Got questions re Stingray shipping & delivery? Ask GM's John Fitzpatrick
 

Hi All

Tomorrow morning I have the opportunity to interview Chevrolet's John Fitzpatrick regarding the C7 Corvette. Specifically we will be asking him about the announcement that Corvettes are shipping and other questions about the delivery process. We wanted to solicit the forum for questions because we know you have questions as well. If so, please reply to thread.

Here's a couple of questions we plan on asking:

If buyers can keep the car covers
Shipping using Trains
Size of shipping fleet
How long to ship the current inventory (approx 1,000)
What to expect from dealers (who will doing this for the first time too)

I'd love to present him with some questions from the Forum so please ask away. We'll have his responses available later in the day.


Here is our previous interview with him which was about orders and TPWs:
http://www.corvetteblogger.com/2013/...ette-stingray/

And here is what we've been waiting for!

http://www.corvetteblogger.com/image...3/091813_4.jpg

top rack, second from the left, black wheels and red calipers ---MINE!!!!

We understand cars have been shipped starting wed. 18 and as of 4:00 thurs. No cars have showed up at dealerships. Where are they?

My question is:
When will production start on the 2014 convertables?

With the availability of modern methods of communication and access to up to the minute data, why do they have so much trouble relaying ACCURATE information to their customers and dealers? The misinformation from the "chat line" got so bad, with patently false information coming from GM's own site, (many screen shots of this false info were posted all over this forum) that they choose to shut down their own tracking site, only for Stingray orders as their 'solution' to there problem. They also suggested emailing a special 'team' that has ignored 3 different requests by me and others for basic information. I would think you can come up with some good questions based on those issues.

Now that production seems to be moving @ a good clip. How long will it take for a car to go from 3800 produced to 4200 shipped to dealership.

Ask him if due to dealer policy, if they are trying to get one car to every dealership at the same time - or about the same time....like other mfrs do, when there us a national launch...

Ask him about the advisability of the end user keeping the car cover and using it time after time. As I see it(a guess on my part), the covers are needed to transport the cars via trains to keep rail/brake dust from getting on the paint. GM never needed a cover for all the Corvettes they shipped strictly by truck for the past couple of decades, as road grime washes right off without damaging the paint.

If the cover(I read that it was paper with a sealant applied) is reused by the customer after he takes delivery of the car, isn't there a chance he will accidently transfer the iron particles from the cover to the car while manhandling the cover.

Ask him if the covers can be washed to remove the iron particles so they can be reused, and if washing will remove all traces of the iron particles.

EDIT: never mind. Dave at Kerbeck answered these questions in another post.

I696 in Michigan
https://scontent-a-ord.xx.fbcdn.net/...19995311_n.jpg

When will the plant open for public tours?

Also why is the Chat line so misinformed on this vehicle?

And Finally is my car # 1530 done yet?

Can you ask him if those of us who chose to accept non-carbon-fiber instrument panels, due to the constraint, can have them installed later by a dealer? Thanks!

Appears that they might have dropped some off at dealers along the way. I can't imagine them sending a half full truck(or half empty, depending on how you view things) out of Bowling Green.

Ask about the cars that went to Nashville.
Are they being upfitted or just inspected? If upfitted, what was it for?
How long are they going to be stuck in Nashville.

Could be some Special Editions under "Invisibility Cloak" car covers.

:rofl::rofl::rofl::rofl:

Is the reports about a final quality inspection true (some at Nashville, some at BG), or is there a delay at an undisclosed location to perform Upfitting? Also, is this "final inspection" the reason that shipped cars are still not arriving at dealershps.

Obviously taking a round about sight seeing trip on his way to TX .............. :rofl::woohoo::rofl:

I have 3 questions:

1) Will GM consider extending the validity of the $1000 discount vouchers (expires 30th Sept) for the buyers whose cars have been built but not invoiced/delivered yet?

2) Given that it's already fall, will GM consider offering the all-season michelins as a no-cost (both dealer and factory installed) option?

3) Can they give GM'er a raise and a big bonus?

Thanks

Yea - Ask him why his Marketing team can't step up and offer World Class Customer Service as the Engineering team has designed a World Class Super Car?
Very LAME!

