General Motors’ Cadillac division started the week with one president, but ended it with another. In dropping former brand chief John de Nysschen, GM either rid itself of an executive who, as Lee Iacocca would put it, wasn’t cutting the mustard, or revealed itself as an impatient and overbearing automaker that held unrealistic expectations for its goal of a quick brand turnaround.
There’s only two camps in this face-off and, perhaps unfairly, you’ll need to pick a side.
To hear de Nysschen explain it, the executive didn’t “challenge hard enough.” A number of de Nysschen’s ideas — moving the division’s corporate HQ to New York City, launching a subscription service, and running wildly East Coast-urban marketing campaigns — met with furrowed brows. Insiders claim the automaker felt de Nysschen was too forward thinking, and not sufficiently now thinking.
Those of you wrankled by GM’s decision might claim the automaker is the one that could use a better crystal ball. GM allegedly felt de Nysschen wasn’t capitalizing on current domestic market trends fast enough, despite the brand’s rapid growth in the burgeoning Chinese auto market. Essentially, Cadillac wasn’t spitting out lucrative crossovers at a proper pace. And whose fault is that, really?
Already, the XT5 midsize crossover is the brand’s U.S. best seller, and there’s an XT4 compact crossover launching later this year (with another, larger utility to follow). The replacement of the brand’s lesser sedan lineup with two strategically priced models (plus the XT6) is a project that’s well underway, and de Nysschen planned — tentatively, perhaps — for a halo model to appear once the new sedans and crossovers hit the market.
Was this the right product plan, or was it too cautious and safe? Even if you agree with the potential profitability of the brand’s direction, was de Nysschen simply too much of a thorn in the side of dealers and brand faithful to stay on with the company? Pick a side.
[Image: General Motors]
Neither.
Johann DeN’s meaningless alphanumeric names are a metaphor for the arrogance and delusion of people in high places. This was one of his tactics for a flawed strategy (Mercedes and BMW are ‘in’, let’s make Cadillac like BMW. So, Cadillac ATS/CTS actually out-BMW BMW, but are sales flops, whereas the 3-series is not).
The new guy, as a senior GM exec, probably got his job by making his bosses “feel better”, to be polite. And besides, he’s locked into this “winning strategy” of moving to NYC, and trying do a better job of platform sharing than GM did in the 1980s.
Both sides are losers, doing the bidding of their senior leadership, which is woefully ignorant about cars since Lutz left.
Kind of like asking, whose side, Democrat or Republican? Most Americans realize they both stink, or are different sides of the same coin.
The model names are a tired red herring of an argument. When he got there Cadillac already had the ATS, CTS, SRX, and XTS. So gradually transitioning those meaningless names to ones that were arguably slightly more logical but otherwise quite similar was his downfall? No.
The problem was that GM is like most huge corporations. They do not have the patience for a long-term strategy on just about anything, and they are allergic to execs who do not fit well into the corporate culture. This was eminently predictable.
Agreed. While I’m not interested in a Cadillac at least de Nysschen wanted to take the time to do it right.
@RedRocket
Cadillac has about 1400 dealerships worldwide. How long should they have to wait for JDN to get his act together.
It takes about 4 years to get new product from the drawing board to production (if they move really quickly, automakers can do it as quick as 3 years if they have the major components ready – platform and powertrains).
The XT4 is about to be launched (the first model greenlit by JdN) and JdN’s tenure at Cadillac didn’t even last a full 4 years.
Also, Ren Cen delayed funding of new Cadillac projects – which is why the XT4 took as long as it did.
Ren Cen doesn’t gave the patience or foresight to (re)build a lux brand properly, which is why they got fed up with JdN (who was disciplined when it came to putting $$ on the hood and lease deals).
We already seen Cadillac going back to it’s (and GM’s) old ways with the announced $10k in the hood of the Escalade and the just announced (up to) $6,500 on the XT5.
JdN is NOT to blame for the failures of the ATS, CTS or even the CT6 – as they all were greenlit and developed before he got to Cadillac (the CT6 was in its latter stags of development).
Regarding the ATS and CTS, the failure was specifically the poor packaging of the Alpha platform – which also prevented Cadillac from basing CUVs on that platform (which is why there was a delay in expanding Cadillac’s lineup and JdN had to resort to using FWD GM platforms).
The first of many new models that were greenlit by JdN is the XT4, and even in that case, there was a delay brought on by Ren Cen (unwillingness to fund new projects until seeing higher sales projections – which is why JdN moved so aggressively in China).
And while JdN gets the blame, the decision to move HQ to NYC predated his arrival at Cadillac.
I really don’t have a dog in the hunt, but I am going to go with he got what he deserved.
I fail to see how moving a headquarters coincides with saving what was once a celebrated brand, as an example.
I can’t really pick a side. de Nysschen’s pursuit of RWD sports sedans and heartland-toxic marketing look like a obvious mistakes, but he came in after literally decades of Cadillac’s poor quality and loss of prestige. How soon can you expect to resurrect such a brand? Seems mission impossible to me.
Again, the failure of the Alpha platform (ATS and CTS) and the lack of CUVs (as the Alpha platform couldn’t support CUVs) was on the previous regime.
As are the CUE system (which JdN improved), the CT6 and the ELR.
Im going to side with De Nysschen. I may not agree with some of his moves, but I think he had the right game plan. His moves seemed to be all about image. That is what you are selling to the public more than product in the luxury segment. True, you do have to have very competent product, but you are selling image above all. Mercedes, BMW, Audi are able to charge a premium just for their badge.
Exhibit A: Mercedes CLA. This vehicle is not a superior product in any sense or even all that desirable form a spec sheet or purely objective point of view, but people buy them for the image that the Mercedes badge projects and are happy to pay a premium for that even if they would be better served by a Corolla. This is what every luxury brand needs to project. “If nothing more, its better because it costs more.” Those are the buyers you are catering to and those are the buyers you are gouging profit from.
So building brand identity and image, in my opinion, is just as, or even more important than having the right product mix at the right time.
>>Exhibit A: Mercedes CLA.
That’s called debasement. Packard did it and never recovered. Cadillac did it and never recovered.
Sales do well and then people realize it’s not the real deal and then image suffers.
I think Range Rover may be a better example. They successfully sell a very expensive product that is objectively lower quality than basically every other option in the segment. People don’t buy Range Rovers for the build quality, reliability, handling, or technology; they buy one for the badge. The MB CLA sells due to aspiration- people who can’t afford a nicer Benz start with an entry level model. But the people buying $100k Range Rovers could have bought any number of other luxury brands/models.
Really, WOW!
Pinkslip, you seem to be defending the wrong cause here.
If a company as you seem to believe can produce “sh!t” and promote a “turd of a vehicle” as a marketable and profitable product, I ask you how poor does this illustrate Caddy’s ability to sell a “superior” product?
I do believe you might be incorrect.
JdN’s moves were also about improving the product (including packaging – which were just horrible on the ATS and CTS).
Which is why the ATS replacement (the CT5) will grow back to the size of the 2nd gen CTS and the CT6 will be repositioned as Cadillac’s 5 Series and E Class competitor, with the production version of the Escala (CT7/CT8) to be Cadillac’s flagship “sedan” (likely will be a liftback in design).
