SIGforum.com    Main Page  Hop To Forum Categories  The Lounge    Don't want to sell EV Buicks? Sorry, you can't be a dealer any more
Go
New
Find
Notify
Tools
Reply
  
Don't want to sell EV Buicks? Sorry, you can't be a dealer any more Login/Join 
goodheart
Picture of sjtill
posted
WSJ: GM buys out half of its Buick Dealers

quote:
Dealers who are taking the buyout would give up the Buick franchise and no longer sell the brand, he said. The dealer can continue to sell other GM models, such as Chevrolet or GMC, that often account for a higher percentage of sales.

The Journal reported in late 2022 that the automaker planned to offer buyouts to its U.S. Buick dealer network. The move came after the Detroit automaker gave them a choice: Invest at least $300,000 to sell and service EVs, or exit the Buick franchise. The investments would cover electric-vehicle chargers and worker training, among other initiatives.

The majority of the Buick network has already made the necessary investment, the spokesman said. GM is ending the year with around 1,000 Buick dealers.

GM offered a similar buyout program for its Cadillac brand starting in 2020 that trimmed the luxury brand’s U.S. dealer network by roughly one-third, the automaker has said.

The automaker has given dealers the opportunity to exit from the Buick network voluntarily and with full support of the National Dealer Council, the spokesman said. He added that Buick sales are up nearly 60% this year.

Dealers across the country have expressed concerns about leaning in too much on EVs when customers are worried about the range, reliability and high price of these models.

A group of dealers voiced their hesitations about the government’s role in pushing electric vehicles in a letter last month to President Biden, saying they were worried demand wasn’t keeping up with the influx of new models coming to market.

Automakers have been encouraging a more direct-sales model for EVs, in which buyers purchase the vehicle from the manufacturer or go through a no-haggle process with a dealer. This shift, which executives say will better match supply with demand, also reduces how many battery-powered models are kept on dealer lots.

Ford Motor
in late 2022 asked dealers to invest up to $1.2 million each in store updates, including installing new infrastructure for charging EVs at dealerships. The automaker eased some of these initial requirements recently, saying the company will continue to adapt its overall EV strategy to the changing market.


_________________________
“Remember, remember the fifth of November!"
 
Posts: 18615 | Location: One hop from Paradise | Registered: July 27, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Thank you
Very little
Picture of HRK
posted Hide Post
Other articles show that the 900 that left of the 1900 total represent 20% of total sales. Small dealers in mostly out of the way places, probably a lot left over from the old GM multi line dealers
Chevy Oldsmobile Buick Cadillac GMC store days.
 
Posts: 24650 | Location: Gunshine State | Registered: November 07, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of sgalczyn
posted Hide Post
People still buy Buicks?
Why?


"No matter where you go - there you are"
 
Posts: 4685 | Location: Eastern PA-Berks/Lehigh Valley | Registered: January 03, 2001Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Not really from Vienna
Picture of arfmel
posted Hide Post
Because they’re Chinese? A few years ago I read that Buick was hugely popular in China. FWIW. I doubt they’re buying EVs though.
 
Posts: 27274 | Location: SW of Hovey, Texas | Registered: January 30, 2007Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of P250UA5
posted Hide Post
Yup, Buick pretty much is still around because China loves them.

And the Lexus ES has developed out of the Luby's parking lot staple population Razz




The Enemy's gate is down.
 
Posts: 16274 | Location: Spring, TX | Registered: July 11, 2011Reply With QuoteReport This Post
אַרְיֵה
Picture of V-Tail
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by sgalczyn:

People still buy Buicks?
Why?
VentiPorts.



הרחפת שלי מלאה בצלופחים
 
Posts: 31692 | Location: Central Florida, Orlando area | Registered: January 03, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of Prefontaine
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by P250UA5:
Yup, Buick pretty much is still around because China loves them.

And the Lexus ES has developed out of the Luby's parking lot staple population Razz


Hey now. That’s my favorite place to eat there is. LuAnn plate. Fried fish, macaroni and cheese, and their got damn mashed potatoes with white gravy are the best there is. GOATED!
My GR Corolla Circuit Edition was parked there while I ate as I was coming back from a hard day of driving in the country, twisty, rural roads.

Now go wash your mouth out for spouting sacrilege about one of America’s finest dining establishments Razz



What am I doing? I'm talking to an empty telephone
 
Posts: 13125 | Location: Down South | Registered: January 16, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by HRK:
Other articles show that the 900 that left of the 1900 total represent 20% of total sales. Small dealers in mostly out of the way places, probably a lot left over from the old GM multi line dealers
Chevy Oldsmobile Buick Cadillac GMC store days.


