Originally Posted by MtViewGuy88
The thing that really annoys me is that GM already
has a bunch of small cars that could easily compete against the Japanese onslaught of small cars, namely the Opel Meriva, Opel Corsa and Opel Astra.
How come GM isn't seriously considering selling at least the Meriva in the USA? Remember, they're already assembling the Meriva in Mexico, so it wouldn't take much to expand that plant and sell US-certified versions under the Chevrolet label (in fact, in Latin America the Meriva
is sold as a Chevrolet model).
Eh, the Meriva is kinda weird and the Corsa is too dinky for the US market. The Astra is a lot nicer than the piece o crap Cobalt though, and they're on the same platform.
Thing is, GM can make pretty decent cars out of their newer platforms, but they're hoarding the good stuff for upper-end models that aren't competitive in their price segments.
Perfect example is the Saab 9-3. It's on the same platform as the Chevy Malibu and Pontiac G6. It gets nice interior materials, a nice powertrain, nice chassis calibrations, and is generally a rather nice car. If the Saab 9-3 was sold in decontented form (and by this I mean less gadgets and maybe less power but the same basic "nice" stuff) it would be plenty competitive against the Accords and Camrys of the world.
But GM has to take the basic platform and crappify it for the Malibu and G6, throw some old pushrod engines in them--and while they may be good pushrods they're still old school low tech--and make way too many stupid variations. Then the 9-3 gets priced as a supposedly premium Saab but it's nowhere as nice as the competition it has to go up against.
If GM wants to use a platform in "premium" and also regular cars, they have to make the platform good enough for the premium car and then just offer a basic, cheap-to-produce version as the regular car without making it a piece of crap. They can't use a platform that would make a nice regular car when set up in its premium form, then take all the niceness out to make the regular version.