But JdN also had to fight tooth and nail with Ren Cen and GM’s bean-counter to sink more $$ into the interiors, bespoke engines, etc. – when they wanted to stick to old habits and do things on the cheap (and to throw incentives at product to move metal).
I’m driving a BMW right now and before that an Audi and before that an Infiniti and so on. I can afford any reasonable car I want and Cadillac wasn’t even on the list. And yet for the my first 20 years or so as a driver I bought only American cars and usually GM.
If I’m not Cadillac’s target demographic who is?
GM is going to cling to the past until there is no Cadillac and perhaps no GM.
I think the Cadillac CT6, though misnamed (it should have had NAME), is an excellent car, and a credible “Cadillac”.
It’s large. It rides comfortably and is quiet. It also handles very well. It’s relatively light weight is a technological advance worthy of any car.
It took Cadillac forever to get there, sadly. If this is Johann’s handiwork, he deserves credit (and it was being designed around 2013-14, so I think it predates him).
IT’s also priced correctly (with the V6).
With good marketing, it could be a turnaround car.
The cars biggest drawbacks: offering it with a 4-cylinders (those are for peons, definitely NOT the Cadillac of engines, I don’t care how good), and the idiotic, meaningless name.
Every Cadillac now on the market should have its MSRP immediately reduced by a minimum of $10K.
Sure the product may be finally better now, but few wish to spend the same as they would on more credible luxury nameplates to take a chance on a historically tainted brand. That’s not going to change without GM admitting it has no business charging Lexus, Bimmer and Benz prices when its products are still viewed (and not entirely inaccurately) as subpar.
Middle-Aged?-Miata-Man
Most German luxury car owners I talk to believe Lexuses are subpar. Lacking in refinement,interior quality, offer poor performance and driving dynamics.
Well Petey, they have that it common with Cadillac then.
Middle-Aged-Miata-Man
No well off Gen Xers are very open to Cadillac. The Escalade is a very common vehicle for those with 3 or more kids.
Baby boomers like yourself just don’t understand.
My parents are baby boomers, Petey. I’m firmly in Gen X and lived through the continuing downfall of Cadillac, which is why you DON’T see those of my generation beating down a path to Caddy’s door.
That millennials aren’t particularly adept at taking lessons from history isn’t my concern.
@Middle-Aged-Miata-Man
Trying to force everyone into the same 4 brands of Luxury car is not a very eclectic vew point. Refusing to acknowledge the success of the XT5 and Escalade seems very closed minded.
Let me leave you with the same words the students left Tiennamin Square with in 1989.”We will outlive you”
The CT6’s biggest drawback is it’s price when properly equipped. 90k for a Cadillac sedan is delusional. It’d sell the same if it was named Cimarron.
The CT6 needs lease specials asap. How many people are buying a 70-90k car? Not many, I’d wager. Most potential customers lease cars at that price. And the lease for the CT6 is odorous brown bovine material compared to those from BMW, MB, Audi, etc. especially factoring in the damaged Cadillac brand.
CT6 is a deeply flawed vehicle.
It has very un-luxurious ride attributes (harsh impacts report and reverberate), some very cheap interior switchgear and plastics, a nightmare of a chassis (bi-modal metal with aluminum lapping steel lapping carbon fiber in the platform/unibody) that will be susceptible to many issues and a nightmare to repair post-accident, and shares common GM powerplants with NO V8 available.
It I’d also ridiculously expensive in anything other than base to medium trim (it nears the S Class and A8 in top trim level).
It will have EPIC depreciation, even by epic depreciation Cadillac standards.
It is also suffering from major transmission issues that GM apparently can’t repair.
DeadWeight,
I do empathise with your dislike aimed at Caddy. But, maybe you are delving way to deep into what issues are at Caddy.
I would first start at the top of the management tree, GM HQ.
Look at GM’s overall performance, taking into account it’s global operations, then look at Caddy.
GM is losing out big time globally. This to me illustrates GM has it’s priorities all wrong. It has lost Opel and Vauxhall. It is now losing Australia and Korea.
Now look at Caddy. GM requires a major shift in the model it is using as a corporation for future growth.
Caddy is like Opel, Vauxhall or Holden, it’s going to disappear, it’s just GM’s management is prepared to throw good money after bad to maintain the illusion that GM is capable of producing prestige/luxury vehicles.
GM can’t produce prestige vehicles, hence it’s success in China. What the Chinese consider luxury we consider normal for most.
Well your view of the CT6 is not shared with just about any review I have read about it and the only thing I would agree on is the price is too high into the stratosphere on high end versions and the price should never be higher than 80K.
For 2019 Cadillac wisely dropped the lackluster 2.0T making the superior 335 HP 3.6 std and just introduced the new 4.2 liter twin turbo V8 for this car making it std on V-Sport and available on regular CT6. Let’s hope the price was also adjusted.
tomLU86,
So, did you buy a Caddy? If you haven’t why not?
If the Caddy is better, then where is GM or Caddy going wrong?
“With good marketing, it could be a turnaround car.” Could of would of doesn’t translate into dollars.
Caddy’s issue is perception and choice of product to sell to the US market. Caddy is just perceived as a fancy Chev, why would you not buy a BMW, Audi, Range Rover, Mercedes Benz, etc.
Why buy an overly priced Chev?
If it wasn’t on the list how do you know they were not worthy of consideration? Most current Cadillacs out-BMW today’s BMW. There is little wrong with the cars themselves. 20 year old brand images are not erased overnight.
By “not on the list” I meant not something I would buy not that I didn’t consider them. I visit auto manufacturer websites, I read reviews, I talk to friends and I try to rent cars I might buy. When I rented a Cadillac the Cue system alone was enough to cross them off my list.
If back in the 1970s, anyone had said that someday Audi would out-sell Cadillac in the U.S., they would have been considered insane. But that is the case today.
The CUE infotainment system was a crazy, unforced error that cost them countless sales. A Cadillac should be easy to use. And, a car is not an iPhone–you can’t give it your full attention while you are driving. Cars need knobs, and other controls that you can operate without looking.
Cadillac can only save itself by producing Cadillacs, that is, cars that are big, flashy, and distinctly American. The only true “Cadillac” today is the Escalade. And, yes, Cadillac models s should have real names, not alphanumeric designators.
The biggest Cadillac sedan should be bigger than the biggest Mercedes, but be much less expensive. Toward this end, it should be powered by a pushrod V8. GM has to stop worrying about the EPA gas mileage regulations and build what its customers want to buy.
A Cadillac sedan should also have a the biggest trunk in the industry, and the smoothest ride. The trunk of the CT6 is smaller than that of a Honda Accord. WTF?
If someone wants a BMW, they will buy a BMW. Cadillacs must be Cadillacs.
When someone sees a Cadillac, they should go “Wow.” The archetypal Cadillac is the 1959, with the bullet taillights.
Amen, brother.
Dead on
Agreed. And, they should be HAPPY to appeal to middle aged and old people rather than chasing a younger demographic. Oldies have the money. Stop putting all that money into cars for younger buyers. Yes, old people die. So what? They are replaced by other old people. The number of old people is increasing, not decreasing. Grab this market, THEN expand your demographic. As it stands, they have no demographic. Why did they neglect their core customers?
