When GM banned TTAC from its press cars some thirty-five years ago, I told the local delivery guy not to fret (as if). After GM filed for C11, things would change. The warm winds of glasnost would sweep through the company’s corridors, opening the company’s corporate culture to outside criticism. A new era of openness and honesty would begin. Man did I get the munchies that day. Anyway, we shall see. Meanwhile, with 27 days left to go, TTAC’s not riding phat in no Pontiac and it’s the same old spinmeistery at RenCen. Here’s what I discovered in GM’s increasingly taciturn press site this morning:
DETROIT – General Motors is proceeding to the next step with respect to the sale of Saturn. A number of potential buyers have surfaced and expressed interest in the Saturn brand and retailer network. GM will be reviewing expressions of interest from the potential buyers and will look to secure an agreement with a specific buyer later this year. S.J. Girsky&Co. has been retained by GM as advisor for this transaction. Saturn will continue to keep its retailers updated on its progress throughout this process.
About Saturn:
Saturn markets vehicles in the U.S. and Canada through a network of about 400 retailer locations, with a focus on providing innovative products with solid value and excellent customer service. The brand has one of the freshest lineups in the industry: the Sky roadster, the Aura midsize sedan, the Vue compact crossover, the midsize Outlook crossover and Astra compact car. Saturn currently offers two of the most affordable hybrids on the road, the Vue Hybrid and the Aura Hybrid.
“When GM banned TTAC from its press cars some thirty-five years ago…”
Gee, who was runnin’ TTAC in 1974?
Did they also post something about the Volt still being almost ready for production?
This story gives the people over at Saturnfans.com hope. It does not matter what happens to Saturn they still try to stay positive.
Is it not incredibly obvious that there are too damn many car brands out there? Some are going to have to die, there is too much capacity and not enough demand. Some small brands will survive, but they will be small premium brands, very much unlike Saturn. In fact, the auto industry right now is going through a sort of industrial Darwinism, if you will, and the only thing keeping several endangered automakers around is government intervention. Several brands have to die because they are not strong enough, or have not evoloved with the differing demands of an ever changing marketplace. Anyone that buys Saturn is pissing money down the drain.
Having only been on the planet since the ’70s, I didn’t see the massive wave of dying brands like Studebaker, Hudson, and Packard. I imagine none of that played out the way is is today. Why is it so different now? Why won’t we just let the brands (or companies) that refuse to adapt die off? That’s the way nature works.
With the correct partner and product Saturn can do just fine, GM has not been that partner. There has never been a less expensive time to enter the U.S. market and most Saturn retailers are solid operators in solid locations.
I love that scene from “Titanic” where the captain orders the engine room to go to full power as they sail towards their disastrous fate. Kind of like GM.
Best case scenario: Fiat does indeed buy Opel, and gets Saturn tossed in as part of the deal. They use the Saturn brand to (continue to) sell rebaged Opels in North America. A Saturn dealer network plus Chrysler/Dodge/Jeep would give Fiat a huge freakin’ albatross strong distribution presence.
Less likely (and less good for Saturn): Cherry or Tata or some g*dforsaken turd-world carmaker purchases the Saturn brand to hoist a Yugoesque junk entry into the NA market. Please, no, for the love of all that’s holy.
Other than those two scenarios, I see no future for the brand. Which is sad. What will driving-range-golf-ball-collector-guy drive now? (I do miss those early ads.)
roar
The U.S. new car market has tanked. Saturn is excess to demand, no matter what they sell or how well they sell it.
MikeyDee
In fact, the decision to reverse engines helped kill the Titanic. The ship had an outdated rudder that became less effective at slower speeds.
Assuming that PTFOA is serious about this whole plan about Chrysler emerging from bankruptcy and being run by Fiat (and I have my doubts), then I agree with Axel, Saturn should be included in the deal somehow. Chrysler’s most immediate problem is that it has nothing to sell that the public wants to buy, and Chrysler’s products will get older and less attractive during the next two years, the interval before new product could hit the showroom floor.
With Saturn, Chrysler dealers would get a competent, but underachieving small car in the Astra; a competent but underachieving midsize in the Aura, and a competent but heavy SUV in the Vue. (I suspect that GM would not throw the Outlook into the mix, and the Sky does too little volume to worry about.)
There would have to be some weeding out of excess dealers, but Saturn would gain by getting more small town dealers. Chrysler would gain because a lot of the Saturn dealers are rated much higher than the typical Chrysler dealer.
A prudent prospect would visit each and every one of the dealers in the due-diligence phase of this brain f@rt. GM has so pistol-whipped the dealers I would not be surprised to read the result is over half are walking dead.
