A commentator recently accused TTAC of posting a CarMax superbowl ad just because the company owns a panel on our home page. Uh, no. Short of not accepting any advertising and switching to a pay-per-view model—which our Best and Brightest rejected like a high school quarterback talking to an ugly misfit frump in a low-budget horror movie—we’ll take what ad support we can get. But we give our advertisers no quarter. I’ve seen plenty of GM, Toyota, Ford and Chrysler ads on TTAC, and you know how we roll in that regard. Some of you may also recall negative comments from buyers who felt they were boned to the max by CarMax. Personally, I really like Chris Wilmore and his crew. I also like every PR person I’ve ever met (on the personal level). Ça fait rien. No one has ever successfully messed with TTAC’s editorial independence. Nor will they. It’s our USP. It’s what we do. K? Now, CarMax ran an interesting survey asking the question above. Their results after the jump. My take: not asking TVR how long their half-sized underfloor battery could hold a charge. Yours?
Several weeks ago, I took my 18-year-old daughter to Pennsylvania to find her a used car (I don’t believe in buying a new car for a kid). We found a Honda dealership that had a nice, clean 1998 Civic for about $4000. My daughter had $3000 saved up from working at the mall. We gave the salesman the cash and I asked if I could get a loan for the balance. “No loans”, he replied. “We had a guy in here this morning that had an 800 credit score that had to walk away from the car because he couldn’t get approved.” I then agreed to give the salesman a personal check from my account and we were able to buy the car (which, by the way, has been a real gem). The Honda dealership is right across the road from a Cadillac store. “I sold more Hondas myself in December than all the salesman over at Cadillac combined,” he told me. I think this experience is a good indicator of what’s happening in car sales in the USA right now. It’s a bloodbath.
Reading GM’s FastLane Blog sometimes feels like watching the images generated by an underwater camera cruising through the Titanic’s sunken remains. Yes, I know, GM hasn’t cracked in two yet, never mind hit the ocean floor. But the blog’s extended periods of silence strikes this jaded journalist as, well, creepy. A sense of impending doom that’s also reflected by the editorial mix: half-assed attempts to address the key questions vexing GM’s “turnaround plan” (as bulkhead after bulkhead buckles under pressure), interspersed with exec-sourced, over-optimistic appraisals of GM’s prospects. And now, it looks like GM’s just given up, surrendering the floor to “resource analyst” Amory Lovis’ mob over at the Rocky Mountain Institute. Abundance by design™! ‘Cause austerity sucks, right?
When a car salesman tells you an expensive model’s pointless, nine times out of ten, it’s pointless. If he proffers this opinion in the depths of a recession, with new car sales lower than Bernie Madoff’s morals, it’s a dead cert. I’ve experienced this vehicular vertigo twice in the last week. First, when contemplating a zero-mile Honda Civic Mugen Si gathering dust in an otherwise empty former Saturn showroom. Second, whilst sitting in an Acura RL, moments away from an extended test drive. The salesman told me flat out that the Acura TL is a better car than the RL, hinting that anyone who buys an RL is a sap. As I’ve rated the TL as a one-star car, where do you go from there?
You know, this sounds crazy, but this MicroFueler thing might just work. I’m no fuel expert (I just play one in the autoblogosphere), but flex fuel vehicles are ready to rock and roll on any mix this bad boy can brew. And now E-Fuel, the maker of the home pump, is expanding beyond the home brew market to… the micro brewery market. CNET’s Green Tech reports, “The inventor of the EFuel100 MicroFueler home ethanol maker has signed on Sierra Nevada Brewing to make ethanol from beer dregs.” I would have thought that waiting around for drinkers to leave the dregs would be a time-consuming business, but then that’s just a bad joke isn’t it? Here’s the real deal…
Not buyers of Dodge Vipers per se. Some 127 of them found their way to a Dodge dealer in January, a 74 percent gain from last year’s total. Of course, that may have a little something to do with the fact that A) Dodge dealers are dealing as if their life depends on it (which it does) and B) the chances of buying a new Viper are decreasing by the minute. Especially since Chrysler revealed that it wants to sell the model as a brand to . . . someone. Oh how we laughed! Well, not Autoblog obviously, despite having reported that American tuner Saleen was a suitor (after having reported that Saleen’s busy going belly-up). I mention this not because I’ve been dying to put the boot in to Autoblog ever since my reader-inspired vow of fraternity, but because it raises the obvious question. Is Chrysler lying when it told the MSM that it has three companies interested in buying its Viper tooling and trademarks? (Setting aside the question of whether or not Cerberus has already mortgaged these “assets.”) Here’s AB’s take:
Well, not so wild ass, obviously. Other than getting sued by disenfranchised Saab
dealers—which isn’t so much of an issue now that Uncle Sam is paying for everything—why wouldn’t GM shutter Saab? When it comes to buying car brands, no one is. Or will be. For a very, very long time. If ever. And GM needs to show its Congressional overlords that it’s doing something about something™. So we’re passing along a tipster’s assertion that yesterday’s resignation of Percy Barnevik from GM’s Board of Directors signals that the axe is about to fall on the Born From Jets brand. The divine Mr. B. was born just (pronounced youst) outside Trollhättan. If he ever wants to show his face in Sweden again, he has to distance himself from the author of Saab’s neglect, abuse and final destruction. You know, GM and its Board of Directors . . . which he joined six years after GM scarfed the Swedish brand, during which time it produced the America-only 9-7x (a TTAC Ten Worst winner). For that alone, I’d be worried.