Wow brother!! you hit it right where it should be. i own an 01 330xi and although i truly love the handling(also owned 09 325, 05 325)i am 56 years old. i grew up with “Cadillac is what you buy to show you’ve arrived” i still have that mentality(the yougster in me still lives)Sadly there hasnt been a caddy i can grab onto since the brougham of the 90’s. The BMW is a great car but i needed something softer and smoother to drive. 4 years was taxing using the Bimmer as a daily driver. i knew what i wanted was a caddy. unfortunately i am really tired of the Art and Science look. i do like the Escalade though the only REAL Cadillac left. but im not doing $100.000 for any car. so i found a one owner 88 sedan deville with only 63,000 miles on it. now i drive a caddy. so cool to drive with one finger. they need to go back to there roots. i could sure use a classy get out the wat Fleetwood right about now.
Nice find on the low mile 88′. With moderate TLC this car will last quite awhile.
Thanks! i lucked out on it, no rattles 4.5 v8 power everything and smooth as a luxury liner.
Agreed 100%. Here is a mindblowing data point.
Through 2017, in the US the ancient Chrysler 300 outsold all of Cadillac’s sedans, including the XTS….
COMBINED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If that is not proof that Americans want AMERICAN luxury, I don’t know what is.
SMIA1948,
I read an interesting article on the direction and what current Baby Boomers want. They want a small to medium SUVs. Easy to ingress and egress from, enough room for the shopping and comfortable enough for longs hauls when they visit their adult kids and grandkids.
Spot on except for the pushrod V8’s Those belong in Chevy’s. Cadillac needs to utilize there new 4.2 in more models and make sure it is 110% reliable.
The name Cadillac at one time meant something good. It was the standard of the world. The only car better was a Rolls Royce. And the Rolls was only more expensive. After a couple decades of rebadged crap they lost their image. I don’t believe they will ever get it back, no matter what they do. The cheapest Caddy should cost more than the most expensive Buick or GMC.
Any brand can recover. Look at Hyundai and the trash they were selling 30 years ago.
The issue is GM doesn’t have leaders that understand branding or letting their designers loose.
Look at the Bolt. That should have been a home run for GM, but the styling is lame, the interior quality is meh and the price doesn’t represent value in any way except driving range.
No.
Hyundai didn’t “recover”. It improved. It had no image in this country to begin with.
Cadillac was king of the hill for decades. Then it was crap for decades. That’s WAY harder to turn around than a new brand that starts out bad.
Hyundai didn’t “recover”. It was crap, and then it became good. Much harder to be good, then become crap, and then become good again. Especially in the reputation focused luxury market.
Why not try building *Cadillacs*?
They can’t hope to succeed by building me-too German sleds.
Define American Luxury and Style. A Cadillac is Quiet, Comfortable, Capable, and Reliable.
Cadillas are Sinatra, not German Death-Metal. It’s a car for adults. I don’t need to run The Ring in 7 minutes. I want to drive 10 hours while my wife snoozes, arrive fresh and relaxed, and go to dinner. A steak dinner with a damn good martini. And I don’t give a flip what you think.
Product:
1) Keep the Escalade. it’s a cash cow and can help fund development.
2) Keep XT5, and give it a better CUE (Or kill CUE and put in a better interface). Stretch it a bit for more interior comfort.
3) Keep XTS and give it more traditional Cadillac styling cues. It’s a FWD luxu-barge. Embrace it. Call it the DeVille.
4) Build a luxury coupe. Eldorado. Drive wheels don’t matter; use the 420 BHP TT V-6 or a big V-8 (if RWD). Make it silent, luxurious, and comfortable. room for 4 adults and their bags.
5) Build a new Seville on the XT6 Chassis. Longer, lower, wider. Big American V-8, tons of torque. Dead Silent and give it a traditional, cosseting interior experience. Use air suspension and MagnaRide to give it a smooth ride and enough handling to keep up.
6) Build one mid-size sedan off the CTS Architecture. Call it Calais. Nothing less than 6 cylinders. Comfortable seating for 5. All-wheel drive, and, again, dead silent.
4) There is no such thing as a small Cadillac. Kill them with fire.
Across the board:
1) Hire whoever design’s Volvo’s seats. That’s the first thing that I touch, and it has to be world-class.
2) Make sure EVERYTHING the driver or passenger touches is of the highest quality. A cheap door panel (or even a crappy glove-box door) can kill the experience.
3) For whatever Infotainment system you have, enable the owner to customize it so they can navigate their selections with ease, avoiding the down-a-rabbit-hole-of-screens effect. I should be able to select a couple of pre-set options that set the car the way i want it, depending on my mood. Smooth for the highway, tight for the mountains.
4) Increase glass area. Nobody wants to drive in a bathtub.
5) People want space. Nobody should EVER feel cramped in a Cadillac.
6) Reliability is expected. 10 year Fully Transferable warranty, no mileage cap. Everything should be built to last.
7) Improve the dealer experience. Pick up my car. Fix it. Deliver it back to me (washed and vacuumed, and no paper floor mats stained with grease, thank you very much). And for God’s sake, man, do NOT leave the radio set on full volume with whatever crap music the delivery driver likes. If I ever hear Linkin Park in my Cadillac, someone’s getting hurt.
8) Marketing. Sheesh, look at 1950’s-60’s Cadillac marketing. Cadillacs are sold to those who have arrived. Everyone else needs to go to the Chevy dealer. If I see skinny jeans, you’re fired.
Rant over.
Check that. Call the CT6 replacement the Fleetwood. Call the CTS replacement the Seville.
Call the XT5 whatever you want. Just sell a bunch of them to dentist’s wives to fund real Cadillacs.
They tried all that in the late ’90s/early 2000s. Nobody bought them.
They bought Buicks. Know why? A Park Avenue was a better Cadillac than the deVille was. Better looking, nicely trimmed, more reliable.
@Earnest
Interesting of you to mention. My mother-in-law owned a Lesabre at the same time her boss owned an early Northstar Deville. Being a small family run company there were a few times he threw her the keys and told her to go get the mail.
She honestly could not figure out why anyone would choose Cadillac over Buick.
My folks had a ’79 Sedan DeVille (mom’s choice) and loved it. Come late ’86, when mom decided she needed something a bit smaller and more sensible, she picked out a loaded Lesabre Limited after test driving the downsized DeVille. She objected to the bodystyle (“it’s a little box”), the lack of power (“I’d hate to merge onto the freeway with that car”), and the interior (“reminds me more of a Chevy than a Cadillac”).
If Cadillac couldn’t sell well-off grandmas, who the heck did they think was going to buy their cars?
Couple of questions from someone definitely not in-the-know:
1. You are proposing sedans and coupes in a market that wants SUVs and crossovers. Is there any reason to believe a damaged luxury brand will be profitable doing this? Particularly when the closest analogues to your suggestions (Genesis, Lexus LS, and brand new Continental) are struggling already?
2. How is a damaged luxury brand supposed to fund the development of these new sedans and coupes when the money is made in crossovers and SUVs and Cadillac is largely uncompetitive there? This difficulty is compounded by the apparent unwillingness to pay top dollar for a product that will probably require top dollar to develop.
1. Are you saying that a prestigious luxury brand should cater to the blasé lower middle class with cheap utility vehicles instead of classy luxury tanks? Cadillac used to be an aspirational brand; one that people would work hard for all their lives for the chance to afford a brand-new one for their old age.