I can’t imagine a world where Fiat is the dominant player in the low to mid range car. God help us.
The problem with this concept, as I see it, is that the “buyer” will have to go to a manufacturer to get product to sell. GM under this scenario will only supply vehicles for two years. So, where does one go? Why would a manufacturer sell vehicles to a Saturn distribution outlet when an existing outlet under the manufacturers name probably already exists? Sounds like more brand dilution to me.
Oh, and regarding the Titanic, they reversed the starboard and center engine, not the port engine. The port engine was throttled up; the idea was to “port around” the berg by pivoting, which almost worked….
RF is right, the rudder was too small, they’d have been better off hitting it head-on. But I digress from the matter at hand…….
@roar:
I have to respectfully diasagree and ask:The “right partner”?
GM was no “partner” but the slush fund from which Saturn operated. All it’s intellectual,engineering, design talent,workers,funding,support and every single thing that created Saturn was provided by GM.
A clean sheet of paper. And the S series was the best GM could come up with?
“Almost” meeting it’s objectives to meet the imports head on according to one of the rags at the time.And “almost” is where it stayed, falling further and further behind over the years.
Barely better than a GEO Metro: easy to fix, economical,fun to drive, sort of, but loud, rough riding,with miserable seating,a ridiculous turning circle, oil abusing engines and exploding transmissions all included in the “no haggle” price it wasn’t the jewel people make it out to be.
There is so much BS written about Saturn and the S series, the car itself has become an “urban legend”,the wunderkar that could have saved Detroit and the Domestic auto industry if evil old GM hadn’t blah blah blah.
These press releases are comical.There is no private equity investment company out there with the funds to sustain something that never made a bloody dime of profit since it’s inception as a wholly owned GM subsidiary. No entity out there has the deep pockets to make Roger Smith’s Folly viable. It never has been in it’s entire history.
It won’t happen now.
And I own two Saturns. I like them but I am objective about their limitations. And their abilities.The 95 had to have the head replaced twice before 36,000 miles. And it is looked upon as the “best” of the 1st Generation. The 05 ION is the 03 with improvements and better than it is given credit, it addressed all the S Series shortcomings and then GM sent it out before it was ready with it’s own set of problems: the run of the mill GM 80% car. The not ready for prime time product they’re used to manufacturing. I know it. I still like the fool thing though : quiet, gas mileage is great, comfortable ride, great commuter. A good long distance traveler, unlike the s which would cripple and deafen if I attempted to take a long trip in it. The oil would probably cost more than the gas it used though….
DweezilSFV :Barely better than a GEO Metro: easy to fix, economical,fun to drive, sort of, but loud, rough riding,with miserable seating,a ridiculous turning circle, oil abusing engines and exploding transmissions all included in the “no haggle” price it wasn’t the jewel people make it out to be.
It was what it was: The perfect, no-frills, first new car for someone just out of college. Especially the 2nd generation, where they had worked out the problems of the first.
Loud? Sure, on the highway, but you’re not likely to care when you’re getting 42 MPG, and since your last car was an ’89 Tercel, you’re not likely to notice.
Rough riding/Miserable seating? When you’re 23, it’s not that bad, and that sciatica/herniated disc is years and years away from developing.
As an added bonus, cranking that steering wheel around trying to squeeze into tight parallel parking spaces in downtown Madison gave me PECS OF STEEL!
My SL was brilliant for what it was, got great mileage, gave me no trouble (other than feeding it a quart every 3k miles or so after 150k), and in inflation-adjusted dollars cost about $14k. Gave me 186k miles, absurdly good fuel economy, and I still sold it for real money when I was through with it and ready to buy a *real* compact (Honda Civic).
That Saturn Corp. died with the introduction of the ION and VUE, and I still miss it.
What do you buy these days when you’re 23 and getting your first new car? A Kia Rio? Or do you just snap up a 4-year-old Civic?
Axel: that S that I own is all that you say and more and that is beauty of it.
I admire all that in a car and it is rare these days, but I am getting to the point where a little luxury and quiet is a stronger pull.It’s great for a commute a couple of weeks a month and as a 2nd car. My brother couldn’t kill his and as a car owner, he should only travel by bus.His lack of maintenance and awareness of the need for oil water and air is notorious in our family.
The 5 speed I tried in the ION was noisy, fussy and obnoxious, unlike that of the S.That was as natural and easy to use as an automatic.If the ION’s had been as easy to use, I would have gotten the 5 speed.
The 2nd Gen was better but the oil problem went on all the way to the year 2000.
