What is causing the disparity in sales between Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky?
The Pontiac Solstice and the Saturn Sky were released at the same time in 2005 to many raving responses. The Solstice was the greased lightening for Pontiac right out of the box as the waiting list for the new roadster stretched out for many many months. Now two years later and the Sky is the steady date and the Solstice is sitting along the side of the gym waiting for someone to ask her to dance.
The New York Times tackled this subject and focused the microscope on the reputations of the two GM brands. What they found is that no matter what Pontiac builds their cars will eventual suffer from the brands poor reputation; no matter what the initial response is when the car is unveiled. The Transformers movie could not even Jazz-up the status of the Solstice to the car buyers eye (making the fact that Jazz, the Solstice in the movie, was killed off even more foreshadowing for the car and brand).
The 400 Saturn dealerships across the U.S. are cranking out on average one Sky per month (with a lower production total than the Solstice). With 2,700 Pontiac dealerships selling the Solstice they are achieving an average of 1 car every 2 months. Thus Pontiac is on pace to sell approximately 18,000 of the 20,000 Solstices scheduled to be built in 2007.
When the Vice Chairman of your parent company, Bob Lutz, is referring to your brand as “damaged goods” and your own marketing dollars tend to favor the youngster of the brands over the tainted older sibling a rough road is surely ahead. GM will need to reassign some creative resources in engineering, design and marketing on the Pontiac brand if they hope to revive the one time powerhouse. So far there are no indications that GM is inclined to make that effort.
Source[NewYorkTimes]
Pontiac has their hands full, if they want to bring out the Firebird.. they need to work big time…
Words by Dee on August 23, 2007 at 10:28 pm | #
The Solstice came out 9 months before the Sky- not at the same time, and at twice the production output, the Solstice was certain to catch up with demand a lot sooner. Sky sales could easily be in the same slump when there are 45,000 of them on the road- we just won’t know for another three years.
Words by Sky fanboi on August 25, 2007 at 4:00 pm | #
And by the way, Bob Lutz is no consultant- he’s General Motors Vice Chairman of Product Development and Chairman of GM North America.
Words by Sky fanboi on August 25, 2007 at 4:02 pm | #
Sky fanboi,
Thank you for your input and corrections. The quote reference has been corrected.
Words by will bee on August 26, 2007 at 9:13 am | #
The ‘09 Sky Redline is a fun ride (I bought a “Ruby Red”) in August but at $36,000+ (TT&L included) and with absolutely no incentives from Saturn/GM at that time, its a joke compared to the Boxter and other “real” Roadsters. I’m sure that resale in today’s economic envirionment is also a joke.
On the brighter side, my wife and I are extremely fortunate that we have a fantastic income and a ton of cash saved away and we will be fine even if that “little black sambo” becomes President of these here United States. By the way, I hear that he has plans to repaint the “White House” to his liking.
Words by Bruce Larson on October 22, 2008 at 12:17 am | #
I own a SKY REDLINE 2008 and I’ve owned many cars in my time. The REDLINE is a real roadster (Faster than the Boxster and Cayman to 60
mph) and with a manual trans. its a fun ride. The standard SKY has less HP and regidity. I’m pleased with the redline, which is much cheaper than the Boxster/Cayman.
Words by Pete Stanich on November 13, 2008 at 8:05 pm | #