Gm Giving Buick One Last Chance

The critical time has arrived for General Motor’s struggling Buick brand. With its boring image and years of declining market share, the automaker is working hard to pump up some life into its depreciating brand.

In the coming months Buick plans to enhance its two sedans and launch a much anticipated crossover sport utility vehicle. According to General Manager Steve Shannon, Buick can’t afford to allow those efforts to fail stating that this year is a defining time in the brand’s revival effort. “2007 is going to be the breakout year for Buick. The business is tough; we’re fighting it out everyday,” Shannon said in an interview with the Automotive Press Association luncheon.

Buick is searching for that something that would help it to revive sales in North America where sales have fallen more than 40 percent since the year 2002. Despite the fact that it has flourished in the hot Chinese market, where GM was able to sell more Buick than it did in North America still the brand struggled in United States. Two years ago GM product czar Bob Lutz has described Buick as a “damaged brand” and added that GM would scrap it off their product range if things with the brand don’t improve. Fortunately, Buick auto components which its parent company GM supplies like GM wheel hubs will continuously be produced so Buick car owners need not worry.

Shannon also announced that Buick plans for the coming months to revive the Super car designation used on high performance models of the 1950s. The brand also plans to enhance the Lucerne and LaCrosse later this year.

Buick’s most promising vehicle, the Enclave crossover SUV is scheduled to hit showrooms this summer with Tiger Woods to star in the ads. And next month, GM will launch its 2008 LaCrosse at the New York Auto Show.

Saving Buick is a tough undertaking and some are questioning whether GM’s strategy will actually work to save its struggling brand. GM will employ a different approach with Buick than it did with Saturn, a brand bolstered by an all-out product assault in the past 18 months. GM was able to add five vehicles to the Saturn lineup, even if it means shipping a compact car to the United States from Belgium just to better compete in that market.

With regards to Buick, General Motors is continuously thinning down the brand’s model lineup which will soon be dropped to only three vehicles—the LaCrosse, the Enclave, and the Lucerne. GM has earlier scrap production of the Rendezvous sport utility vehicle last December and plans to stop also the production of the Terraza minivan and Rainier midsize sport utility vehicle by early summer.

Last year Buick was able to sell about 96,000 Lucernes and 71,000 LaCrosses both sales increased slightly from 2005. The Buick dealer network is also being consolidated. GM is also planning of consolidating Buick, GMC, and Pontiac dealers into one outlet that would sell all three brands.

According to Karl Bauer, editor in chief of Edmunds.com an online auto shopping site, “Even though Buick needs as much or more attention as Saturn, its not getting a full-fledged revival. Its tough battle and there is a lot of baggage there.” Bauer also added that the Enclave has potential may not be able to go far to actually change the image of the Buick brand.

Last Tuesday General Motors has conducted a Buick presentation in which one of the audiences is Tom Libby, senior director of industry analysis at J.D. Power and Associates, he came away with the impression that GM has not fully focused on creating a well crafted strategy for Buick.

During the presentation Hannon discussed about attracting wealthy buyers while at the same time keeping the Buick loyalists. The brand also aimed in attracting younger urban crowd.