Unable to steer friends towards Big 3.

[heedus]

Darwinism and Eric_c, I just want to add some figures to help further the discussion. I am in the process of purchasing a 2010 Ford Fusion Sport. Here are the relevant figures [[rounded to the nearest hundred):

MSRP: $27,400
Invoice: $25,700
A/Z Plan: $24,800

The dealer sells the car to me below invoice and is reimbursed by Ford for the difference b/w invoice and the A/Z plan price. In addition to being reimbursed, the dealer gets some amount [[~$800) for selling the vehicle at the A/Z plan price. This is its profit on the A/Z plan sale. Therefore, the dealer still gets something like $800 above invoice for the car. The $1,700 difference between the MSRP and Invoice is the maximum dealer profit. As a consumer, it is up to you to squeeze that $900 out of the dealer [[$1,700 max. profit - $800 A/Z plan profit) by having them reduce the MSRP by $900 or as close to $26,500 as possible.

In my opinion, I don't think these figures are that unreasonable. As shown above, the A/Z plan price is only $900 or 3.5% below invoice and $1,700 or 6.5% below the $26,500 savvy consumer price. Even if you look at the difference between the MSRP and the A/Z plan price, it's less than 10%.

Both of my wife's grandfathers busted their asses for 35 years at Ford. Like I said before, they are extremely proud that their grandaughter is eligible for a discount when she purchases Ford vehicles. Although Ford has not taken taxpayer money yet, even if it had, I think that continuing the employee discount would not necessarily be a disservice to taxpayers. Ford gets a lot of indirect benefit from having its employees and their families drive the same vehicles that they assemble, market, and sell to the public.

[Danny]

There's going to be lots of friends streering away General Motors when it goes bankrupt by June.

1. The U.S. and Canadian govt's will have 70% of the stake of the company. Followed by the U.A.W. who would get 20% of the stake.

2. Dow Jones will dropped GM out the share markets.

3. Over 1100 car dealerships will be closed by the end of year.

4. Over 21,000 people will LOSE their jobs.

5. A proposal by Warren mayor to let GM moved their world headquarters to their tech center on Van Dyke Rd. and 12 Mile Rd. in return for tax breaks.

6. GM will recieve 20 to 80 billion dollars for bailout money from the U.S. government to keep it afloat.

7. General Motors will have to either sell or permanently shut down Saturn, Hummer and SAAB and keep Buick and Cadillac.

8. GMAC will remain a bank holding company to monitor GM financial problems.

This is GM's LAST CHANCE to liquidate and sell their yealy car models or go defunct like American Motors, Packard and Studebaker.

[darwinism]

An update on another friend, different from the one whom I have been visiting dealerships with, over the past couple of weeks. This buddy of mine, was quite set on a VW Passat or a Nissan Altima. I brought him to a Chevy dealer to check out the 2009 Malibu, and after some in-depth Web research on Edmunds and on TrueCar.com, we returned to the dealer for a more extensive test-drive.

My friend liked the car, and simply needed to dealer to work out the numbers favorably. The dealer didn't disappoint, because the price out-the-door was better than the Passat and the Altima. Aside from that, the financing terms and interest rates were equally as aggressive.

Hence, he may very well be a new 2009 Chevy Malibu owner soon.

[MoparDan]

An update on another friend, different from the one whom I have been visiting dealerships with, over the past couple of weeks. This buddy of mine, was quite set on a VW Passat or a Nissan Altima. I brought him to a Chevy dealer to check out the 2009 Malibu, and after some in-depth Web research on Edmunds and on TrueCar.com, we returned to the dealer for a more extensive test-drive.

My friend liked the car, and simply needed to dealer to work out the numbers favorably. The dealer didn't disappoint, because the price out-the-door was better than the Passat and the Altima. Aside from that, the financing terms and interest rates were equally as aggressive.

Hence, he may very well be a new 2009 Chevy Malibu owner soon.

Glad to hear that may work out. I'm not a Chevy guy, but we use Impalas as our primary fleet car: excellent mileage, plenty of room, good power & not that bad ergonomically considering the long road trips we embark on.
I was at a get together with friends/acquaintances over the weekend & the conversation eventually turned to GM & Chrysler with their situation. Immediately the bashing began about how crappy American cars were...one guy was non-stop in his hatred of them. As it turned out, he has never owned one. Period. In essence, he was full of sh*t & his "expert" opinion suddenly meant nothing. That gave me a chance to really plug the Impala. Another guy said he was in the market for a new vehicle & that he'd put it on his list to check out. Whether he will or not, we'll have to see. The key was calling the basher out & turning his argument against him. It didn't hurt that I wasn't alone in defending the domestics...outnumbered but not outgunned.
Being a Chrysler guy I wasn't thrilled about the bankruptcy but I'm hoping it will turn out to be positive in the long run. I figure Fiat can't be any worse than Daimler or Cerberus.

[Swimmaven]

The US auto companies never turned around the prejudices from the '70's. Remember when they allowed the Japanese into their factories ad allowed the them to take photographs. And then going to the Land of the rising sun and whining. What an embarrassment.

I live in CA and although most of the truck, SUV behemoths are 50% of the vehicles on the roads, the majority of other vehicles are Japanese, Mercedes, BMW's. even the elderly drive Camarys and Hondas. [[hate Honda drivers, such a**holes).

The car ads over the past few years have not been so whiney, but the flashing lights and shouting are pretty horrible. The ads have said desperation to me.

And then there is the issue of what they are producing. I would love to have a Mustang hybrid that gets 40 miles to the gallon. When I wrote to Ford they replied with an SUV [[which I hate - SUV's that is) and and ugly one with NO STYLE at that. And, it got 15 mpg. HUH?

How many cars does a company have to produce for the elderly? How many different models of trucks are needed? Why is the styling so lame? Why is the quality perceived to be inferior?

It's like the execs are living in the land of the opaque and have been totally in denial on the changing trends and buyers.

I recently visited Southern United States and did see alot of American cars - but they were old, the smaller types and rather tired looking. I was surprised to see so many American cars.

There is much anger towards the auto maker bailouts from the CA blogs I read. I commented on the lack of anger towards the banking and insurance industries that have been ruining peoples lives. But the automaker execs really need to turn around their thinking and processes to get themselves back on their feet. You can throw money at them all day and it won't change outmoded ideas.