2. How do you think? By building something actually worth more than middle-class wages and tout its luxury ride and interior fittings and SO elite style over something so outré as a common CUV.
I didn’t say cheap utility vehicles, I said SUVs and Crossovers. Navigator. Aviator. Those look expensive and desirable. Something to compete with an X5 and Q7. Not really my cup of tea, but this is a company that needs to turn profits, so I think it’s an honest question. There are two formerly succussful types of luxury cars that seem to be faltering in today’s market: sports sedans and luxury barges. They tried sports sedans. And you just assume the barges will work. Maybe. Maybe not. Lincoln’s didn’t. Provide some proof before making the claim.
Your naivete is kind of charming. Kind of. I’m sure it’s really that simple, huh? A car brand’s success is a difficult nexus of product, marketing, timing, perception, brand trajectory, budgets, corporate culture and you know how to just snap your fingers and make it all work?
Perfectly stated, I agree with everything except “Calais.”
They’re sliding into the abyss right now, the need to be brash and different to get out. Don’t conform to the Germans, be CADILLAC.
I think you are on the right track, but big sedans, and ESPECIALLY big coupes, are a road to nowhere.
Caddy should do all you suggest, except put all their sedan eggs in one basket- something CT6 sized. The rest of the lineup should be crossovers/SUVs. Why? Because the only way Cadillac will succeed is by building cars buyers want.
Exactly!
The large sedan market is dead unless you’re the S-Class. Just look how well the big Hyundai/Kia sedans are doing. They sell what, a few dozen or so a year?
Knowing GM, even if they did make new large sedans they would be overpriced and depreciate horribly.
Actually Tesla sells more Model S than MB S-class.
@Mandalorian-you don’t know GM.
Cadillacs are holding their value better than the German cars right now.
Also the CT6 & XTS are 2 of the best selling large sedans on the market. If they were over priced no one would be buying them.
I think the key failure was simple: these guys didn’t bring out enough crossovers soon enough. That’s on the boss.
And now they will be rebadge jobs in the exact mold of Roger Smith (Roger Smith v2.0 editions).
The XT4 is an Equinox with a 2.0 liter engine, and absolutely derivative, anonymous styling.
One could intelligently make the case that Cadillac’s best chance at being revived would center around a strategy of being a bold version of Britain’s Range Rover/JLR (mostly refined, large, stylish, opulent SUVs with a smattering of refined, large, powerful sedans and coupes) – but Cadillac would have to make such vehicles in a truly good way, made of truly bespoke (not GM parts bin) parts, and of truly good, well-engineered things, with reliability somewhat reasonably close to Lexus along with better dealership and corporate customer service (wipe their a$$ and hold their hand/kiss their ring/no questions asked brand new, drop off service planets, no hassle ever on warranty claims, even post-warranty, KISS THE CUSTOMER’S A$$ & blow them away with amazing customer service to create a 100% stress-free, pleasurable dealership experience that exceeds what Lexus does, with a much longer bumper to bumper warranty – go nuts and surprise the industry by offering the 1st 12-year, 120,000 mile, bumper-to-bumper, fully transferable warranty).
It would help if the vehicles had excellent, distinct exterior aesthetics and styling, and the interior ps were premium, ergonomically excellent, made of extremely high end materials through and through, with at least inline 6s or V6s as base engines and an option to V8 every vehicle (with the 6.2 V8 standard on many).
To be fair, being the American Range Rover seems to be Lincoln’s current strategy, hence they’re on the upswing
They’re ALL rebadges, DW…it’s pretty much the CUV way.
It’s unfair to pin Caddy’s recent sales failures purely on Johan when Cadillac had a good 30 years of producing horse poo*. There were no plans for any Cadillac crossovers when Johan came on board. We’re just seeing the fruits of his labor with the XT4 and XT6.
I would say though that pricing the ATS and CTS as they were and moving to NY was a big WTF.
*V-series cars nothwithstanding. Those things are a riot.
I’m of the belief that the departed ‘chief’ did everything wrong; he added cost over cost over cost with no positive effect on the brand, ultimately losing sales rather than gaining. He was very literally trying to copy Mercedes when he needed to be copying vintage Cadillac.
Whether the new chief can do any better, we’ll have to wait and see. If they were to ask me, Caddy needs to go back to luxury over performance and make it truly a premium brand. Cadillac was never a ‘wagon’ brand outside of hearses. It was a luxury brand meant to emphasize style and status over utility. Bring back the limos. Bring back the Fleetwood, the deVilles. Drop all these senseless CUVs intended to appeal to budget-minded or utility-minded families. That’s Buick’s job.
There’s a reason Buick was below Cadillac, Oldsmobile below Buick and Pontiac was below Oldsmobile. General Motors lost its purpose when it tried to make one set of platforms serve all their brands.
No no no no no no no
For the millionth time…. nobody wants “limos”. If they did, the old B-bodies would still be in production. I agree that they took the wrong tact… they needed to double down on SUVs, not limos. This fixation with the past is unhealthy.
Never understood why they made the move to NYC. I wish someone could explain that to me.
Better restaurants where you can blow the entertainment budget than in Detroit. Being serious.
And I doubt Johan was ever excited about living in Michigan.
I obviously don’t have insider info on that decision, but when I search my mind for logical explanations, here is what I come up with:
1. Separate Cadillac from the rest of GM in the eyes of the public (despite still platform sharing everything).
2. Escape the Detroit mindset that “Everyone should drive American!” to help corporate culture come to terms with the fact the brand is competing with compelling European and Japanese options, not just Lincoln.
3. New York is a place of International commerce and Cadillac is making a big push in foreign markets. Detroit doesn’t exactly scream “International brand”.
Still, I don’t know that the cost and time involved with making that move (not to mention the strains it would have on a ton of Detroit-based employees) was worth any of these potential goals.
I think they should have picked Palm Beach, Fla.
If that was the reasoning they should have moved to Southern California. We actually buy cars here. How many New Yorkers actualy own a car, let alone owning two or more cars in a household? And foreign cars do well here which would drive home the point that not everyone drives American cars.
The move to NYC was foolish and costly.
Civicjohn
If it was done right, the move to New York would actually make sense.
1. All the large media companies are their GM should have a representative on air promoting their vehicles everytime a big news story breaks.
2.All the finance companies are their, GM should be forging connections to protect its stock price from short term speculators.
3.New York is also a much better place to entertain business partners & journalists when expanding to a worldwide brand.
The decision to move HQ to NYC predated JdN.
GM deserves to go bankrupt and never recover. Bad companies need punished.
Cadillac is just the symptom, but the patient relapsed and is now terminal.
I agree that GM should have been allowed to die (taking the UAW with it) in 2009; however, we’re now stuck with it for better or worse, so it might as well stick around as long as it is able to generate decent products at a profit… which, thanks to China, trucks and SUVs, it IS doing.
I think it is a loss for Cadillac.
There have been many problems with GM in the past 3-4 decades of decline but most pertinent to the subject would be incoherent brand management and thinking not far out enough.
While not perfect Johan
1. Convinced management to invest strategically (much lamented by DW 12 bn investment) as bandages weren’t fixing it. GM can afford it as Cadillac brings more than a billion of profit a year.
