carlover23

Why can't they put the 6-speed in the Hybrid, wouldn't that make it more efficent?

Also, I think it's also linked to the Saturn no haggle pricing strategy, the price you see is what you get and there many people who see that they are not really getting a deal for their Saturn as much as other cars. The XR is 25K, you'll pay that much regardless of what you say to the salesman. But the flipside is that GM is making more money on the Aura than any other vehicle because it's not discounted as much and they are getting the list price. It's not like walking into a chevy dealer and seeing a malibu for 21,500 and getting it for 19K just because you negotiated a lower price from the dealer. You can't with a Saturn. Give it time it will catch on, especially with GM being more aggressive with updates and redesigns, I can see Auras being sold at 100K or more a year.

What everyone is missing here is that American would scream and moan if gas prices go up $.25 because of something the government did, increasing taxes on gasonline would be political suidcide, period. No this is not a really solution and yes it is punishing the companies who are making products that people want, but it is not politically incorrect to do so. Americans like to blame industry for making the world a worse place, but not take responsibilty for their own actions. I remember hearing someone taking about pollution and blaming factories and then driving off in a huge SUV, somehow they couldn't equate riding a V8 powered SUV with increasing polution or dependance on foriegn oil.

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2006/04/gm_saturn_aura_.html here's an article from the green car congress, wonder what the MPG figures will be. Affordable Hybrids from GM, can Toyota do the same?

I agree wholehartedly with the above statement, I think people are putting too much stock in Indian and Chinese people being so much better/smarter than americans. My wife is in a Masters program with people from India who claim that their education is so much better than everyone else's but when asked if everyone in their country is given the same opprotunities to succeed, the answer is no, and that means the doctors, lawyers, etc. you see are the best of the best from those countries where the parents push them very hard, the average person from India is not that. You have money and influence, you get better education better opprotunies. That would be the same in any country/culture. The bottom line is not that multinational/global companies are setting up shop because the workforce is better educated that their American couterparts, they are setting up shop because they are taking advantage of the economic difference between the second and third world country and the US. I also have a co-worker who has had a knee replacement and had someone tell her that stopped using a particular companies plastic knee because once the company outsourced to India the quality of the product also got worse. And in cases of Dell and tech firms who also outsorce their tech support, their customer service suffers, it is not in most instances better employees, but cheaper employees.

In all honesty, I do not know if that will be such a great idea, when you bring over European market cars and engines, you have the propensity to be have realiability issues(VW) and space issues(ford Mondeo/Contour) and even safety issues (Fusion). I would hate to have cars based because of their lack of backseat space, headroom, power, or poor crash scores. The only way I can see it working is if it's some kind Niche thing, like Mazda is, to a degree. The different engines are good idea, only dealership mechanics are able to repair and service correctly (catera). It would be nice to have a disel option, other than the germans. Do we have someone on the forum that is familar with Opel/Vaxhaul and is able to enlighten us as to how these vehicles perform, hold up over a period of time?

sure she's not getting it confused with the CRV or is she talking about a used one?

base models only, you are not going to see that on a Hemi or limited version.

I see two possible outcomes, Toyota, Nissan, and Perhaps Honda and Hunydai Perhaps creeping into retail sales of trucks, but won't have an overrall effect on market share, this has much more to do with the amount of company fleet purchases and government contracting. There are so many tie-ins that GM/DODGE/FORD have with companies and governmental entities that the net outcome would be minimal with these kinds of purhcases, also you have to into account the amount of configurations availible, the Asian marks simply don't have as many and would be priced too high for a small business to purhcase on and moderate scale. What I think would happen is that simply more trucks will be sold, not any real loss in market share per say. This is like saying that we will see Police departments with Camries/Maximas/Accords/Altimas or taxis as Avalons/Azeras/etc, simply would not happen because of costs.

And that is main source of the problem, most people cannot afford to buy the new cadillac or specialty Corvette, Solstice, GTO, etc. But the mainstay of GM the FWD cars get outclassed by the others or the perception is that they are. Look at the W-body, The new Lacrosse and Impala are nice, but have an atrociously small backseat and that really doesn't make since considering the size difference between the GM w's and Camries, Accords, Altimas. You have a vehicle about 198 inches long or even 202 inches long and has less backseat volume that a Camry or Altima that's only 191 or so inches long. This is were I see a principal problem with GM and needs to be corrected.

That's what the Japanese government does for their companies.

I agree with this statement, I think that strategy should be Two minivans and three Crossovers, There should be a Lower priced Crossover, Chevy/GMC, a midlevel, Saturn, and then an upscale model; Buick. There should only be two Minivans, a budget model like Chevy and an upscale one, maybe Buick or Saturn. The Minivan market is dwindling as people are purchasing more and more crossovers as they become availible. It does not make finanical scense IMO to release 4 minivans and 3 crossovers. Plus Crossover can be sold at a premium VS there minvan counterparts, because they do not have that Soccer mommy stigma and are the hot thing because they aren't as thursty as a BOF SUV.

you're right they did, however, Intrepid/Concorde/LHS/300 had to sell at serious discounts. Used 300s with the 2.7 V6 are still selling close to sticker, at least around here in NJ/Philly. I like the LaCrosse, however, the fact that the backseat is smaller than the competition despite it being a longer vehicle is unacceptible. The fact that you can get a more fuel efficent Chevy Malibu/Impala with the same or more HP is crazy. Shouldn't buick be an upgrade over other Non-Cady GMs?

I saw a white one on RTE 30 in Straford, NJ yesterday, pretty nice, the rear window looked odd, though, almost like it had no rear headroom. I does look at lot more sporty than the outgoing model. a pretty nice package considering you are getting a Luxo-car for less money than a LS430 and the like. It would be nice if Caddy had more features for it.