I’m beginning to shop around for pads for my ’07 Sonata (3.3 liter motor). I’m looking to replace the OEM pads (which were very good, BTW) with something with a little more bite. Initially, I was looking at ceramic pads, but I’ve noticed in my shopping that Titanium Kevlar pads are roughly $10 cheaper depending on where you go. What is the consensus between Ceramic vs. Titanium Kevlar? Is it one of those you get what you pay for deals? Or is there a value? Also, would it be ill-advised to mix and match? Say Ceramics up front and Titanium Kevs in the rear? I’m having a somewhat hard time looking for sites that offer ceramics for the rear of the car. Do the B&B recommend any good sites for brake shopping? TireRack doesn’t offer them, at least for my car. I’ve scoured the forums and they are mostly useless on this subject. I basically want a set of pads that bite well, haul the car down noticeably and give good feel. I don’t care about brake dust.
Post Titanic Tuesday, GM is desperate to do something, anything to move its moribund metal. I speak here not of the pricing blowouts, finance deals and BOGO offers at the sharp end. I refer to the manipulation of dealer relations. Forcing dealers to stock vehicles that no one wants to buy. Back in the day, they used to call this practice “channel stuffing.” These days, they call it “pretending we’re a viable business to our Congressional overlords.” Automotive News [sub] reveals GM’s latest contribution to the genre: the more-than-slightly-ironically named “consensus program.”
Audi’s quest to become America’s upmarket alpha has hit the wall. It might be the same wall Mercedes, BMW, Lexus, Cadillac et al. have struck, but it’s b-b-b-b-b-bad. You know sales suck when Audi PR doesn’t mention the actual percentage drop and headlines A5 and, worse (better?), R8 sales. “The Audi A5 posted a 76.3% increase over last January with 603 units sold in January 2009. The Audi R8 broke its January sales record with over 107 units sold, an increase of 75.4% over January’s sales a year ago.” Woo-hoo! Meanwhile, A4 sales evaporated, down 29.4 percent. The high profit A8 is DOA: sales off 65.1 percent. Sales of the TT roadster (-51.8%) and Q7 SUV (-44.7%) indicate two other dead models not selling.
The Detroit Free Press reports that Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) has added some car dealer-friendly provisions to the proposed $43g (gazillion) economic stimulus package.
Mikulski’s proposal would grant a tax credit for vehicles bought between Nov. 12 of last year and Dec. 31 of this year. The tax break would only go to families making less than $250,000 a year, and would only apply to interest on loans up to $49,500.
“Everyone wants to save auto manufacturers, but no matter how much government aid we give to the Big Three auto makers, they can’t survive if consumers don’t start buying cars,” Mikulski said.
True dat. HOWEVER, this is like putting a band aid on an arterial wound. Until the U.S. housing market recovers, car sales will not come back. And maybe not even then, for a while anyway. How Congress/the feds do that remains to be seen. Later.
Reuters reports that GM Board of Directors member Percy Barnevik resigned his position today “for personal reasons.” Barnevik is one of GM’s longest serving BOD members; he’s watched the epic erosion of shareholder value and the breathtaking destruction of the automaker’s assets, market share and credibility. And yet, on his way out the door, Barnevik gave GM CEO Rick Wagoner and his team an unqualified thumbs-up. “I remain a strong supporter of management and the Board of GM, and of the direction the company is taking.” This from the ex-ABB CEO who had to repay half of an undisclosed $78m (i.e. hidden) severance package, part of an enormous book cooking scandal (called “Europe’s Enron”). The same company (that Barnevik founded) which was deeply embroiled in a global bribery scandal, eventually paying out $16.4m to the Justice Department to settle their criminal investigation. With Board members with this kind of background, who needs enemies?
Well, you knew it was going be ugly. This one’s Medusa class. January sales fell 54.8 percent vs. last January, from 137,392 to 62,157 vehicles. Breaking that into bits, car sales sank 66 percent (15,747) while trucks tumbled 49 percent to (46,410). Chrysler fingered two culprits. First up, fleet sales. Believe it or not, the company claimed credit for the 81 percent fall from their “normal” fleet sales total. Apparently, the drop “aligned with the Company’s sales strategy helping to maintain or improve the overall residual value of Chrysler vehicles for our customers.” Second, tight credit.
“Chrysler LLC received the first $4 billion installment of our $7 billion bridge loan from the U.S. Treasury in early January,” said Jim Press, President and Vice Chairman – Chrysler LLC. “However, it wasn’t until later in the month that Chrysler Financial received its $1.5 billion loan, greatly enhancing its ability to support our dealers and provide credit to our customers. We were very encouraged and working closely with Chrysler Financial, were immediately able to introduce our zero percent financing for customers.”
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