2. Put together a team that will define Cadillac as a brand. GM needed clarity within itself what Cadillac brand is before taking the message to customers. Current Cadillac brand sits below Lexus and Infiniti, let alone MB and BMW. Status quo is not the answer. Johan knew that and made efforts to fix it using whatever tools he could. He just didn’t have enough time.
As far as critism for the product, I feel that he did the best with what he found in the pipeline. He realized that all Cadillacs lack refinement compared to German competition and acknowledged that.
I think his decision to move Cadillac to NYC has its merits. For the past 3-4 decades Cadillac has shown that it doesn’t understand luxury the way Europeans and Japanese are doing, and he needed to take the brand out of Detroit to think outside of tarted up Chevys.
Biggest bummer is that his replacement will be a GM insider and if things revert to the way they were before him, Cadillac will be full of crossovers and do well for the next 3-5 years and when that fad dies, die with it.
Johan focussing on a well rounded lineup defined by a flagship lux sedan filled with crossovers would have made the brand stronger in long term and hence increased profit per unit in the long term.
Caddy needed to change. Run flats on a lux car are just wrong, noisy, lacking in traction, and ride rough on less than perfect roads. Just one of many problems. Dealers do not know how to make customers feel like they care, just a sale and move on. Product could be very good, as an owner of one, I like the car. (disclosure, I also have a Jag and a Merc.)
From my perch, De Nysschen’s goal to turn around Cadillac was not a realistic business goal.
After cranking out unreliable ,badge engineered crap in the 80s and 90s Cadillac in the mind of young people is not a premium brand.
Period.
To me (and many of my under 26 peers) , Cadillac isn’t even in the same brand sphere as Mercedes and Audi. To me the very notion is preposterous. When I think “Cadillac” I think of clapped out Devilles and porous engine blocks.
Rebuilding a debased brand like Cadillac means starting over; as in cut the prices ASAP, name the cars something sensible , and wait. A long time. After five years (an eternity in today’s business environment) you’d start seeing some brand equity return. After ten maybe Cadillac would be a serious luxury marque again. That’s not a brand strategy GM would sign off on ever,regardless of who’s in charge. You can’t realistically turn around a poisoned brand like Cadillac in one fiscal year.
I agree Cadillac did itself a disservice with the silly letters naming convention. As bad as the Catera was at least it had a name and when I hear Catera I can picture the car. I can’t really make heads or tails of the current naming convention, except for the Escalade.
I should be the traget demographic for Cadilac, middle-aged, fairly successful, can afford most reasonable cars, etc. But I would never consider one. Why? 1. I still see them as nothing more than tarted up Chevys. 2. Every time I see one (except for an SRX or Escalade) the driver is over 60, it is still an “old person car” 3. Why would I choose it over a Japanese or Germany luxury car? Especially if I was leasing it?
I don’t understand the whole NYC thing. Do they think millennial hipsters working at artisinel butter makers are seriously interested in Cadillac……
I’m on Lutz’s and Deadweight’s side.
Neither of the two options offered above have a clue how to Save Cadillac or their own necks.
Anyone who thought that moving HQ was going to fix Cadillac’s brand is an idiot. How many highly paid executives went along with that?
Shades of Nasser’s time at Ford at the Premier Auto Group move to LA.
Just spent two days with an ATS-V manual.
Wow.- proof that GM can make a great car….a really great car. My e46 with 200 more HP. No excuses, no “almost”. My 2010 CTS has some “almost” but the ATS…other than price….wow.
CUE. I wanted to like it, the nav system is actually quite good, the Bose system is also excellent.
Cadillac has cracked the electric steering sucks problem…BMW needs to buy an ATS-V and copy.
CUE is just a mosh. You have to aim at the screen too carefully for a moving vehicle. You can use the steering wheel controls for most things, but not all.
The ATS “was a cadillac” in that other than the need for knobs on the radio, it did everything it was supposed to, and in spades….
The Escalade is a Cadillac, because, while garish to some (me included) it is mostly over the top.
The XT 5 and XT 4 need help….
The CTS and base ATS need help…
The ATS-V is the same price as a C43, but the C has a much nicer interior and infotainment…..only problem with ATS-V
other than price…
I bet you could find a dealer willing to deal.
Biggest issue with CUE is that when you hit the small icons on the bottom of the screen, thumb hits the volume bar and you end up with the iPhone “I didn’t want THAT” problem…
There was a CT6 in the showroom, I’d say yes, that IS a “Cadillac”.
GM is like Budweiser. They can literally brew anything, and the fact most of it is swill is because that is what the market wants, and it sells. Cadillac is the Craft Brew division, and has to have the faith to put out a full Stout, or IPA, not backed by corn syrup or cheap malts.
What Cadillac needs more than anything is faith. They need to make “the Standard of the World” and put it out there. The ATS-V would be a GREAT Firebird if there was still a Pontiac…..
ATS-V is any iteration (and the non-V ATS and 3rd gen CTS are both poor products at heart, vastly overpriced) is not a luxury car, and is certainly not the right type of vehicle that should be included in Cadillac’s portfolio; it confuses the branding, unless Cadillac really wanted to copy Mercedes and its AMG division, in its entirety, which has not played out well thus far (an understatement).
The Alpha platform with high performance suspensions and motors should have remained exclusively under the Chevrolet brand, now that Pontiac is extinct.
They should keep Pontiac and make it compete with BMW, with cost cutting of course. Pontiac was atrocious though as it was. It was supposed to be more premium that Chevy. Something went really wrong in America in 70s.
when this fool cut margins, I moved clients into Lincoln. he was a disaster for customers and dealers. good riddance!
Let’s make something clear….Cadillac used to be THE luxury car brand decades ago (not ultra luxury like RR and the like).
Cadillac has been in a quality/design/execution/manufacturing downward trend for decades that has only recently began to be addressed by the higher ups in GM.
It took decades to screw up Cadillac and it will take decades to bring it back to it’s former glory (if ever), it will not be fast, it will not be cheap, it will not be easy, but they will need to learn, correct and improve upon the plan along the way….in the modern corporate chase of quarterly profit and sales numbers I do not know if GM has the right vision to fix Cadillac.
I actually think it only took about a decade to screw up Cadillac. The brand suffered many of the same slings and arrows as the rest of the Big Three’s divisions, but the misstep that really was Cadillac-specific was the decision to cash in on six decades of prestige to chase volume. And the timing couldn’t have been worse, as it occurred when Mercedes was starting to make inroads in the US market. Cadillac should have kept the focus on quality, prestige, and transaction price.
Your take on the climb back is spot on. Given the example of Kia, it’s not impossible to move upmarket, but it’s really, really difficult.
but the misstep that really was Cadillac-specific was the decision to cash in on six decades of prestige to chase volume
On the nose. For decades Cadillac production was deliberately under demand. This made Cadillacs very pricey on the used market. Cadillac also used this low production to keep quality UP.
At some point in the 70s GM made the conscious decision to chase volume. The first year that production reached 300,000 for Cadillac by running the production lines wide open a Cadillac executive commented (noting the slip in quality and exclusivity) – “We didn’t build 300,000 Cadillacs that year, we built 300,000 Buicks.” It was downhill from there.
I don’t know how you get that sort of consumer reputation back.
