What about Saab and Opel? And I wouldn’t suggest completely killing Buick, that’s one of the most popular cars in China, which is going to be “the” market for cars in about a decade or so. Don’t forget that it cost GM $1 billion to kill Oldsmobile, so shutting down a division is not cheap.
IMHO, GM should slash Chevy to the bone. Cut out many of the models, and return the brand to what it traditionally always was: Bargain basement cars, save for the Corvette. Scrap most of the truck lines, let GMC have those.
Pontiac can remain, provided you make it what it once was: The car you bought if you wanted something that went really fast. Trim the line down to the signature models: Trans AM, GTO (a real one, not the bland looking thing they gave us), and a Bonneville that’s a credible BMW fighter. Additionally, public execute those involved with the development of the Aztek.
Buick: This is tricky, but doable. In order to make the brand viable, you’re going to have to really refocus it. At one time, Buick’s were known as “doctor’s cars” as they were the vehicle of choice for those in the medical profession. What I’d do is sit down with folks in the medical profession and ask them what they’d like to see in a car, and tailor the models to their needs. See what kinds of things could be done to make the car really attractive to them. iPhone/Blackberry integration seems to be a must, but there’s probably other things as well. (Of course, one doesn’t have to go after doctors, you could pick any other well paid profession as your target demographic, I’m just using doctors as an example.) Nail it down as firmly as you can, so that no matter what doctors might think of GM cars, they have to give some serious consideration to buying one. Couple this with massive product placement in the kind of movies/TV shows that doctors watch or are featured in, and you’ve got a good chance for keeping the brand (even if the volume of cars they sell is lower than what it presently is).
Saab: Make this the import version of Buick. Hit the same demographic as Buick, but drive home the fact that its a European import (and do away with the bizarro engineering that Saabs seem to favor).
Saturn: This brand can actually be a combination of two things: An American, low-cost alternative to the Japanese, and your cutting edge technology line. Got a new hybrid technology? Saturn gets it first, followed by the other brands.
Cadillac: This brand’s got the worst image problem out of all of them. When people see the cars, they think about blue hairs doing 30 MPH in the hammer lane on the interstate, when they see the SUVs, they think about rappers. To counteract this, you need to kill off the SUVs, to cut down on the blue hairs, jack up the prices and use product placement in movies to change the image. Every wealthy bastard villian in every movie should be driving a Caddy. Shit, make a movie like Wall Street about the current mortgage mess and have the Gordon Gekko types all driving Caddys.
GMC: Work trucks and nothing else. No fancy extras like DVD players for the kids or heated seats. Aim this brand squarely at the farmers/construction companies.
Hummer: Pimp trucks. Want a fancy SUV to show off how wealthy you are? Or want an SUV to haul the kids around to soccer practice? Buy a Hummer.
Opel: This actually has potential in a couple of areas. You can keep it as a European only brand (like they do with Vauxhall) or you can bring them back to the US and aim for the Volkswagen demographic.
Chrysler: Aim for the Mercedes demographic. Not only because its highly profitable to sell cars in that price range, but simple revenge.
Plymouth: Bring the brand back, and make it your bargain basement line of vehicles.
Dodge: Fast cars and pickup trucks has been the staple of this brand, and its generally a formula that has worked. Ditch the SUVs.
Jeep: Pare the line down a bit, but don’t mess with it too much as in the past, this has been the division which has made the highest profits.
Ford: Follow the same model as Chevy, and shoot the engineers who come up with all the bassackwards ideas.
Mercury: Does anybody remember this brand? You can do a couple of things with this brand: Kill it or give it some focus. If you’re going to keep it around, then either go for the Pontiac demographic or the Buick demographic I mentioned above.
Volvo: This should be Ford’s version of Saab.
Lincoln: Tricky. You could go after the Gordon Gekko types or you could aim for the “established” wealthy types.
In all cases, every car maker should offer hybrids as an option and flexfuel/diesel engines should be standard, no gas only engines. They should also work hard to maintain seperate brand identities. At one point in time, GM’s pricing structure was such that the top Chevy price was just below that of the bottom Buick (or maybe it was Oldsmobile, I forget) model. Keep that in place, no matter what. A Chevy guy wants to buy a really rugged work truck? Too bad, he either gets a GMC or he goes somewhere else. Odds are, he’ll buy the GMC one.
Another thing that the car makers need to do is to get “in bed” with their customers. Don’t simply send out multiple choice surveys, but sit down with customers and ask them what they want to see on a car, and what they don’t. Bring back the design competitions they used to have. In the “glory days” of cars, the car makers would have contests where they’d solicit designs from people. None of the designs ever made it into production, but they gave the car makers a good idea of what people wanted in cars. They also need to sit down with people who say they’ll never buy an American car and find out why they won’t.