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Heated steering, heated seats, happy Winter Cadillac Motoring

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This morning my local weather was a brisk 14F here north of Dallas, and we were a relativly warm spot in the US.

My Cadillac lost its garage spot to an antique Roadster replica I am restoring, so we both start out in the cold together. Before I used it, I considered the heated steering wheel a bell or whistle sort of accessory — interesting, but not all that useful. Now it is one of my favorite comfort accessories in the winter. The heated steering wheel is an electric coil arrangement under the leather of the wheel, and is controlled by a switch on the steering wheel. On a cold morning it is very cozy.

Heated seats are easier to understand the value, and my 2nd thing to turn on. The heated seats in my STS-V have 3 selections for intensity; I prefer the lowest setting. I toggle the seat heater on, then turn it down twice to low. By the time I am well on my way, my core temp is warm.

Cooled seats have been harder for me to get used to in review vehicles that had them. Cold air from the seat gives a jarring impression rather than comfort. Perhaps it is an acquired taste.

Do you use your heated or cooled seats a lot or are they frills?

Cadillac ATS Sales up 30% in December 2013 #Motorama

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Cadillac ATS sales in December hit 3,887 units, Cadillac’s best selling car.  The mighty Cadillac SRX sold 6,087 units, almost 1/3 of sales for the month!  Some lucky Cadillac Drivers had a lovely Christmas.

CTS and XTS sales were on par, and Escalade continued to hover just over 2K units.

The new ELR extended range electric Cadillac is just arriving to dealers; 6 were sold in December at first availability.

  December (Calendar Year-to-Date)
January – December
  2013 2012 %Change Volume   2013 2012 %Change Volume
ATS 3,887 2,979 30.5   38,319 7,008 446.8
CTS 3,217 3,372 -4.6   32,343 46,979 -31.2
DTS 0 0 ***.*   19 465 -95.9
ELR 6 0 ***.*   6 0 ***.*
Escalade 1,470 1,371 7.2   12,592 12,615 -0.2
Escalade ESV 775 927 -16.4   7,950 8,083 -1.6
Escalade EXT 66 256 -74.2   1,972 1,934 2.0
SRX 6,074 6,400 -5.1   56,776 57,485 -1.2
STS 0 4 ***.*   7 164 -95.7
XTS 2,670 2,939 -9.2   32,559 15,049 116.4
Cadillac Total* 18,165 18,248 -0.5   182,543 149,782 21.9

Of note in the overall GM brand news:

  • The Chevrolet Corvette had its best December sales since 2006.
  • Crossover and SUV sales were strong, with the Chevrolet Traverse and Tahoe, and the GMC Acadia and Yukon XL all posting higher sales. The Acadia was up 53 percent, for its best-ever December.
  • Small business customers took delivery of 26,231 vehicles in December up 20 percent. For the year, small business deliveries were up 35 percent.

Summary

“December started a little slow but sales were stronger later in the month, especially in the week between Christmas and New Year’s,” McNeil said.  “We didn’t make any big changes to our ‘go-to-market’ strategy during the month, which is to offer competitive incentives and market aggressively, and we are carrying good momentum heading into January.”

Cadillac overall is doing well, but not nearly as well as they should be doing.  ATS sales need to be 9K+ units per month to compete well against BMW 3-Series, or over 5K units per month to meet what I think was Cadillac’s original target.  The ATS needs a serious pricing move — make the mid-line 2L Turbo the standard ATS, and reduce the price to $29,995 for that configuration.  Keep the 3.6L as the Premium, but pull the price down $10K as well.  Tune the 2L Turbo to 300+ HP (easy) and push the 3.6L to 350 hp (harder?).   If necessary make the 3.6L Turbo the Premium engine (a low-pressure variant at 420 HP), and use a high-tuned 475 hp variant in the ATS-V.  These seem like BIG moves, but we will need BIG moves to get the sales numbers up a factor of 3.  Every month Cadillac waits they are missing opportunities for expanding their customer base.

 

Is the Independent Car Dealer ‘Dead’? #Motorama

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The average local car dealer is independent relative to the car company whose product they sell.  However, increasingly car dealers are no longer independent, privately owned firms.  Car dealers are generally owned by large corporations such as Group 1 Automotive:

Group 1 Automotive, Inc. is a Fortune 500 company, founded in 1997. It has its headquarters in the One Memorial City Plaza building in the Memorial City district of Houston, Texas. Wikipedia

Stock price: GPI (NYSE)

What does that mean for you as a car buyer?  Even the manager of your local dealership isn’t the Owner — who may not even live in your state.

Of course Autonation, arguably the largest automotive retailer, with ~266 dealerships across the US, is clearly a large presence in the market.  Autonation stores, however, generally are clearly branded and  marketed as Autonation and not as Independent Dealerships.  When a Buyer goes into their local Cadillac Dealer, named as it has been after the family that started the dealership, the Buyer may be under the mistaken impression that the store is in fact family owned.

What does that mean for the overall model constructed around the theory that independent car dealer sell more cars than factory stores?  Is the theory still valid in this age of large “corporate” retailers? If the best way to run individual dealerships now is to bring them together into large corporations why is it not even MORE efficient (and profitable) for Cadillac to own all the Cadillac dealers as an income generating subsidiary instead of relying on partner corporations that own and sell a variety of brands?

Should GM and Cadillac start to buy up large car sales groups?