My own point is that it’s really over. No one can sustain this brand. There isn’t enough money in the world to pull this off.
How many billions has GM spent on this brand and never cracked 300,000 units in it’s best year?
DweezilSFV: My own point is that it’s really over. No one can sustain this brand. There isn’t enough money in the world to pull this off.
Saturn as an auto make is over. It’s developed and shipped its last native model. Saturn as a badge and distribution channel is what’s in question. It’s a crazy long shot, and I don’t expect it to happen, but the following could keep the brand and the dealers alive:
1. Fiat acquires Saturn as part of an Opel deal.
2. The economy recovers and Opel is able to survive in Europe.
3. The drastic, C11-induced GM shrinkage opens room for sustained Saturn-branded sales in a post-recovery economy.
4. Saturnistas haven’t all forsaken the Church of Spring Hill (i.e., there still is Saturn brand equity).
5. Economic factors make it worthwile for Fiat to sell (or even build) Opels in N.A.
That would allow Saturn to survive as a brand with some degree of continuity.
Saturn dealers consistently have amongst the highest customer satisfaction ratings in the industry, frequently rivaling Lexus dealers for overall customer satisfaction. I have to wonder if GM realized this-they have to and they should be doing everything they can to retain the good dealers of Saturn somehow. I hope they are trying to offer them some sort of dealership package but because most Saturn dealerships seem to be smallish, standalone buildings, I don’t see what line they could offer them in what tend to be small dealership footprints.
One thing that I have not seen too many people touch upon yet is how the sight of thousands of closed GM dealerships across the landscape will severely negatively impact the public perception of the company. Even if you ‘truly believe’ in GM’s survival, if the dealership you drive by everyday is boarded up in your community, all the ‘rally-cap’ commercials and advertisements won’t do much to change your perception of GM as a dead company.
Axel: I like this business model and the story will be fascinating as and if it plays out. I would be curious to see what the newly formed company will find to sell. Whether I would buy from them again is another question.
Stu: one of the reasons I bought the ION was because the SL was sturdy and all work done on it at the dealer was done right the first time, every time, the car returned washed and ready to go. Their prices were reasonable and the work done in a timely and efficient fashion.
What a concept: even the owner of a 10 year old SL1 was treated as if his patronage of the dealership was of value and worth cultivating.
Hell, maybe one day I’d even buy a new car from them. And I did when my other, newer car was destroyed in a rear ender.A future TWAT Award winner but still treated as if I had made the best purchase of my life.
So I guess it was less the product than it was the follow through.
Who knows what lines they’ll rep with an independent Saturn brand. And since I am done for good with GM, the bloody idiots, it would be worth a look when the time comes.
@ Axel: While I generally support (Or, at least in my dream world) what your saying, I disagree with you over one major statement. I do not believe that Saturn as a brand has any equity in a newly merged Fiat-ChyCo-Opel*. Saturn is associated with GM (Which is bad), Saturn is associated with cheap cars (Which is also bad) and Saturn is associated with America. Which is bad, and here’s why. Saturn has been selling basically re-badged Opels for the past couple of years, in the 15-30k range. This is not like what you or DweezilSFV described in a Saturn. You say that GM killed the brand, but I tend to look at the situation in the opposite way- the Brand killed, well, itself. I believe the decision to re-import the Opel brand* as some sort of German VW would be in the best interests of the company.
*This whole scenario is unlikely because Opel hearts Magna anyways, they’ve got no money, plus most old-timers remember Opel as not being the most reliable brand. But hell, sell small cars to the kids!
Having only been on the planet since the ’70s, I didn’t see the massive wave of dying brands like Studebaker, Hudson, and Packard. I imagine none of that played out the way is is today. Why is it so different now? Why won’t we just let the brands (or companies) that refuse to adapt die off? That’s the way nature works.
Long-running auto companies never die, they just get swallowed up by someone else.
If I was in control of Fiat and Opel I’d let Saturn die. They can sell Opels and Fiat here under the Opel and Fiat names. No value left in the Saturn name. Plenty of empty factories that can be purchased if they wanted to set up production here. How do they know which employees are good employees and which employees they inherit were part of the problems that Saturn/GM had?
Best of all no UAW connections so they can keep life simple.
Beside the longer they wait the more former GM plants they can buy at cheaper prices. Saturn isn’t going to get anymore expensive.
Still maintain that if properly managed Fiat/Opel/Saab could sell alot of cars here. Not as part of GM though. GM could mess up a bowl of cereal. They do bad things to good products. Not sure what it is – either bad marketin, brand dilution, value removal in favor of profits, bad dealer network, or management that lives in another dimension from the rest of us.