the sole purpose of collecting dust on dealer lots. Also, somehow buying a vehicle because it’s made locally is somehow in one’s best interests, but buying one due to patriotism (however misguided) is not? Should we prop up an Impala plant at the expense of a plant that actually makes a car people want and can help GM remain viable?
Also wrong. There’s no queue of payment at a company that says certain people get paid first: it’s all dumped out of the HRIS in one big, nasty batch.
Sorry, but several years in manufacturing suggests otherwise. Please tell us how product development and future engineering and design efforts get funded for new cars and updates of existing cars if those groups don’t get paid first. How does the money get properly allocated if it’s all dumped out in one big batch?
If you think that by buying locally you’re supporting domestic engineering and other high-paying white-collar employment, you’re kidding yourself. White collar jobs pay less than union-shop blue-collar everywhere, with the exception of upper- & middle-management and certain very skilled positions, the bulk in engineering. White-collar administrativia is not where GM’s money goes.
Well then please tell us where GM gets the money to pay the 200,000+ white collar employees on the payroll. I guess you believe that all of the money goes directly to the plants and the UAW, and the white collar employees are just paper pushers. Either that or you seriously underestimate the number of product managers, project managers, designers, engineers, marketing managers, analysts, accountants, etc. that it takes to run a high-volume manufacturing operation.
Excepting production engineering, Ford and GM’s car engineering is offshore (GM-DAT, Opel, Mazda, Volvo, Ford of Europe, etc). Chrysler has more domestic engineers by percentage, but that’s not saying much, is it, given Chrysler’s line-up.
Now you’re being disingenuous. GM-DAT sells all of one low-volume vehicle in the US, and Opel has one rebadged vehicle here. Ford sells more Mustangs than Volvo sells cars, yet you’re trying to convince me that Ford gets the bulk of their engineering from Volvo and Mazda? Please. Last I checked, Ford was the parent company for Volvo, and had a controlling stake in Mazda, not the other way around.
Do you seriously think GM et al aren’t getting incredible tax breaks from the government? People in Ontario were screaming blue murder when GM. who just that year negotiated tax breaks, R&D grants and union concessions, published their plans to shutter Oshawa Truck. Ford got the same for Oakville Assembly, Toyota for Woodbridge, etc, etc.
You have conveniently ignored the actual argument, and provided the ‘well, they do it too’ defense. The domestics generally don’t get big tax breaks, because the breaks generally go to the production of new plants (which is what the foreign automakers are more likely to do), not the redesign of existing plants (which is what domestic automakers are more likely to do). Either way, let’s take a look at the actual numbers:
Ford/Oakville: $164m (while agreeing to spend $818 million of their own money)
Mercedes-Benz/Alabama: $253m directly, $60m for training, and promises by the state to purchase 2,500 Mercedes SUV’s.
VW/Tennessee: $578 million
KIA/Georgia: $324 million
Sources:
http://www.siteselection.com/ssinsider/bbdeal/bd041108.htm
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28239206/
Not to mention that foreign automakers use foreign workers and banks while stealing tax money to give to their home countries. The Toyota plant in Kentucky was built by a Japanese steel company using Japanese steel, and the financing was done by Mitsui Bank of Japan. All to make ‘American’ cars.
I’m also in IT. But quite frankly I don’t care about some other poor bastard doing my job in Detroit. I care about the hundreds (thousands? tens of thousands?) of people who are directly or indirectly employed by local manufacturers. If I buy a vehicle not made in my local economy, I’m effectively choosing not to support it, and putting their, and my, livelihoods at stake.
I can’t think of a better example of the tail wagging the dog. Dell, AMD, and Apple are but very few of the examples of companies who have outsourced their manufacturing, call center, and other low-level functions so they can remain a viable entity by still designing and marketing products while having them manufactured and supported at the lowest possible price points. (You can argue that this is suboptimal, but it is beside the point.) You would rather pretend that the money go directly to your economy (which it doesn’t) to save one plant instead of supporting the white collar people who can help ensure the company itself remains viable? GM can survive with engineering and design with zero North American manufacturing well before it could survive with manufacturing plants only.
“On the first attempt, the Hawaiian Rebel blew a hydraulic hose and leaked vital fluid.”
Wow.
What an idiot.
I hope his dealership fails.
In communist China, back in their communist days, they made you buy shit you didn’t want, couldn’t use, and wanted to fold up and shit on. They made you buy it because it was made in China and they didn’t let any imports in.
Now if there is an American car that you want and fits your needs (Vetts come to mind, among others), and that’s what you buy, good for you. You are getting the best car for your money while upholding capitalist principles.
If you are buying something that is not serving your best interests, but you buy it anyways just because it’s made in America; then you are doing yourself, your country, and the founding fathers a great disservice.