GM sells Saturn to Roger Penske

[TruckDriver]

So, now I wonder how long before we will see Saturn racing in NASCAR

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/05/business/main5065203.shtml

(AP)  General Motors Corp. has a tentative deal to sell its Saturn brand to former race car driver and dealership group owner Roger Penske, both companies said Friday.

Penske has signed a memorandum of understanding that would give his dealership chain, Penske Automotive Group, Saturn's 350 dealerships, the companies said. Penske said that he expects to offer all the dealers new franchise agreements and will retain all 13,000 Saturn employees for the immediate term.

"I would expect that the model that we're putting together, the distribution model, will be profitable day one," Penske said in an interview with The Associated Press. "We'll have less costs. We'll not be in the manufacturing side."

Neither Penske nor GM would say how much Penske is paying for the brand. Penske said he expects the deal to close in the third quarter.

Penske Automotive Group also distributes Daimler AG's Smart subcompacts in the U.S., but Smart has its own dealership network and Saturn dealers will continue to exclusively distribute Saturn vehicles, Penske said.

Initially, GM will continue to produce on a contract basis the Saturn Aura sedan as well as the Vue and Outlook SUVs, the companies said. But Penske said he is in talks with manufacturers around the world about building Saturn cars in the future.

"We will be selling as many GM cars - a many GM-produced cars - under the Saturn brand as possible," Penske told reporters in a conference call Friday.

GM had announced plans earlier this year to sell the Saturn brand. The car maker launched Saturn in 1990 with the tagline "a different kind of car company." GM's hope was that Saturn would attract younger buyers with smaller, hipper cars to better compete with Japanese imports. It built a new plant in Spring Hill, Tenn., devoted to Saturn production.

The factory had more flexible work rules than traditional GM plants for the employees who built the cars.

Despite a cult-like following that drew thousands to annual reunions in Spring Hill, the brand never made money for GM. The factory stopped making Saturns in 2007 and currently builds only the Chevrolet Traverse.

As GM focused more on high-profit pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles, Saturn began to languish in the late 1990s. Then in 2006, car buyers began to find Saturn's new models more appealing. But after a good year in 2007, sales dropped 22 percent last year as the U.S. car market withered.

Today, Saturn production is scattered at plants across the U.S. The Aura is built at GM's factory at Kansas City, Kansas. The Outlook is built in Lansing, Mich., while the Vue is built in Ramos Arizpe, Mexico.

The Saturn Sky roadster is built in Wilmington, Del., but that plant is scheduled to close in July and the model will be discontinued. The Saturn Astra was imported from GM's plant in Antwerp, Belgium, and was discontinued last year.

Penske Automotive will take over the separate Saturn parts factory in Spring Hill, which will continue to make Saturn components.

Penske Automotive owns the second-largest U.S. automobile retail chain by sales and consistently scores high in customer satisfaction surveys. the company also has race teams in the IndyCar, NASCAR and Grand-Am series. Penske received wide acclaim for heading Detroit's successful effort to host the 2006 Super Bowl.

Carl F. Galeana, who owns two Saturn dealerships north of Detroit, said Friday he was thrilled that Penske would be the Saturn buyer.

"Roger Penske is an icon in the business world," Galeana said. "I've worked with him personally. Nobody works harder than Roger Penske."

Galeana said the fact that Penske is interested in Saturn means the brand has value.

"It allows Saturn to get back to its original roots, which is to be an independent car company," he said.

GM, which filed for bankruptcy court protection on Monday, has said it plans to shed its Saturn, Hummer, Pontiac and Saab brands. Earlier this week, GM said it found a buyer for Hummer in China's Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co.

However, any such deal would require Chinese Commerce Ministry approval, and reports in state-run newspapers Friday said Sichuan Tengzhong had not yet obtained such an approval.

[moparjohn]

Oh, I thought it was being killed off like Plymouth, I can't belive they are selling it off I was looking forward to it's demise.  Sorry to any likers, never liked them myself. On a brighter note, is Pontiac being sold off too? at least it's a brand with a rich history.

[68charger383]

Good deal. I like the current Saturn cars much better the current Chevy lineup.

GM selling off certain brands is almost like a return to the early 1900s before GM bought up all of these independent car manufacturers.

