CEO Mary Barra Discusses GM's Short & Long Term Priorities - Here's What She Said About Trucks

[BobHancock]

On 9/18/2018 at 7:44 PM, Nargg said:

 

You are obviously not an average consumer of vehicles.  The items that have no use for you have a lot of use for most others.  In other words, the World does not revolve around you.

Correct.  It revolves around me.

[cr250Silverado]

For those complaining about trucks getting bigger and the lack of small trucks;

 

*CAFE standards are based upon a vehicle’s wheelbase.* Bigger wheelbase means looser emissions & MPG allowed by the Feds. Smaller wheelbase means higher standards. A small truck is hard to produce because it has to achieve exponentially better MPG and emissions than a full size truck.  The current technology limits MPG and emissions. This is why the 19’ silverado has a longer wheelbase than the 18’. And I imagine this plays a role in why they are abandoning sedans. This tier’d scale has enabled them to continue to produce trucks, and without it all trucks would have to achieve Prius emissions and MPG. This isn’t GMs fault, they are simply doing their best to play by the rule book put into place by legislators who got into office by the voters.  GM would want nothing more than to be free to produce whatever they want such as  a ranger size truck with 37” tires, Dana 60 axles, LBZ diesel, and whatever else you can come up with. 

 

Tell the Feds to pound sand? Laughable at best, I am willing to bet going against the LAW wouldn’t go over well for any manufacture.

 

Even FCA, who has held out on direct injection, now has a small 4 CBC turbo direct injection engine for their wrangler.  

 

My only apprehension about this CAFE argument is that FCA still mostly has multi point injection engines, 5.7 V8s, wranglers, Power Wagons, their auto/stop tech and direction injection motors are OPTIONS vs forced standards like GM.  Maybe they are not saving any “credits” while GM, by being ahead of the regulations, is stock piling credits for future use when CAFE standards get even more restrictive.  No matter how you slice it the manufactures have done a bad job with educating the public with why they are doing what they are doing.  

[revrnd]

On 9/19/2018 at 8:11 PM, RyanbabZ71 said:

People want smaller trucks??? I’d take a full size over a mini any day of the week.

 

 

Ryan B.

 

I bought an S15 in'88. Went back to a fullsize in '94...

[Largely Unknown]

On 9/24/2018 at 6:10 PM, Black02Silverado said:

Yes, they want smaller trucks.  There are more short bed trucks on the road than standard bed trucks.  To me a short bed is a waste. May as well drive a Ridgeline...

Here's some random mythbusting: I had an '06 Ridgeline and only averaged 17mpg over 150K miles.  I never dreamed of taking it in for warranty work. I also never saw another one driven by a young person (probably due to purchase cost).  For me now with '17 my Sierra, a long bed would be painful for my usage taking kids to their events where the parking spaces are small. That's the problem with generalizations.  I'm an urban cowboy, that's the way it is.

[Largely Unknown]

It's true, and sad,  Mary's comments seem to be aimed at the political elites.  It would give me more confidence in GM if her comments reflected what we're seeing out in the world.  Take F*rd for example, the recently told the press that they're mostly done with cars and focusing on SUV's and trucks.  Bravo, it's almost like they actually visited a dealer!

[Joey Roth]

Everyone I know are pretty damn good drivers. As a matter of fact, percentage wise, the people of these United States are pretty good drivers. Take into consideration how many people live in California, for example, the number of accidents is actually low. Compare that to Japan, or even Russia, we're good. I guess we've been driving longer than they have might be the reason? Check out those car crash videos from eastern Europe on YouTube. It's like the wild west over there. Russia is just one big hundred mile an hour nightmare.

[aseibel]

On 9/18/2018 at 6:44 PM, Nargg said:

 

You are obviously not an average consumer of vehicles.  The items that have no use for you have a lot of use for most others.  In other words, the World does not revolve around you.

I'm not sure you represent the average truck buyer either.

Most (all) of the people I deal with on a daily basis aren't paying a monthly subscription to onstar. I don't know how they make any money with their terrible structure and gouging practices. Its rare to hear anyone speak positively of onstar who isn't in an advertisement for them.

[Nargg]

1 hour ago, aseibel said:

I'm not sure you represent the average truck buyer either.

Most (all) of the people I deal with on a daily basis aren't paying a monthly subscription to onstar. I don't know how they make any money with their terrible structure and gouging practices. Its rare to hear anyone speak positively of onstar who isn't in an advertisement for them.

Why do you care about average?  And how do you think your small bubble of people you "deal with" represent the average either?

 

Here's the real numbers: https://www.statista.com/statistics/736921/general-motors-onstar-business-subscriptions/ 

 

Around 7 million.  That's significant enough to be worthy of consideration.  For me?  I subscribe for my Wife and for the Younger driver in the family.  Worth every penny for those of mine I wish to keep safer rather than being risky.  I could care less if you do or don't subscribe.  But since you don't, you're opinion is really not very worthwhile in this topic.

[Jsdirt]

I think 7 million is slightly optimistic. GM must've released those numbers to keep shareholders from bailing ... 

 

I've been all over the country from MA to CA to FL and back, and I have yet to talk to a truck owner that paid for Onstar. I pulled the fuse for mine the day I bought the truck. Anecdotal evidence, sure, but if there were actually 7 million users, I'd have at least run into a FEW of them ...

[aseibel]

42 minutes ago, Nargg said:

Around 7 million.  That's significant enough to be worthy of consideration.  For me?  I subscribe for my Wife and for the Younger driver in the family.  Worth every penny for those of mine I wish to keep safer rather than being risky.  I could care less if you do or don't subscribe.  But since you don't, you're opinion is really not very worthwhile in this topic.

yeah, 7 million is a lot. But your source does not indicate if those are paid subscriptions or the free ones that most new cars come with that people just let expire. 

 

if you find value in it, that's fine. I don't. And neither does the person you originally replied to in this thread. I'd rather GM put money into vehicles that are safe and dependable to drive on the road than worrying about "connectivity", which is the only point I'm making. Connectivity is not a feature I will ever pay more for.

 

Maybe you'd like to look at this list of complaints about onstar from the Better Business Bureau if you have some free time.

https://www.bbb.org/us/mi/warren/profile/automation-equipment/onstar-corporation-0332-27002502/complaints

[j-ten-ner]

6 hours ago, Joey Roth said:

Everyone I know are pretty damn good drivers. As a matter of fact, percentage wise, the people of these United States are pretty good drivers. Take into consideration how many people live in California, for example, the number of accidents is actually low. Compare that to Japan, or even Russia, we're good. I guess we've been driving longer than they have might be the reason? Check out those car crash videos from eastern Europe on YouTube. It's like the wild west over there. Russia is just one big hundred mile an hour nightmare.

I was always taught to compare myself with the better ones, not the worse ones.

 

so long

j-ten-ner