Postby agent007 » November 2nd, 2019, 5:55 pm
^^Exactly.
So story time.....at one point in time, GM owned a plethora of brands and Daewoo Motor of South Korea was one of them. But it goes deeper than that, Daewoo was more of a paper brand because their platforms, suspensions, braking systems, electricals, engines and transmissions were sourced from the Opel parts bin (at least most of it). Opel also supplied all these parts to Vauxhall for certain models and then most recently to Holden again for certain models.
It was only a matter of time until all these brands with products competing with each other becomes an undesirable business model. Over the years, GM shut several brands down (Geo, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, Saturn, Hummer and of course Daewoo) which was escalated due to the 2008 global financial crisis. The Cruze started life as the Daewoo Lacetti Premier (the successor to the Chevy Optra aka Daewoo Lacetti) but was then named as Chevrolet Cruze so that buyers will forget that Korean brand.
GM made a hit with that Chevy as they sold, (I think it’s around 4 million units globally within a decade IIRC). Things started to slide again for GM for 2 reasons: firstly, reliability and secondly, car sales are sliding worldwide in favor for crossovers, suvs and pickups.
The 2nd gen Cruze will remain selling in Latin American and other countries until it will eventually meet its demise as GM will focus on where the money is.
It should be noted, GM even realized sourcing technology from Opel was not a profitable venture so they sold those 2 brands (Opel and Vauxhall) to Peugeot-Citroen (PSA).
Now that the excess fat is cut, would GM focus on improving their lineup? The answer to that question is, sure they will. Will we then see a truly American engineered car to compete with the likes of the Corolla, Sentra, Civic, Mazda3, Elantra and Cerato? I don’t think so.
Once a product is finished for good, resale will tank. Get rid of your Cruze now. It doesn’t stop there, the Sonic, Malibu and Impala’s days are also numbered. Ford is doing a similar thing by axing the Fiesta, Focus, Fusion and Taurus etc.
You want a compact car to buy, your best bet is a Mazda 3. You studying resale, then it’s a Corolla. You want speed then it’s a Civic 1.5 turbo. You want lots of glitz and glam at a reasonable price then Elantra/Cerato. Your life is boring and you feel like you want some trouble then Ford Focus and VW Jetta is for you.
Choose wisely.