Probably they're on their way to a super secret submarine base in Flint, MI for shipment to Africa as part of a deal by the State department. Very hush---hush, so they have to be invisible, otherwise everyone would know about the submarine base.

Please ask him what the CURRENT QC hold time is for cars being built NOW (not those in the first few weeks of production) ... and please don't let him get away with the scripted
"we want a world class sports car, and we won't release any car before it's perfect" line.

On average, HOW MANY DAYS will CURRENT BUILD cars be held in QC?

GM builds what we believe is going to be a world class car. Some of us have been ready since January 13! The only reliable information we get is from this forum and the GMer.

GM could have used this as a great marketing tool for the last 8 months and going forward.
When I order my Stingray I get the order number and a special web site for tracking.
You go to the web site and set up a user name and password. Then you can go on the site daily, or several times a day for some of us, and we have access to all the build status codes from 1100 to 5000. You could expand that list of codes and give then names that really describe what is happening.

What is 4D00 and what is the difference from 4B00????

Why not have........
You Corvette is completed
Your Corvette is in our quality hold to ensure the best possible car
Your Corvette has passed quality control and is stored in our parking lot for shipping
We have requested that the shipper scheduled you car
The shipper has scheduled pickup of your Corvette
Your dealer has been invoiced
Your car has been delivered to the dealer

We are just excited and some accurate information would go along way to make us happy owners.

I echo the question about the time they expect it to take from 3800 to 4200 over the coming weeks/months.

I believe the reason the customer service information has been so vague is due to several reasons, including a lack of confidence in the timing of the build process, resulting in them not wanting to commit to build dates and delivery dates for customers.

So an appropriate question would probably NOT BE "why does customer service suck"
But maybe we should ask: "Is GM/Chevrolet aware of the current frustrations experienced by corvette customers related to knowing accurate info on build dates and deliver dates? If so, is there anything in place to improve this in the near future, so that GM can better compete in this department with their foreign competitors especially those in the $50k+ price range"?

When I ordered my new Audi S4 and my new BMW 330, they gave me a month when I could expect the car, but after a few weeks they knew EXACTLY which week I could expect the car to be delivered, and it was accurate, and they had great details along the way.

Another thread has info about cars shipped to Nashville for a final review?
It says "a number of cars". It just a select few or ALL cars?
Why after sitting on the lot for 3-4 weeks are we doing a final review?
Why can you give a time frame?

Joe you are going to lose your clearance if you keep telling secrets...might as well change your username to WikiLeakes

This comes off as a lack of confidence in their own processes, employees or vendors.

I know. The place is so secret that the 10,000 people in Detroit that work there don't even know about it. They just cash their government paychecks each month and continue doing what they did before they went to work at the submarine base....nothing....

I'll answer the first question. Yes the buyer can keep the car cover.

Ask him if he, and/or others with Team Corvette, follow the posts on Corvette Forum?

:thumbs:

:D :woohoo:

Since he is the head of Marketing, I would ask him when will they have a working configurator that will help buyers select options and colors for a C7.

This won't help most of us that have orders already into the system, but it certainly is a frustrating point that we had to scrounge whatever pics we could get our hands on to look at possible color combinations due to the lack of an effective configurator.

Mr Fitzpatrick, We realize the significance of quality control with the roll out of a new model, but there's been a stream of misinformation and rumor about the "quality control holds" being placed on the new C7s. I'm certain the first consensus customers and those of us waiting in the wings to order our new C7 would like someone from GM/Chevrolet/Corvette to provide an official statement so that once and for all, we can understand what is going on. Your candor would be much appreciated.

Respectfully

Phil Rhodes/Future C7 owner

When will production of the convertibles begin?

new deliveries
 

When I ordered my C7 from the dealer, it was the 12th car ordered by the dealer. When the first 20 were set for delivery to the dealer, my was not one of them. What's up?

Are any initial releases of 2014's going to Dealers by rail-specifically those shipped by Jack Cooper to their Nashville terminal?

Ask them why they announced the cars were "Shipping" yet no one has reported their car as actually shipped! Sounds like BS !

I believe that the Marketing guys, like Harlan Charles, have done a terrific job over the last year or so of creating a buzz about this vehicle that is seldom seen in the automotive world.

