A Different Kind of Car Company

What happened? -- Picture courtesy of GM

by blogSpotter
In the new age of Obama, General Motors is valiantly fighting off bankruptcy -- trying to become solvent and relevant once more. Their new focus for 2009 is to:

o Improve quality & fuel economy
o Fight imports
o Forge a better relationship with Unions

Amazing, these goals, because they precisely match the 1982 goals which were stated for the then-nascent Saturn Division of GM.

In seeking to be "a different kind of car company", GM's CEO Roger Smith funneled $5 billion into Saturn. A new type of manager-union-dealer consortium was created for cooperation and communication all across the board. The trial ground was the Spring Hill, Tennessee plant and the changes were far-reaching -- probably helps to explain why Saturn took every bit of 8 years, from early 1982 concept to a 1990 reality with cars in show rooms.

The 1991 Saturn was greeted with great fanfare. It made the cover of TIME magazine as an American comeback story, and it won the hearts of quite a few Toyota and Honda fans. But all was not well in the land of Saturnalia -- sales (originally forecast at 500,000 units) peaked in 1994 at only 286,000 units. The Go-Go 90's became dominated by SUV's and Saturn lost out in that transition. The promised quality never quite materialized; Saturn is still behind Pontiac (an "old school" company) in car quality rankings.

Saturn became the source of satire as a "car cult" where the purchasers form a sort of bizarre clique -- the cult aspect was played up on an episode of the Ellen show. The product, until very recently, featured mostly bland, boxy cars -- in fact the "revolutionary" 1991 model showed a non-revolutionary resemblance to a 1983 Buick Skyhawk. Another curse, almost impossible to overcome, is that Saturn became branded as a "chick" vehicle -- something primarily appealing to women (who sexistly are considered to be unsophisticated in picking out cars).

So, whither the Saturn in 2009? Saturn has become more conventional now, with a smattering of SUV's and car models based on the German Opel Division. What of the heralded manager-union consortium? Well, it turns out that neither managers nor unions really liked it -- it made strange and uncomfortable bed fellows. In light of the 2008-2009 financial melt down and $4 gas prices, one has to ask if there might be motivation to try it all again.

My own crystal ball says that Chevrolet will be the small car division for any future experimentation -- no more consortiums. Saturn was an idealistic attempt to change "what is" with "what can never be". Let's hope that 2009 is a more practical, practiced approach -- let's replace "what is" with "what should and can be".

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