Yep they have way too many Buick dealership for what is essentially 4 SUV's

Buick was selling very roughly 200,000 units a year pre-covid. If their statement of the 1,000 dealers accepting the buyout only represented 20% of that volume that means they were only selling 40 vehicles a year. A lot of these stores were making little to no profits and it was a huge windfall to take GM's buyout offer? Meaning little to do with the BEV transition.

I wonder how that affects GMC because almost every Buick dealership is actually a Buick/GMC dealership.
 
Posts: 4060 | Registered: January 25, 2013Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of P250UA5
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by Prefontaine:
quote:
Originally posted by P250UA5:
Yup, Buick pretty much is still around because China loves them.

And the Lexus ES has developed out of the Luby's parking lot staple population Razz


Hey now. That’s my favorite place to eat there is. LuAnn plate. Fried fish, macaroni and cheese, and their got damn mashed potatoes with white gravy are the best there is. GOATED!
My GR Corolla Circuit Edition was parked there while I ate as I was coming back from a hard day of driving in the country, twisty, rural roads.

Now go wash your mouth out for spouting sacrilege about one of America’s finest dining establishments Razz


Big Grin
Can't say I've had a bad experience at a Luby's, but it's probably been 15 years since I've been to one.




The Enemy's gate is down.
 
Posts: 16274 | Location: Spring, TX | Registered: July 11, 2011Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Altitude Minimum
Picture of BOATTRASH1
posted Hide Post
Damn it! Buick dealers going away and I’m going to retire in 16 months!
 
Posts: 1315 | Location: Shalimar, FL | Registered: January 24, 2007Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by P250UA5:
Yup, Buick pretty much is still around because China loves them.

And the Lexus ES has developed out of the Luby's parking lot staple population Razz
They get different Buicks than we do unfortunately.
 
Posts: 4060 | Registered: January 25, 2013Reply With QuoteReport This Post
I swear I had
something for this
posted Hide Post
What's funny is people are dropping more money on Chevys than they are Buicks.

https://www.thedrive.com/news/...brand-now-not-chevy#

quote:
Buick Is GM’s Budget Brand Now, Not Chevy

James Gilboy
PUBLISHED Dec 15, 2023 1:54 PM EST

Chevrolet: General Motors' brand for the everyman. The light beer bottle-clinking, blue-collar American who's working up a sweat to afford the next brand up the ladder: Buick. And if they work hard enough, maybe they'll follow that up with a Cadillac one day. But the world has changed since GM envisioned this brand progression decades ago. We may still see Chevy as the working-class brand, but that's a carefully crafted image for marketing's sake. Instead, some of GM's most budget-conscious buyers are flipping the script, because they're not shopping for Chevys. They're buying Buicks.

That may be a provocative claim to some, but kicking the hornet's nest isn't the point here. It's to observe that Buick's position is now that of GM's de facto economy brand. It may posture and even price itself like a premium product at times, but Buick's offerings aren't those of an upscale brand—not in the United States in 2023.

Since the 2020 retirement of the Regal, Buick's lineup has consisted entirely of crossovers, a body style whose sheer popularity makes it the archetypal modern car. Crossovers are for people who want the ability to do as much as possible with a single vehicle; take the kids to school, a Costco shopping run, and be up for a road trip. Anything more than that, from hauling a bed of wood chips to laying down quick quarter-mile times or leaving zero emissions behind are—by virtue of cost—luxuries.

They're luxuries that Buick doesn't afford its customers. Not a single vehicle in its lineup is a pickup truck, performance car, or EV. That third option might be on the way, but having an EV in your lineup isn't enough to make people covet your badge. Just ask Nissan.

"Now hold on," you might be saying. "Buicks are still more expensive than Chevys!" And you'd be right. The Trax-based 2024 Buick Envista starts at a price $2,000 higher, the Trailblazer-related Encore GX is an extra $2,500, and the Enclave is a whole $9,360 dearer than the Traverse. On its surface, Buick still looks like the upscale option. But the way Americans spend their money on new cars indicates otherwise.

For starters, let's compare the price range of new Buicks to those of Chevys. Chevy undeniably takes the title of cheapest car between the two, with the 2024 Trax starting at $21,495 against the $23,495 Envista. But not a single Buick nameplate starts north of the $48,334 that the average new car in the U.S. cost in July according to Kelley Blue Book. Chevy, meanwhile, has four above that mark: the Blazer EV, Corvette, Tahoe, and Suburban. There's simply more room to spend big on a Chevy, which people wouldn't do if they didn't think a Chevy was worth splashing out for.

There's also data from Cox Automotive about GM's Q3 sales, which gives us insight into what people actually spent on each model. Mirroring the relationship above, Buicks sell for more than their Chevy equivalents.