Porche and Ferrari owners committing to buying a Corvette before they have even driven the C7!!!!!

Lots of interest/orders from the younger demographic too.

Hope all those who have placed orders get to enjoy your cars soon.

:iagree:

Prob. because they are quickly running out of space in the BG lot.

I too would like to know about getting an extension on the $1000 Private Offer that expires 9/30. For those of us that have built cars, it's not our fault if they don't make it to the dealer by that date. In speaking to the marketing department, they don't seem to have any consideration for someone buying his 5th new Corvette. :mad:

yeah i would like to know about the $1k voucher as well

As an aside, who is that in your avatar?

you've more than earned it! :cheers:

Thanks for the responses and additional questions. I'll be talking with John Fitzpatrick in just a few minutes and I hope to have his answers to your questions available later today.

You might ask him WTF is wrong with Corvette Marketing?
The tracking site is down - prompts you to email "faq" which by the way, even after 24 hours have not responded!
Good thing Marketing is not involved in Engineering and/or Production!

No, they're headed to Syria as part of a trade that the government made GM do in return for the bailout. Expect commercials soon for "The Chevy Year-End Nerve Gas Sales Event."

YES, PLEASE ASK HIM HOW LONG THIS WILL TAKE AS MY VEHICLE HAS BEEN SITTING IN NASHVILLE SINCE THE 17TH :(

Exclamation FYI-QC Inspection on selected cars will cause some delays. Not a joke.
Sent: Thursday, September 19, 2013 2:08 PM
To: Stanford_NewCars; MAB
Subject:: Fw: Corvette Stingray Coupe Ship to Commerce **Follow Up**

As you know, GM works exceeding hard to insure all GM vehicles adhere to very high quality standards. Therefore, a number of Corvettes will undergo one last inspection at the Nashville Railhead to insure quality expectations are met. Feel free to share the below note with your dealers.
________________________________________ ________________________________________ _____________

As you are aware, we announced that we are shipping Corvette Stingray coupes to dealers. As part of the process, we have shipped a number of cars to the national rail head in Nashville, TN, for a final quality review of each car prior to being shipped to dealers. This final review is part of our standard procedures for a launch.

As we indicated in the press release, we have nearly a 1000 cars, and we are using facilities in Nashville to expedite the process. Once the review for each vehicle is completed the vehicle will be shipped directly from Nashville to the dealer. We do not have an estimate we can share on the amount of time a particular vehicle will spend in Nashville.

Please understand our number one priority is to deliver the greatest, highest quality Corvette Stingray -- to every dealer, to every customer, every time.

Although slightly off the delivery topic he might still know: are the rumors about an increase of MSRP for the 2014 C7 true?

where oh where has Keith @ corvetteblogger gone? I though he would have some answers for us by now!!

:iagree: :lurk:

Why don't you ask for an update on what happened to the first 600 VINs.:eek::leaving:

Keith - when will you be having the results of yesterday morning's interview available?

Where oh where is Keith ????

still waiting for an update
 

I'm guessing the interview didn't go off as planned. Keith, an update on if and when you'll be posting would be nice. I've still not seen any answers from anyone in an official capacity about the reasons for the quality hold in Nashville. I'm VIN 204 and wouldn't mind the wait if I only new what was going on!

Thanks for everybody's patience as we prepared the article following our interview. We spoke with Fitzpatrick and Monte Doran for over an hour and transcribing the whole interview to make sure I have the most accurate answers took way longer than I initially thought. The good news is that we have many of the answers you guys asked and I've copied and pasted the entire article below:

http://www.corvetteblogger.com/2013/...ette-stingray/



CorvetteBlogger: Are cars going straight from the plant to the dealers or are there additional stops for quality control purposes?

John Fitzpatrick: “There are cars that are going directly out from the factory to dealerships, but there are a handful of cars that still have to complete their quality assessment. The quality assessment is being done in two places. One is Bowling Green, the other is being done in Nashville. Why two different places? Really, every car needs to get looked at before it gets sent out. As we announced in the press release, we have 1,000 cars that we’ve produced. Every one has to be checked out before we say okay, yes or no. And so just because of the magnitude of that, we really wanted to find the expedite it, to see if we could get more hands on the cars and get them through the process, we decided to move some of the cars down to Nashville and once they are done with the quality assessment, they are shipped directly to the dealer out of Nashville.”

