sunsalem

Today it was announced GM will make Cadillac a separate business unit and move its HQ to New York.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/...unit/16093343/

A few years ago GM's Board discussed separating Corvette into in its own brand with many different models.
Would this be a good thing now?

Z06Norway

YES, and YES....

Sorry guys but dragging Chevrolet with the name of Corvette is like insisting on Ferrari beeing a Fiat ...

dwward

I wouldn't bet on it.
That move seems unique to Cadillac which is struggling to compete for luxury cars sales and more likely has more to do with a new executive who wants to live in NYC as opposed to Detroit.

Corvette doesn't have sales issues or a new product manager seeking a more clamorous home. We're in a period of consolidation with Pontiac, Mercury, Plymouth, etc. going away. I don't see GM reversing that trend to launch new brands.

Kingspoke

Very doubtful because Corvette benefits from the GM in terms of budget, research, & development.

GM absorbs a lot of overhead (facilities, labor, wind tunnel, paints, design teams, etc.,etc.) costs that would stifle Corvette's budget for development.

Likewise Corvette performance innovations are shared with GM.

RoketRdr

Ummm...you just won foolish statement of the year award. Got a good chuckle out of that one.

RoketRdr

Cadillac does the majority of R&D engineering behind GM high performance. With its loss of sales GM cant afford for Cadillac to tank while being neck deep in GM's up and coming performance projects. They are doing this for the exact same reason Dodge separated SRT and for good reason.

sunsalem

IIRC, this was the point the proponents of the split made to the Board.


It's really a damn shame.
Modern Cadillacs regularly have better reviews in the mags than their competitors.

I have had several (at the moment, a 2012 CTS-V Coupe) the last 15 years and have always been more than satisfied.


Probably so....

moose.b3

Maybe Chevrolet looks at it a little differently. Like the Corvette name adds a little credence to the Chevrolet name. Besides, Corvettes will always be Chevy's.

Glenn Quagmire

Large corporations don't move entire businesses to suit where one executive wants to live. Turnover in those types of positions is too prevalent for operations to be moving around a lot. Although, I can't imagine that many exec's would want to move to the Detroit area. Housing is cheap, but that is about it. I think it may be more of a case that being centralized in Detroit is no longer as necessary as it was 100 years ago.

I guess it wouldn't surprise me if Corvette is separated, but in truth, I don't know enough about what the real upside is to doing so.

dwward

The NYTs had an interesting article on the Cadillac move to NYC with a lot of quotes from Johan de Nysschen, the new head of Cadillac. It appears the HQ move to NYC was a precondition of de Nysschen taking the job. Before coming to Cadillac he headed Infiniti and moved their HQ to Hong Kong to separate it from Nissan.

When we hear an HQ is moving is often sounds bigger than it is. In this case, only a total of 100 people are actually relocating to NYC -- Suits and their support staff. For a company the size of GM, 100 people relocating is insignificant. Much of what is Cadillac will remain in Detroit.

This all seems unique to the Cady brand and really doesn't seem to have anything to do with Corvette.

A link and a PDF.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/24/bu...york.html?_r=0

sam90lx

Corbettes and Chebys go hand in hand.

Bill Dearborn

They all used to separate business units. Chevy, Buick and Caddy were all separate from each other although they shared a lot of components. Each had their own engine designs. Moving Caddy executives to NY City basically gets them out of the way.

Bill

USAF

Put Corvette under the Cadillac brand.

Give us a dealership that understands the high priced buyer.

USAF

racezx9

it would serve corvette as a brand better. Take the highest serving corvette dealers and have them separate the brand out and create a better buying experience. A friend of mine and I went into a Chevy dealer in his Ferrari F430 and he wanted to check out teh new stingray and I was checking on my Z06 and the experience left him speechless on how bad the salesman and the GM was.They straight out lied to us both in within 10 minutes. First it was they would sell the Z06 they have coming in at MSRP, ten minutes later it was 10 grand over list and they wouldn't let him test drive a stingray. When we can go down teh street and test drive a Lambo or a a Aston....he just chuckled and we left....that will be teh death of Corvette, due to some of these dealers out there.

travisnd

FYI the SRT separation was a failure and they have since but it back under the Dodge brand.

Jimbob26

Could happen. Take a look at your C7 and how many times do you see Chevrolet on the car? The only place I see it is in the Corvette flag where the bow tie emblem is. Nowhere else.

Another thing, and perhaps it is unique to my dealer, but they have a separate Corvette Service Manager and only 1 technician who works on the cars. He is exclusive to Corvette service.

Creating a Corvette Brand could allow for slightly higher prices. Not SRT Viper high, but a few thousand more.

Just saying...

ravill

This.

My local chevy dealership, Broadway (a sponsor here) recently went to an appointment only system and the ONE guy at the counter has NO idea about cars. He actually asked me if my corvette had a V8.

What a kick in the 8ball.

Very sad turn of events at my dealership. It makes me question about buying that new Z06 sometimes.

Stingray23

I would love to see that.

Harry2

I totally agree!

jdhommert

I'd love for Corvette to be its own brand. Come out with different models like Porsche.