This is the main issue. GM is doesn’t have the patience to see Cadillac through. It will take decades to improve the brand where they want it. They think that the reputation can be changed overnight. Ford is just as short sided with Lincoln. Thinking about killing off the Continental since it didn’t set the sales world on fire right away.
The other day I watched comparison test Continental vs Volvo S80. In all aspects Continental beats Volvo as a luxury car. But Volvo looks more elegant, lower and wider than Lincoln. Continental concept looked great but production car was underwhelming. My Fusion looks more luxurious than Continental. How hard is it to understand that luxury sedan should be low, wide and long, have a RWD proportions and look elegant and have presence? How Audi and Volvo understand it and Ford has no clue?
BTW I saw CT6 and it looks great. I do not know why it does not sell. May be interior is cheap or ride is not as refined as MB. I test drove STS vs E-class once – side by side – STS was not even close in refinement to E-class let alone interior/exterior design and quality and GM was hoping to compete somehow with MB. BMW is a German Pontiac, Cadillac should compete with MB or RR.
De Nysschen did many things right during his tenure. The move to NYC was smart. Also, despite criticism, his alphanumeric system was much easier to understand than ATS, CTS, STS, DTS, SRX, etc. JdN retained the name Escalade, and the new flagship will allegedly be called Escala. This suggests de Nysschen understood that names have some place at Cadillac, if only for the halo vehicles.
On the other hand, Dare Greatly was a marketing fail, and the company itself didn’t even live up to the credo it put forward. They weren’t building the Ciel or a new flagship. They were building CUV’s which is about as daring as building shoddy McMansions circa 2004. Maybe de Nysschen couldn’t get the tanker turned around.
Removing de Nysschen is troubling because the reason is wrong. If they had fired de Nysschen because Dare Greatly was awful, the public could have some faith in GM management and the higher-ups at Cadillac. However, it does appear they fired de Nysschen because they want to sell lifted hatchbacks to millennials in Hoboken. GM can’t dilute a brand that doesn’t that has no potency. The time to prepare for the CUV boom was 10 years ago.
Whatever, the situation is sad. Cadillac is an easy fix, especially considering the money allocated for its rehabilitation. I’m not sure if de Nysschen fell short or if he was dealing with idiots in GM who want to sell trendy handbags. Maybe it was both.
“Cadillac is an easy fix, especially considering the money allocated for its rehabilitation.”
Oh, really?
Probably can’t be “fixed”. Either accept being a volume model tier II faux luxo marque, or discontinue the full lineup and go ultra lux with three or so models and 933 dealers who mostly should have been culled in bankruptcy. The middle ground JdN sought clearly does not work.
Tick, tock SoHo.
The relative ease with which Cadillac can be fixed is what motivates someone like JdN to head the brand, despite its obvious institutional failings.
Cadillac doesn’t need to choose between Rolls Royce or re-skinned Chevrolets. Mercedes certainly doesn’t.
Cadillac is not trying to convince Americans that the Japanese or Korean auto industry knows how to build luxury cars. That’s a tremendous uphill battle that the Japanese rightly concluded could only be waged on reliability grounds with value-proposition mixed in. Cadillac is merely trying to convince American car-buyers that American industry and design can produce luxury vehicles, like we did in the past.
Fixing Cadillac is practically a mundane chore, which would explain the extraordinary number of mistakes along the way. Let your guard down, and the GM bureaucracy will remind you how Cadillac fell apart.
Except every Cadillac made between 1991 and 2002 proves they can’t build quality luxury cars. Including the Escalade,which everyone knows is a rebodied Tahoe.
I argue it does, as the middle ground approach is clearly not cutting it. The entire design and UAW assembly process cannot produce the caliber of product as their Japanese luxury equivalents, nor the features or snob factor of German competitors. The brand has been lost for three decades and every halfhearted attempt never sticks so they try something else after a product cycle.
“Fuel efficient” RWD/FWD boats -> DOHC “sporty” FWD boats -> Opel zig zag + DOHC boats -> Opel/Holden + legacy DOHC boats -> Second tier BMW plus Saab wagon and Volt Coupe -> ?
@LS1Fan
So the 89 and earlier and 03 and later are kwality? Ironically, its the 90-95 cycle which represents the only period since 1980 where Cadillac was semi-competitive. Agree Escalade is a Tahoe, and was a cheap rebadge at that till 07.
@28
I suppose everyone has their own take, but the copycat routine for the high volume segments (luxury high volume) is more or less required. The flagship products and halo vehicles are what build the brand. The copycat game also creates the appearance of market stability, which triggers automatic consumption. Just drive the old 3-series into the dealership when the lease is up, and sign and drive a new one. Not much thinking. If Cadillac stays within box of convention, they will eventually achieve the same thing.
Overall, Cadillac is on the right track. Someone just needs to find a way to kick the psychos out of the decision-making process. Placing the LGX behind a $10,000 paywall in the ATS and CT6 is insane, not clever pricing. Putting haptic feedback controls that don’t work into the newest vehicles is not high tech, it’s high stupid.
If they can cut that sort of stuff out, they will be fine. GM management also needs to stop panicking.
It doesn’t matter who assembled them if the engineers who that laid out the manufacturing process are wrong. Blaming the UAW is either intellectually lazy or a cheap shot seen too often on here.
Quite a common canard. The truth is many of the business processes are influenced or determined by UAW. Case in point, the hiring process in a GM plant.
In order to get into a plant, you must be referred into the system by a union member using the GMOR application, which was developed by the third party company GM used for hiring. After your name is added to the system, when GM does any planned hiring the third party will pull X names from the AMS system based on the spread. So, if there are one hundred positions, and the spread is ten, they will pull one thousand names from the system (this is referred to as “the lottery” as these are effectively steady jobs for life.). Through a process of elimination including interviews and employee assessment (written and then on site), the pool of one thousand is reduced usually to around two hundred or less (IIRC its a five step process start to finish).
This is the hiring process agreed to by GM and UAW, but in addition to being so onerous, you’ll notice you have to be referred into the system in order to even have a shot in the first place. You can only be referred by a current UAW member through the terminals placed in the plant. Funny how that works eh? So please spare us from “the engineers” sort of thing. They don’t know what they are doing but UAW weighs heavy on business process and what is in GM’s best interest (i.e. efficiency) is not necessarily in their best interest.
Source: I maintained the GMOR application as I worked for the third party hiring company for five years.
@TW5
“Overall, Cadillac is on the right track. Someone just needs to find a way to kick the psychos out of the decision-making process.”
GM is a dysfunctional organization and it has not changed much in terms of how it is operated internally. I expect no change from the direction it has taken for the past thirty five years.
I gotta side with Johan on this one. Even the moves he made that seemed laughable were better than the same old crap that kept failing. Moving to NYC seemed silly on the surface, but I can see the logic in getting away from Detroit groupthink…it also probably won him some enemies in the senior ranks. I hated the new naming convention, but mostly because they didn’t rebrand the existing products…if the ATS, CTS and XTS had immediately become the CT2, CT4 and CT5, it would have been fine. Instead, the XT5 SUV was sold alongside the XTS sedan with badging that looks basically identical, which is incredibly stupid.