Monte Doran: “Regarding the quality assessment process, it’s not that there was a problem with the car, it’s just that as we went through the launch process we found that there COULD be something that was overlooked so we made a change to the process to fix it and now we need to make sure all the cars are built correctly.”

John Fitzpatrick: “What we going through is standard operating procedure, this is not extraordinary for us to do this.”

Monte Doran: “I get that people are really antsy and they are desperately excited to get their car. But if you put it in terms of look, we really want to make sure that the car is perfect before we deliver it. I think people will be a little more understanding. It’s not that we’re parking all these cars in the back lot because we want to be mean to people, we want to make sure particularly with these customers who have been waiting so long that the car is as good and as perfect as we can make it with every car with every dealer and every customer.”

John Fitzpatrick: “They are going to go thoroughly through the car to make sure its perfect.”



CorvetteBlogger: The order status codes 3800 (produced) to 4200 (shipped), but there is also another code, 4300, that shows when the car is shipped to an intermediate location. Is that like when it goes to Nashville?

John Fitzpatrick: “Yes, but we been having some issues. The tracking system hasn’t been presenting proper codes at times, so the order tracking system we actually took off-line, we did that earlier in the week and we put a billboard up there asking customer to send an email to faq@chevrolet.com. We have a group of specialists up in Detroit that there job is to track vehicles for customers and give them the latest and greatest information. I know one of the most frustrating things is to think the car is coming to you and then to find out its not coming to you. So we’re trying to really be proactive in this area and our specialists are answering those emails, running it down and checking to see where the cars are at and then giving the update and sending those out to the customers. We ask the customers not to be sending an email every hour because the status doesn’t change that quickly. But we’re hoping we’ll be able to proactively follow up on these and give the update. If they do send an email, we ask they put in the subject line: Corvette Stingray Order Tracking and their Order #.”



CorvetteBlogger: What’s the size of the transport fleet and are you planning on shipping cars by rail?

John Fitzpatrick: “We not putting any cars on railcars at this point. All cars are being shipped by truck. So what happens is they get moved down to Nashville, unloaded in Nashville, they go through our quality assessment process in Nashville, and then put back on the truck and sent out the dealer.

“The auto transports hold 11 cars, but we down’t have a number to share in terms of the size of the fleet, there is only one transporter [company] and that’s Jack Cooper. But I don’t know how many trucks are actually moving at the moment.”



CorvetteBlogger: Is there an effort to get the cars spread out geographically so that cars start arriving at dealers at different parts of the country at roughly the same time?

John Fitzpatrick: “There is no focus, we do group cars, we can’t ship just one car to California, we got to make sure the cars are loaded with the proper load going into that general direction of the county. So but were not saying we’ve got to get cars to NY first. We’re taking the cars, getting them through the quality assessment, we’re evaluating almost hourly where we are with the cars, and then loaded them on transports and sending the transports out.”

“One of the neat things we’re doing now is that we are covering the cars. We’ve come up with this off-white heavy duty fabric car cover that now goes on the cars. We really think that’s going to help us in minimizing the wear and tear the cars go through during the transport. We think in the end that will also help in improve the quality of the car the customer receives when they take delivery.”



CorvetteBlogger: There is a current inventory of approximately 1000 cars, do you have any idea of how long it will take to ship those 1000 cars to dealers.

John Fitzpatrick: “Not that this point. We’ve literally just started the process. We are trying to get through it as quickly as possible, but I can’t give you a time frame. It’s just not practical at this point to give you that time frame. The quality on the cars is the most important thing. We want to deliver the highest quality Corvette Stingrays that we can. And we want to do it every time. We want to give it to every dealer and every customer every time. And so we’re not going to cut corners or do anything like that. We want to make sure these cars are right…we not going to rush it either. We’re going to get through it as quickly as possible, but we’re also going to do it in a quality manner.”



CorvetteBlogger: What is the current quality control time for cars that are getting built now. I think we’re in the 1200-1300 VIN numbers and you’ve already had 1,000 go through. We kind of time frame are we looking at for these current cars getting built?

John Fitzpatrick: “The same as the other cars, they all go through the same process. Like with anything else, you hope with better practice you’re delivering higher quality product but the same rigorous reviews go on all these cars at this point.”



