Re: Why such bad USA sales this year? - Saab General Bulletin Board - Saabnet.com
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Re: Why such bad USA sales this year?
Posted by MikeLev [Email] (more from MikeLev) on Tue, 22 Dec 2009 07:42:39
In Reply to: Why such bad USA sales this year?, Dan in St Louis, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 06:37:37
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GM dropped nationwide marketing (ie: television advertisement) somewhere between 2006 and 2007. In fact, the last ad I remember was the "Born from Jets" ads featuring the Saab emerging from a jet flume back in '07. Without advertisement, prospective buyers (who are not loyal Saab fans) forget that this line of cars exists! I think what attracted a lot of new customers in the late 90's and early 00's is the sexy convertible model that was in such high demand--that and the ability to lease one of them!
It became clear to GM early on in the 00's that Saab was no longer worth keeping. Once they extracted the high-technology (Tech II) from Saab and applied it to their other brands, it seemed they no longer had a use for Saab. More surprisingly, they totally Americanized the Saab and compete it against the likes of BMW, Audi and Mercedes; while at the same time eliminating feature after feature (goodbye fuel door lock and isolated SID and external trunk lock). The real European companies were also doing yearly upgrades to their models, while GM just made fascia changes to Saabs--essentially leaving the model as-is over the years. While prior owners would be happy (like me with my '02 9-5) because everyone thinks it's a late-year model, I never had incentive to go buy a new one, because mine still looks like the new one and runs fantastically and has MORE FEATURES that GM eliminated over the years.
Bottom line here is GM poorly managed what could have potentially been one of it biggest profit-makers. With proper marketing (and not that stupid "State of Independence" campaign), more frequent upgrades, better financial incentives (lower pricing and leasing options), sales of Saabs would have easily surpassed that of Volvo, Audi, even BMW...because it's a better vehicle to own and operate, and more loyal owners than any other car in the world!
posted by 66.229.212...
Posts in this Thread:
- Why such bad USA sales this year?, Dan in St Louis, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 06:37:37
- How about old models (9-5) and zip marketing, Noel, Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:03:45
- inventory, jp498, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 14:53:09
- Re: Why such bad USA sales this year?, ramblerdrver, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 14:21:25
- Re: Why such bad USA sales this year?, Ray L, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 14:10:31
- Re: Why such bad USA sales this year?, MikeLev, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 07:42:39 <-- Viewing This Message
- It has to be due to the lack of real updates...., Paul H, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 07:11:11
- Very Simple..., DonaldM, Tue, 22 Dec 2009 07:03:20
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