We just had a chance to read the detailed plan that GM submitted to Congress yesterday regarding their restructuring efforts.  There has been a great deal of media buzz about this the past week, and specifically a lot of speculation and misinterpretation regarding GM's plans for Saturn, Pontiac and Opel, the three GM brands that our car club is all about.

Rather than try to second guess based upon media speculation, we decided to wait till we could see the actual plan, and we suggest the same for you.  A PDF of the detailed plan can be found on our site at the link below:

GM Plan for Congress 12/02/2008,  242.03 Kb

Regarding the Saturn SKY / Opel GT, GM made a point of highlighting that the Saturn and Opel Insignia earned "car of the year awards," and indicated that "as part of the plan, the company also will accelerate discussions with the Saturn retailers, consistent with their unique relationship, to explore alternatives for the Saturn brand."

In recent months, Saturn has indeed been meeting with their FOT group (the dozen or so dealers that represent the franchisees) to develop a new "go to market" strategy for 2009, possibly including plans for returning to the company's small car roots.  If anything, the GM statement appears to be a corporate blessing for Saturn to accelerate redefining their brand and operations, possibly returning to the core values and original vision put forth when the company was created.  If anything, we believe that the new partnership with Opel has resulted in refocusing on smaller more economical vehicles at Saturn, which was created to be a stand-alone quality and customer service oriented automaker, giving the leadership the control and freedom needed to compete with Japanese imports.

Regarding the Pontiac Solstice, the plan indicated that they would continue to merge Pontiac with GMC and Buick brands to create a single BPG-branded dealership network "with Pontiac serving as a specialty/niche brand with reduced product offerings solely intended to complement Buick and GMC models and reinforce the channel as a whole."  Therefore, Pontiac would be parred down to fewer models and the Solstice could very well survive if GM determines that it is both profitable and desirable within the new "niche" it defines for Pontiac.

There is a lot of speculation out there about the future of the kappa platform due to the reduced focus on Pontiac and Saturn within GM.  However, we do not see the brand issues as the biggest threat to this platform.  Additionally, the plan calls for a workforce reduction, laying off 20,000 to 30,000 manufacturing employees by 2012.  Therefore, the biggest threat that we see to the kappa platform is that if the platform is not profitable, it could be that the Delaware plant could be shut down completely, and without a replacement platform in sight, it could be the end of the Sky and Solstice.

We wish GM and all the automakers the best as they work this difficult economic time, and we hope and fully expect that Congress will act in time to avoid further chaos in the market.  Even Toyota sales were down 30-40% month-to-month right now, so this downturn is affecting the entire industry.  GM, however, has developed one heck of a vehicle in the Solstice/SKY/OpelGT, and we hope that this vehicle remains one of the bright spots of GM's leaner more efficient future.

The video below was created by GM to illustrate some of their contribution to the US economy, some very interesting numbers.

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