CorvetteBlogger: Are all the cars that have been built through the current VINs for domestic customers or have any been built for export to Canada or Europe?

John Fitzpatrick: “I’ll have to check but I think there have been some Canadian units in there but I don’t think we’ve done anything for Europe yet, but I’ll check.”



CorvetteBlogger: Do you have any confirmation yet that cars have actually arrived at dealerships?

John Fitzpatrick: “We have confirmation that trucks have left but not anything that a truck has arrived, but I assume at the end of the day [Friday] there will be a car offloaded at a dealership somewhere across this country.”



CorvetteBlogger: When the cars arrive at the dealerships, have the dealers been prepped and trained to receive the cars and get them ready for the customers?

John Fitzpatrick: “It’s standard procedure to do those preps and such. You know, they’ll take the covers off, they are some checks we want them to do with the cars, make sure that the fluid levels are all correct and that everything is operating like it should be. There aren’t any extraordinary steps they have to take as it’s standard operating procedure, not only for this car but for every Chevrolet that’s out there. It will be extraordinary in the sense that when the cars show up they will get a lot of attention at the dealership.”



CorvetteBlogger: What’s the status of the online configurator?

John Fitzpatrick: “It’s almost there, we have the pricing up and we have the interior images done, we’ve run into a bit of problem getting the exterior colorizer done, but that’s where we are at the moment. But we’re working hard and hopefully we’ll have it done soon.”



CorvetteBlogger: With the first run of the 1000 cars, are you looking at customer demographics and is there anything interesting about the age of buyers?

John Fitzpatrick: “No, we won’t see that [demographic information] until actually after delivery. We know whose ordering the cars, but at that point we don’t collect demographic info. Just contact information. We don’t have much in the way of knowing any demographic or psychographic information about the customers. We usually find that out a couple of months after delivery.”



CorvetteBlogger: Regarding the first orders, it looks like the majority have the Z51 Performance Package and that the is a nice division between the autos and the 7-Speed manual. Can you provide any information about the current orders?

John Fitzpatrick: “We’re seeing a lot of ordering on the Z51 performance package. We are seeing a 50/50 mix between the manuals and automatics, seeing a lot of the Blacks out there interior-wise, but we’re seeing a nice mix of the different interiors. It’s heavy black. People aren’t shying away from the Brownstone of the Kalahari or the red. We’ve seen a nice variety of those orders as well. Almost 15-20% each in those three [interior] colors and then primarily black is the dominate color in the interior.”

“Exterior-wise, we are seeing almost every color out there. People see the colors and then they change. We’ve seen a lot of color changes. I think once people started seeing some of these cars live, we were heavy in black and were still a majority black exteriors, but we’re seeing a lot of people going with the yellow, Laguna Blue, going with Lime Rock Green, we take that as a good sign as well.”

Monte Doran: “The first people who go and place their orders are the die-hard enthusiasts, right. they typically want the high content performance options. They skew towards manual transmissions and then once we get through that initial batch of orders, things level out to the mix that we expected.”

John Fitzpatrick: “It changes, we get a really strong demand upfront with everyone checking the box, and then what happens to Monte’s point is you start getting into a normal flow and you get people out there that don’t necessary want the upper suede interior so you start to see that option drop off a little bit. I think the Z51 package will always be a strong option and the split between manuals and automatics will be interesting to see how that changes. We’ve always seen on the previous generation that whenever we offered an automatic in a performance model, that always outpaces the manual transmission. You always thought the manual outpaced the automatics on Corvettes because you have the Z06 and ZR1 where you can only get the manuals, but whenever you offer manuals and automatics as an option, you always saw automatics always have that 5-6 point percentage lead. It will be interesting to see as you go along whether the 7-speed manual and active rev matching if you see it stay more 50-50 or how much of a lead does the automatic get on it. That will be very interesting in that regard.”



CorvetteBlogger: Have the Corvette Stingray Premiere Editions started production yet?

John Fitzpatrick: “They have. I think we’ve built a hundred of them already. we’ve just done the coupes so far. We are going to do a convertible edition and the convertible Premiere Edition will obviously start when Convertible production starts later in the fourth quarter.”