I wonder how much autonomy he really had at Cadillac? Was the half-baked renaming, the cripplingly slow rollout of key products, and the continuation of crap like the XTS and the CUE system all on him, or were the suits in the Ren Cen playing a role? It would be very GM-like for the C-suite to muck up the works for a bothersome executive and then to blame that executive for the mucked up works.
The whole thing reminds me of the DeLorean saga, minus the celebrity and engineering chops.
His is replacement is a GM lifer, right? Just like GM lifer Barra, who’s biggest accomplishment prior to getting the top job was having a plant paint cars that matched her nail polish? That pretty much ensures mediocrity from here on out.
Focus on: interiors, reliability, silence, comfort, dealer buying and maintenance experience. (wait this sounds like what Buick should be)
America’s roads are garbage and during the summer you’ll inevitably be sitting next to some dude with his stereo at 11—build a CUV/SUV/car that keeps you isolated from noises and bumps.
Most luxury car buyers don’t care if their car rides on a RWD or FWD-AWD platform.
Cadillac’s goal right now is survival/profitability. Not chasing the Germans on the ‘Ring.
We need Sevilles not cts’s we Fleetwoods not xt6. we need someone to run Cadillac that knows what Cadillacs are that can look back to spring forward.
I side with JdN, at least for another year or two so we can see how the XT4 pans out first. That’s probably the first car developed completely under his watch.
Also, he seemed to have come around to the idea that Cadillac can’t focus just on sport, based on the new Y-strategy (base and then sport or luxe) the reps were touting at the NY Auto Show.
FWIW, I get that Cadillac needs to have a big, flashy flagship, but to insist that all Cadillacs need to be that way ignores reality.
What could de Nysschen actually control at GM? Apparently he could change the car names, move the headquarters, and use metrosexual themed ads, but did he actually have authority to prioritize the development of the vehicles and platforms Cadillac needed to offer market leading cross-overs and SUVs? If his only option for fast market entry into the X1 and X3 markets were Cimarron versions of the Trax or Equinox, then I can’t really blame him for his slow response to the market changes. If he didn’t have authority to change platform parameters on the ATS and CTS to provide adult sized backseats, and was forced by corporate beancounters to offer the lame 2.5 liter 4 and 1980s Atari instrument panel on the ATS, then he really can’t be blamed for the weaknesses of those cars. As some others have commented, part of the problem is the weakness of the GM parts-bin, they just are not geared to make high-end cars and haven’t been since the 1960s. Without authority and budget to develop high-end components and platforms, the job of someone like de Nysschen is sort of like being in charge of deck chairs on the Titanic, which he screwed up, but ultimately his mistakes with names and NYC and advertising are not going to change the final outcome.
he could have sold cars. nice guy? go play with your kids.
results, not excuses.
Buickman
Founder
GeneralWatch.com
I think the problem is his brain and heart weren’t into selling most of the Cadillacs he inherited. Instead, he wanted to sell Cadillac versions of the Audis he used to sell, but GM couldn’t supply them fast enough.
@Stingray
Good take on the situation. Maybe moving to NYC didn’t help anything as he’s now half-a-continent away from where the design and engineering is done.
Nysschen made to major strategic mistakes! 1. Focus on performance instead of luxury. 2. Focused on sedans instead of crossovers and SUVs.
“President of Cadillac since August 18, 2014”
All of 3 1/2 years. Your description of Cadillac’s vehicles far predates JdeN’s arrival on the scene.
So I must regretfully dismiss your ideas as uninformed. Trying to turn the ship that is GM around in 42 months, which is about the lead time for a new vehicle, is impossible. In other words, he never really had the chance to do anything of note. And was no doubt backstabbed by all the internationally-minded GM execs sitting in provincial Detroit who felt that Caddy job should have been theirs, rightfully.
Well now one of their own has made the ascent up the golden staircase. Where he will no doubt show true GM grit, and prove that effete foreign snobs have no business interfering in the civil service style promotions that all good GM lifers deserve. And JdeN was a rude SOB apparently, not helping matters.
Lutz’s utterings strike me as sour grapes too. “Why didn’t they hire me back in my late eighties to usher Cadillac back to greatness and volume sales with a luxury Solstice? Wah!”
All these auto execs of whatever background or nationality come with oversized egos as standard equipment, not tied in any way to ability
On the bright side, I saw two XT5s today in my boondock area. Stop! They’re breeding like wabbits.
As stated, you’re blaming JdN for the sins/errors of the previous regime.
The first 2 models that were greenlit by JdN were the XT4 and XT6.
He also made the move to re-package the size of Cadillac sedans so they offer what American buyers most want in their sedans (interior room) – starting with the ATS replacement, the CT5.
The Alpha platform would probably have been a Pontiac follow-on to the G8, produced domestically (less costly than importing from Australia).
On of the terms of getting the US to bail out GM was to kill Pontiac.
So the Pontiac XX got rebranded as a Cadillac ATS, and it spawned the CTS.
The ATS biggest drawback is the Instrument Panel. Not becoming of an ‘luxury’ car. My Buick Regal’s is much better.
It’s mind boggling to me how Cadillac could build such an amazing beautiful car high quality car like a 64 Sedan Deville (which I own), to the lame, soulless, and cheap wannabe Cadillacs they claim to be making today.
Everything in their lineup is just another badge Chevy besides for the CT6.
I mean really folks, this is all common sense stuff, we all know what they need to do, yet the ones in charge of the brand refuse to do so. In that sense, the brand will eventually die as it obviously has lost its prestige and being the luxury go to brand for decades now.
I’m not sure if GM execs are holding up the brands ability to be able to do what it wants or what, because it’s like not much has changed since the DeNy was fired. We were all hoping for a Halo Cadillac which they so desperately needed in order to shake up the industry with something truly amazing and impressive where every other luxury brand would want to, if not, HAVE to imitate.
What truly hurt the brand IMO was when they decided to build small sporty cars that young people honestly didn’t care for, then they decided to eliminate the Deville and never had an answer for the S-Class. How and why Cadillac never did build an S-Class fighter for years will always be a mystery. Abandoning their older, well established clientele has ruined the company, the horrible quality of the 90’s-2000’s Cadillacs also didn’t help matters.
You either go big, all out, give it your absolute best, or just effin go home and stay there for good!! I still can’t believe with GM’s wealth of knowledge, long history of manufacturing experience, and money, why they’re aren’t spending more of it all at truly making Cadillac the best luxury brand in the world? I simply don’t get it.
The XTS is probably their only Cadillac that looks decent and traditional in a small sense. It has good bones, a great reliable power train in the GM’s 3.6 V6 and its 6 speed trans setup. It had good interior room, (not Fleetwood spacious) and is fairly comfortable to drive. No it’s not the floaty Cads of the past, but it does have a good ride balance.
Oh and before I forget, no Cadillac should ever come with a 4 banger! That’s just a disgrace and an insult to the brand. Nobody wants a buzzy whiny Cadillac, I don’t care how fast it is.
2 years with no new models, Cadillac unveils new XT4 at New York Auto show.
-No plug-in version
-No RHD version for international markets
-No Super Cruise
-Priced below Lexus NX
Yep, Your Fired!
I do believe Caddy’s problems are also GM’s problem.
GM overall only has two really great platforms, the Silverado and Colorado, including the pickup truck station wagons, ie, Escalade.