Base 2023 MSRP Q3 Average Transaction Price (ATP) Average Upsell
Chevrolet Trailblazer $23,395 $27,880 $4,485
Buick Encore GX $27,195 $29,725 $2,530
Chevrolet Traverse $35,915 $44,657 $8,472
Buick Enclave $46,195 $52,294 $6,099
Data not available for 2024 Buick Envista for comparison to Chevrolet Trax

Take a closer look though, and you'll notice an interesting trend: The difference between the models' average transaction prices is markedly less than the difference in MSRPs. That means people are spending more on options for the cheaper Chevys.

Base MSRP Differential ATP Differential
Trailblazer & Encore GX $3,800 $1,945
Traverse & Enclave $10,280 $7,637

This tells us people who walk into Buick dealers aren't spending as much on options or higher trims as Chevy customers are. You could argue Buick's trim structure discourages this with better standard equipment, but generally speaking, that's the opposite of what you expect as prices go up. Pricier cars have more and costlier options—Porsche in particular is famous for its nickel-and-diming. But for some reason, Buick bucks the trend.

Front 3/4 view of the 2024 Buick Encore GX Avenir in Ocean Blue Metallic. Buick
One reason might be that Chevy customers who aren't after something aspirational like a Silverado HD ZR2 or Corvette might seek a deal that a lower MSRP promises. But because they feel like they're saving money, they splurge a little more on options than a Buick buyer might. Perhaps the Buick badge is what buyers show up for, not what backs it up.

There's a more telling piece of data from Cox's report, though: Average transaction price by brand. Chevy's Q3 ATP—this is the average price of all new Chevys sold in the U.S. in that time—was $48,074, buoyed by its top seller the Silverado averaging $61,033. Buick meanwhile scored just $36,590, the lowest of all GM brands.

You could argue that number would be higher if Buick buyers had more expensive choices than the Enclave. Or, for that matter a newer one. The Enclave may have been updated for 2022, but the current model dates back to 2017. Maybe that's why sales are sluggish, totaling 28,483 through Q3 according to Good Car Bad Car. Its higher price than the related GMC Acadia probably doesn't help either.

But a Buick beyond the Enclave presents a problem for GM because it would risk cannibalizing sales from other brands. Besides, the premium market isn't Buick's strength anymore, as GM admits to those it's accountable to: Shareholders.

In a Q3 results presentation given to investors, GM touted Chevy and Buick together as "the new leader[s] in affordable, small SUVs." Elsewhere in the slides, it revealed that just 28 percent of Buick customers spring for the Avenir trims, which are positioned at the premium level that formerly defined Buick. (This also implies the average Buick buyer spends even less on options than the ATP indicates.)

That's not about to change, as the next Buick in the pipeline, the 2024 Envision, is expected to start in the mid-$30,000s, just above the outgoing model. Or as you may remember, right at the price the typical Buick buyer is comfortable at. It's an embrace of a status quo, and the closest we'll get to GM admitting Buick is Chevy's underling. That's not a bad thing, it's just where things have ended up—even if it's at odds with the rest of Buick's history.
 
Posts: 4589 | Location: Kansas City, MO | Registered: May 28, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
goodheart
Picture of sjtill
posted Hide Post
Thanks for this last post. If Buick buyers are working-class and conservative in their buying habits, as suggested by this article, then they would probably be the last group to be interested in EV's.
GM buyouts of rural dealerships because they don't want to sell EV's--that is they don't want to make necessary investments? Probably not great for either GM or the soon-to-be ex-dealers; and certainly not for their local customers.


_________________________
“Remember, remember the fifth of November!"
 
Posts: 18615 | Location: One hop from Paradise | Registered: July 27, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
delicately calloused
Picture of darthfuster
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by sgalczyn:
People still buy Buicks?
Why?


Because they’re golfers?



You’re a lying dog-faced pony soldier
 
Posts: 29997 | Location: Norris Lake, TN | Registered: May 07, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of abnmacv
posted Hide Post
A friend once described the state capitol here as "a city with a suspiciously high number of Buicks." He attributed it to state employees and an over abundance of lobbyists.


U.S. Army 11F4P Vietnam 69-70 NRA Life Member
 
Posts: 1646 | Registered: June 11, 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Thank you
Very little
Picture of HRK
posted Hide Post
GM's buyout money was $400 to $500K, the cost to upgrade, $200K, small dealers selling few Buicks made out closing the doors, essentially selling the dealership to GM which there were probably few buyers for small town dealers.

The big groups don't buy up 40 unit locations so these were dying out anyway.