This is good for continued competition , increased improvement in cars via R&D and America   

[Todd Wilson]

Initially, GM will continue to produce on a contract basis the Saturn Aura sedan as well as the Vue and Outlook SUVs, the companies said. But Penske said he is in talks with manufacturers around the world about building Saturn cars in the future.

"We will be selling as many GM cars - a many GM-produced cars - under the Saturn brand as possible," Penske told reporters in a conference call Friday.

I bet we see China built Saturns before its over with. This just makes it sound like a good deal right now. Once we get our hands completely on saturn its all about turning a major profit. Build cheap piss poor quality cars in China and continue to sell them for premium price in the USA!  My crystal ball has went dark...................


Todd

[Ghoste]

And then they will sell like hotcakes.  The part that bothers me is that they report the brand was never a big seller for GM even though it was devoted in mfg and marketing and vehicle class to sell small cars against the imports.  I would bet the same "reporters" who wrote that also have a recent story in their portfolio that goes along the line of how GM only offered Hummers, trucks, and SUV's instead of small cars like the people want.  It seems like if the Saturn fit that mold then the people's President as the new majority shareholder of GM should have made them sell off all the other brands.
Oh well, this has to be getting old coming from me now.   

[Mike DC]

 
I've never cared much about Saturn either way.  GM never needed it in the first place.  They could have saved themselves a few billion dollars by just cutting fewer corners on the small parts of their Chevrolets & Pontiacs. 

 

[Ghoste]

You are 100% correct Mike.  They could have done better with what they had and stayed out of Hummers and Saturns.  The five price point idea of Chev, Pontiac Olds, Buick, Caddy was a good one that they abandoned for badge engineering.

[89MOPAR]

Oh, I thought it was being killed off like Plymouth, I can't belive they are selling it off I was looking forward to it's demise.  Sorry to any likers, never liked them myself. On a brighter note, is Pontiac being sold off too? at least it's a brand with a rich history.

  Pontiac is going to be simply shut down, not sold, just fade away - like oldsmobile + plymouth

[dodgecharger-fan]

So, one could infer that the problem with GM is the dealership chain?

Basically, GM is still going to manufacture the cars. They're just not going to manage the part of the industry that sells them at retail anymore.
At least that's the "day one" model.

Ignore the future model of having cars built by other manufacturers, and that's essentially what is being said... pretty interesting.

So, could this be a model for all brands of automakers? Just be a manufacturer. Let someone else sell them. It might just work. After all, there has been talk of taking the purchase experience online - that'd effectively take the dealership out of the sales equation - then we'd have "certified service depots" much like we have for stereos, toasters, etc.. (who fixes their toaster anymore? disposable cars anyone?)

[Brock Samson]

 Now that's what I've heard too, that the entire process will be streamlined by selling  cars online,.. afterall,..  hasn't there allways been a traditional bottleneck and problematic experiance between the Manufactures and the Dealerships?..
Not to mention the problems the Buyer has with the Dealerships?.. we allways complain about the dealers I know they have soured me... I can't begin to recount the wide variety of problems I've had whenever a dealer was involved,.. I tried to Buy my GF a 300 a few years ago and I couldn't even get a call back... 
Of course they closed up shop a couple weeks ago along with five other local Mopar dealers... I can count Six local Bay Area dealers that have gone defunkt in the past few years (most in the last six Mos.)
So Penske is really on to somthing, don't forget he's also the exclusive SMART car Distributor and those cars are spring up all over here...
So yeah,.. I'd have to predict we'll be driving hybred Smart Cars produced in China and bought over the internet before too long.

[Ghoste]

And as much as the dealerships have soured us (and I'm one of the ones who has had bad experiences) I sure as hell can't say the "new" model is any better.  If you think getting service on your globally assembled toaster or television is a pain in the ass now, just wait until you try to get your vehicle repaired by talking to some idiot in a call center on the other side of the planet.
Oh joy.

[Old Moparz]

.

[hemigeno]

I just talked with that guy   

[Ghoste]

Was he helpful?  Or was it morelike... ? 

[hemigeno]

Simwarr's solution for everything is a reboot, followed by another download of the software.  Not much help, but hey, that's what you get for free.

Want someone with an actual grasp of the Ingrish language?  That's gonna cost you...