GM's Other Halo Cars

The New York Times weighed in today on the popularity of the new Camaro, saying, “With GM shrinking, hot products like the Camaro become more critical to its survival.” In reality, while it’s great for the Detroit Three (really the Detroit Two, Rome One) to have halo products with waiting lists a few months long, the cars that will turn GM around are more, for lack of a better word, pedestrian.

Take for example Chevy’s new midsize SUV, the Equinox. Completely redesigned for 2010, this SUV is as comfortable as a Toyota RAV4 or Honda CR-V, its interior quality is at least equal to those high-selling rivals, and it gets 32 mpg on the highway (with its four-cylinder engine), besting both. Granted, the four-cylinder Equinox won’t win any drag races, but neither will the RAV4 or CR-V. The compact crossover market is also booming, unlike the sports cars market.

For another example, look at Chevy’s Malibu. Since it was redesigned a couple of years ago, it has been popular with consumers, garnering enough sales to propel it to No. 3 on our American-Made Index (although fleet sales are included in those numbers). It might not have as much interior room as the Accord, but its ride is more pleasant. It was one of the first examples of GM turning the corner in interior quality, as well. Oh, and it beats the Japanese rivals in gas mileage (as of the 2009 model year).

Sure, the Camaro looks retro cool, but as our staff experts decided, it couldn’t beat the Ford Mustang or Dodge Challenger in a head-to-head-to-head matchup. There’s heavy demand for the Camaro now, but in time its shine will dull a little, just like the new Mustang’s. That shouldn’t worry GM, as long as it can continue to build more cars, trucks and SUVs like the Malibu and Equinox.

Quality. Reliability. High mpg. That’s the recipe for the Detroit automakers to muscle aside foreign manufacturers to regain their market share, and that’s the way they’ll be able to fire us taxpayers as their employers and bring us on as customers.

A Muscle Car to the Rescue (New York Times)

Comments

I disagree with two points within this article. Anyone who test drives the 2010 Equinox should come to the conclusion that it is superior to the current RAV4 and CRV - it's not even close. On the other hand the Malibu interior quality has been panned by many of the experts (ie Car & Driver, Automobile Mag, Edmunds, etc) as being of dollar store quality. GM nailed the ride and handling but blew the interior quality and exterior design.
What GM needs to do is design, engineer, and build a few models with the goal that they will all be class leaders by a significant margin instead of aiming to be "just as good as Toyota or Honda". I think GM has proven with the Equinox that if they want to play with the Honda's and Toyota's of the world they certainly can. I'd like to see GM pull a "Hyundai" like move and load-up their cars for the next two years with things like leather, heated seats, moon roof, etc, while still undercutting the Japs on price. Hyundai did this and it worked wonders. GM needs to get radical or it won't matter how many halo cars they think they have.
One of my bosses went to HBC with Fritz Henderson and knows him well enough where they still speak. He said Fritz is known to be a rabble-rouser and that many insiders believe this is exactly what GM needs in order to really shake things up. My boss added that several folks within the HBC circle think Fritz is the next Carlos Ghosn in the making. If that turns out to be true then GM's future could ironically be very bright. Only time will tell.