It was a home run for these owners.
 
Posts: 24650 | Location: Gunshine State | Registered: November 07, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Lawyers, Guns
and Money
Picture of chellim1
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by sjtill:
If Buick buyers are working-class and conservative in their buying habits, as suggested by this article, then they would probably be the last group to be interested in EV's.
GM buyouts of rural dealerships because they don't want to sell EV's--that is they don't want to make necessary investments? Probably not great for either GM or the soon-to-be ex-dealers; and certainly not for their local customers.

Yeah... Buick was always the brand my parents generation aspired to... until they could afford a Cadillac, which few could.

But, ever since the 2008-2009 (fake) bankruptcy of GM, the decision making of those running the company makes no sense to me.



"Some things are apparent. Where government moves in, community retreats, civil society disintegrates and our ability to control our own destiny atrophies. The result is: families under siege; war in the streets; unapologetic expropriation of property; the precipitous decline of the rule of law; the rapid rise of corruption; the loss of civility and the triumph of deceit. The result is a debased, debauched culture which finds moral depravity entertaining and virtue contemptible."
-- Justice Janice Rogers Brown

"The United States government is the largest criminal enterprise on earth."
-rduckwor
 
Posts: 24853 | Location: St. Louis, MO | Registered: April 03, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Page late and a dollar short
posted Hide Post
FWIW I worked in a Buick GMC Cadillac dealership for the last nine years of my dealership career prior to retirement. I saw the storm clouds on the horizon from lackluster product offerings, poor (IMO) customer support and poor product support. One example, replacement parts, now could they justify not offering a replacement inside door handle for one model, the only way it was available for awhile was as a inner door trim panel assembly. Finally someone woke up and made it a serviceable standalone part. Things like a car being down for parts, all ordering and special handling cases being opened through the parts system. All avenues exhausted including phoning dealers around the country that show it on hand and being assisted by your factory rep. Then the icing on the cake, Buick Customer Service calling and telling you that they are addressing a customer concern and what you are doing to address this concern. Left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing despite them having in front of them all the steps you have done in the meantime.

That Buick rep wasn’t too happy when I asked her if I should find one in a parking lot and steal the part off of it. I was told this is serious, I replied “And all the work I’ve done so far is t serious?” Clueless.

If you look back into what occurred during the bankruptcy the government as part of the bailout wanted GM to shed all but two divisions, Chevrolet and Cadillac. GM fought this with the reasoning that GMC while having the same vehicles as Chevrolet trucks they were perceived as more upscale and would complement the Cadillac lineup for business owners that needed a truck but wanted more style than Chevrolet represented. And Buick, well GM wanted a foothold in the Chinese market and since the 1930’s it had been considered a premium brand above Cadillac there. So that is why Buick was saved.

I believe that at some point Buick will go away in North America and only be an Asian offering, simple enough for GM’s Chinese partner to slap a Tri-Shield on one of its home market offerings and call it a Buick.

Cadillac’s lack of dealership facilities in rural areas at some point will start to affect numbers. That brand’s customers expect “white glove” treatment and while any GM franchise can perform service and warranty work they are going to be in for a rude surprise when they are no longer a special snowflake. Things like pick up and delivery of customer’s cars at home or work, loaner cars for oil changes. Yep, times will be a changing.


-------------------------------------——————
————————--Ignorance is a powerful tool if applied at the right time, even, usually, surpassing knowledge(E.J.Potter, A.K.A. The Michigan Madman)
 
Posts: 8498 | Location: Livingston County Michigan USA | Registered: August 11, 2002Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of Prefontaine
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by P250UA5:
Can't say I've had a bad experience at a Luby's, but it's probably been 15 years since I've been to one.


Go back. They have closed a lot of them because these gen z people want foo foo food instead. So you’ll have to hunt for one. Great family place and they charge kids almost nil. The guy that is like my little brother, and I, swear by the place. He has three kids and would religiously go there. I mean if you can’t find any food you’re in the mood for at Luby’s you’ve got personal issues. But you’ll be amazed at the cost taking your whole family. Pound for pound, bang for the buck, can’t be beat. Their mash potatoes with white gravy are better than 4 and 5 star chef restaurants. We love this fuckin’ place man. I only have one left around me and it’s a good 20 minute drive at least. You get a choice of rolls, desserts, I could go on and on Big Grin



What am I doing? I'm talking to an empty telephone
 
Posts: 13125 | Location: Down South | Registered: January 16, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
  Powered by Social Strata  
 

SIGforum.com    Main Page  Hop To Forum Categories  The Lounge    Don't want to sell EV Buicks? Sorry, you can't be a dealer any more

© SIGforum 2024