Caddy should improve the Colorado7 and sell it as a mid size SUV. Drop a V8 into it and pimp it up, replace the suspension, etc.
GM cars (overall) are not so good, to the point I compare them to lower end cheap sh!t cars. Even the Camaro isn’t a huge seller when compared to the Mustang.
GM (and all Big 3) manufacturers have also pushed the view of “GM” vs “Ford” vs “Chrysler” way too much. So, a Caddy is just a fancy Chev too many people out their. This is where the EU presitge marques have excelled, VW I personally believe has done the best job of delineating the difference between brands within VAG.
Mercedes Benz and BMW are just that, Mercs and Bimmers, not a fancy bullsh!t appliance Chev spruced up.
Toyota has done the best job in selling the Lexus as the ultimate Toyota.
Is Caddy the ultimate GM? No, not by a long shot.
As my orignal sentence stated, GM is not doing as well as it should overall. Vauxhall and Opel ……. sold. Holden doing poorly because GM HQ in Detroit doesn’t understand the Aussie market and wants to push EU GMs onto us ….. or Korean GMs.
GM illustrates why the world doesn’t buy US vehicles. It has little to do with unfair trade as the rest of the world manufacturers deal with the same countries as the US.
GM wake up to yourself.
What you’re doing hanging out in the backwater of Australia is beyond me. You should be in New York City as special consultant to Goldman Sachs or high growth vulture hedge funds. Your deep far-sighted analysis is simply wasted here, advising us plebs for free about GM’s failure modes and and Ford’s Pkayskool interiors.
Wait, GM does sell well in China, you say? Get outta here! No!
conumdrum,
I know GM is doing okay in China. But, elsewhere?
As for Ford’s and GM’s interiors, they are both not up to scratch. They could do a better job. They look built to a price, a low price.
Then I suppose there is that much crappy plastic in the F-150s interior it would be pet and child friendly.
Here is the *real* reason this clown reeks of failure (and why GM leadership is a failure too). Tesla Model S caught the industry with its pants down and single handedly redefined luxury. If you don’t believe me, then why in ONE product cycle has BMW, Audi, and Mercedes struck back with a vengeance? Go to inside evs website and you’ll notice new EV articles on all 3 of these brands for their EVs about to be released (not to mention Jag just released the i-Pace)
WHERE IS THE **REAL** CADILLAC EV?!? The ELR was a ridiculous joke and whoever product planned that hunk of junk should be blacklisted from the industry for life.
Lack of a real luxury EV cross-over is why Cadillac, Johann, and GM are all miserable failures. GM coming out with the Bolt first and not having a Cadillac luxury EV using similar technologies was one of the dumbest moves of all time. Cadillac could have re-invented itself as the EV luxury king, GM has the know-how, they just lack the leadership…GM just put out a *press release* for a Buick EV cross-over concept with 370 miles range. A freaking concept?!? Give me a break, the concept is 3 years too late. *You should be selling the thing* and not as a Buick!
I don’t believe a stable full of RWD V-8 powered luxo barges is going to save Cadillac. Even the luxury brands like Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Jaguar are relying on more suvs and crossovers. Why waste valuable funds on designing RWD full size cars when most consumers are leaving them in droves. There is nothing wrong with GM sharing platforms with Cadillac as long as the Cadillacs have a much better interior, have a smoother and quieter ride, and have their own engines. Also as some have mentioned above offer real service and a 10 year transferable warranty with unlimited mileage. Make the Cadillac the most comfortable and smoothest riding of any luxury vehicles and don’t worry about the zero to 60 or making another canyon carver. Big Al has a good suggestion on using the Colorado platform and using it to make a midsize body on frame suv with its own V-8 and make it with an luxury interior that cannot be matched by the Germans, the Brits, or the Swedes. Give this midsize suv sound deadening material throughout the passenger compartment including the roof and give it a better suspension system than any existing GM to where it just floats. Quiet, comfortable, smooth ride, with a Gold standard for service.
All of you are wrong. The problem with Cadillac is it is associated with “American” luxury, which isn’t really associated with anything today. Most everyone else does luxury better than we do. Everyone.
German Luxury = BMW, Audi, Mercedes Benz
European Luxury = All of the above, plus Jaguar, Land Rover and Volvo
Japanese Luxury = Lexus, Infiniti and to a lesser extent, Acura
Korean Luxury = Genesis and high end Kias, which believe it or not, do well in Korea for obvious reasons.
American Luxury = ??
Lincoln and Cadillac. The former is making strides so I expect the latter to follow, which is what needs to happen. In order for Cadillac to succeed, Lincoln needs to succeed and vice versa. Then, they can take on everyone else. Until then, they’ll both be fighting for marketshare from the rest of the brands.
I do agree with some of the comments above that Cadillac cannot be turned around in 3 1/2 years. de Nysschen did not have complete control of what products were made and when a new product is released. Many of the current Cadillacs have been on the market or were planned well before de Nysschen came to Cadillac. Even if Cadillac did come out with a large rear wheel drive V-8 car it would take several years before it would be available. Cadillac could come out with more crossovers based on GMs current platforms and at least cash in on the crossover wave which will eventually wane. Need the money now so that would generate needed revenue.
It should be real simple. 1. A 10 year, 120,00 bumper to bumper warranty that includes wipers, brakes, tires, and fluids. 1a. Not if, but when something breaks no GM boosh-wha telling me it was my fault that it broke. 2. A service minion delivering my loaner car for ALL service work. (Lincoln already does) 3. Declining the service minion for routine maintenance? I go to head of the line at Mr. Goodwrench. My car will also be ran through the carwash and the coffee better not suck. I can’t believe I’mm saying this; get as many fanblois on “ClubCaddillac” as there on ClubLexus. Yes, I’m on Clublexus. Lots of technical help.
It probably doesn’t matter what GM executives do. The fundamental problem is Cadillac is no longer a real luxury brand desired by the majority of people leasing luxury cars. Moving the headquarters doesn’t fix this. Giving Cadillacs real names doesn’t fix this. Building large RWD sedans with tail fins probably wouldn’t revive the brand either, at least with the people who lease luxury cars. Dead brand.
We are back to the stupid old cliche “Cadillac needs to produce American cars”. I got news for the Americans, Americans don’t want American cars, they want European cars. If Cadillac cannot sell semi-european feeling cars how the hell are they going to sell American cars. Nobody in the world wants American cars, least of all Americans. America is good at producing cheap shit from food (burgers) to jeans (Levi’s) clothing (Calvin Klein). Cheap hardly ever equals good, whereas luxury generally implies quality (though not always). America can produce luxury when there is no competition as was the case with Cadillac for decades. As soon as European competition arrives American goods are shown to be mediocre or worse. America doesn’t do luxury (with may be a few exceptions) because American business is geared towards mass-production not luxury.
Cadillac is dead, it’s just a matter of time when the GM management comes to see it.
Cadillac and Lincoln both might be dead brands. One of the costs to consider is the cost to closed the dealerships. The less costly choice might be to phase out the car models as they age and demand goes down and over a period of time offer the free standing Cadillac only dealerships a GMC/Buick or Chevrolet franchise unless that dealership is close to a same brand competing dealership. The Cadillac and Lincoln brands might be beyond redemption. Might be better to put more funds into developing a better Buick, Chevrolet, and GMC and make Buick the luxury brand.