“500 Coupes, 500 on the convertibles. And for the most part, any dealer who who is eligible for initial allocation for the Corvette has the opportunity to receive one of those Premiere Editions, either coupe or convertible. They have the choice of whether to say they want one or not, but they also have opportunity to tell us if they want a coupe or the convertible. Most of them are telling us they’ll take a Coupe and a Convertible and at the end we’ll divide them up and probably distribute them based on dealers overall Corvette Sales for the last 13 months or so.”

“The Premiere Editions should start arriving in dealerships. Those [dealers] that want the coupe those should start arriving in dealerships in the next couple of weeks.”



CorvetteBlogger: There was a $1,000 private offer that expires on 9/30 and it looks like in the fine print it says that the car needs to be at the dealer by that day. Is there any information you can give on the details.

John Fitzpatrick: “That’s a great question. The only thing I can tell them is really to work with their dealer on it. The offer was designed to stimulate people who indicated they were in-market right at that moment and trying to get them even further in-market. The goal was not necessarily to be a mainstream program. And to be honest, if we had our druthers, we probably would have excluded the Stingray on there. I think the people that did the offer didn’t realize we were this close with the Stingray coming to market. We made the mistake and those people that got the offer that buys a car by 9/30, we’ll honor that offer, but the important thing is to work with the dealer on it.”



CorvetteBlogger: Can you give us any information on the status of the Carbon Fiber roof constraints?

John Fitzpatrick: “It’s a demand/supply situation. The demand especially for the visible carbon fiber roofs is very high, our supplier is doing everything they can to meet the demand, but at this point, they’re falling short. Any order that’s in the system now is going to be built. It may lengthen the time of production just because you can’t build what you don’t have. It may lengthen the time it’s in the system so they are working hard to meet that demand.

“We have asked some dealers that may have had either the exposed carbon fiber or the painted carbon fiber standard roof, we have asked some dealers to consider changing those to transparent tops just so that we can get a little more relief for those that have actually ordered the painted or the exposed roof. If the dealer had a stock order in there, we have asked them to consider changing it to transparent. Now the problem is we think it’s stock but in the meantime the dealer has actually sold the vehicle. Some dealers are telling us sorry, we can’t change it. Some dealers are saying yes they can, and in those situations they may get the car earlier than those with painted and the visible roof.”

“The issue is that the supplier that were dealing with supplies both the painted and the exposed roofs. You got to deal with what you have and right now were trying to figure ways we can maximize that production. We don’t want to take any production out because of supplier issues. If a customer is looking for a car quickly, they may want to consider the transparent roof.”

“Anything that’s in the system right now at event 3000 or above, we will build it without having them make a change. It’s the dealer stock order which is an inventory or non-sold order that we are going back and giving them the choice of taking the transparent roof and hopefully get their car sooner or they can leave it as it is and when we get the roof to build the car as spec’d, then we’ll build it.”



CorvetteBlogger: We were just clued into an invitation only program called the Corvette Precision Drive Event. What’s the program and is it invitation only?

John Fitzpatrick: “It is a closed invitation. It is a pilot program for us, we’re trying to as we have talked about in earlier conversations, is we’re trying to figure out how can we attract people who are basically European sports car buyers. How do we attract them and change their perception around the Corvette. So we’ve been working on this pilot program where we would invite these European sport cars “intenders” to the Monticello Motor Club in New York and give them an experience with the car and see if that changes their perception around Corvette.”

“So we put together this program to give them an experience behind the wheel of the Corvette. The way we’ve done this is that we’ve partnered with Conde Nast, the publisher of GQ and Wired and such and tried to bring forth some customers that may know from their subscription base that are our “intenders” and try to give them some experience with the car and see if we can get them thinking differently about it.”

“It’s basically an experience with the car. It’s a half day program and we run it twice a day, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. We bring people to Monticello, talk to them about the car, let them drive the car for a little bit and give them a great experience for that half-day.”

“We’d love to invite all of the Corvette people who are buying cars to the event, but its not practical at this point. Its not the goal of the program. This is to try and start changing those influencers out there and get them to experience the car. We hope to have programs in the near future where our core customers who really are our die-hard loyalist to give them an opportunity to experience the car on the track. We hope to have that announced later this year.”