I just wanted to try to put things back into perspective with Camaro, because I think it's needed.

It's very easy to get excited and angry at GM for killing off the F-body (we seem to easily forget the Firebird guys are just as frustrated as we are). It's also very easy to feel that we are in a position that if we get mad enough, and threaten enough, GM will feel the heat, and rush a new Camaro into production. Hate to be the one to break it to ya, but it's a fantasy.

In 2002, Chevrolet produced 42,098 Camaros, of which only 24,805 were Z28s, SSs, or Police Camaros. Those numbers are very close to the same for 2001.

In less than 2 weeks GMs Oshawa assembly plant ALONE produces more W cars than all the Zs/SSs/B4Cs produced last year, and in about 4 weeks (remember, this is ONE plant making ONE chassis/body) it produces more cars than all f-bodies made last year...COMBINED!

The point I'm getting at here is that of all car chassis, the F-body is the lowest production chassis.....yes, even behind Corvette!

Corvette has a high profit margin for dealers AND GM. GTO, because it was made & produced by a division that can create cars for virtual pennies, will also have a pretty substantial payoff for both GM and it's dealers. Camaro doesn't fall into either catagory, so it doesn't get the priority of the volume cars, or the priority of the high profit cars, or the ease to production of the cars that cost little to create or produce.

Camaro has to have a RWD chassis. The primary reason there is no new Camaro is because GM-NA has NO RWD chassis to put one on!

Till recently, Cadillac had exclusive use (with the possible exception of Buick) of the CTS based sigma chassis. GM-NA pulled out of the RWD business back in 1997 when GM (and it wasn't only Zarella who decided this... no 1 person runs GM) decided not to use Holden as a base for RWD cars. At the same time, there were at least 2 separate years Camaro & Firebird were in fact supposed to die. Quite a few people made quite a few cases to keep Camaro going as long as it did.

The management team at GM now inherited a mess. Design was by lowest common denominator, no real money was set aside to upgrade the car side beyond redesigns (except Cadillac), and GM-NA is so big, it normally takes 5 years for any changes made or projects started to take effect.

GM is scrambling like crazy as we speak to repair the car side of the business. Things that normally take 5 years to happen, is being squeezed down to 3! Logically, the items that are getting the 1st attention and the 1st spending are the volume cars, and rightly so. Those are the cars that are going to pull GM along when SUVs & Truck sales start to fall (and they know this), not low production Camaros (which if some of you got your way, Camaro would even have lower production numbers due to them being only V8 niche cars).

This means that even considering those of you so angry at GM over Camaro that you never buy another GM product, your absence will more than likely be made up when not only from new buyers when Camaro comes back, but by the multitudes of people who will be buying RWD Impalas, GTOs, CTSvs, and the improved FWD cars and crossovers that GM will be bringing out in the next few years.

The actual painful truth is GM is a business. If a small segment of customers of a car that sold less than 25,000 (actually less than the high profit, low production Corvette) for at least each of the past 2 or 3 years turn grumpy and threaten to jump ship, do you honestly think anyone is loosing sleep over it?

Camaro has fans in key places (and enemies where you'd least expect them), and even with fans in key places, it ended up on the slower boat to production than the more important cars. Now that Cadillac no longer has a lock on it's Sigma chassis, Solstice has been approved for production, and Holden is putting the finishing touches on GM's new volume RWD chassis, there are 3 new possibilities for a 5th gen, and now finally things can move forward again. But, again, the volume cars have priority.

The big issue now is what chassis will fit Camaro better (you're dreaming if you think Camaro will have a completely unique chassis again). The other big issue is how much of this donor car can fit under the 5th gen's skin. This won't be answered in a year or so. If Camaro were approved now, it would take till AT LEAST early 2006 (2007 model year) to get it on the market. If Camaro's comming back in 2007, it's likely already approved, and it's also likely to be a Solstice, a Impala, or even (less likely) a CTS under the skin.

Camaro's production simply isn't big enough to make it's return anything more than a matter of pride and a marketing tool for the Chevrolet Motor Division. NOT because a small portion of a small group of enthusiasts get angry & beat on our chests.

It sucks, but such is the corperate world. Camaro will be back, but it wasn't getting a high priority in development.

 

I respect your words and thoughts.One thing which just about anybody will know this-is they would be hard pressed to market the car right in the first place due to the lack there of over the years.It would be nice if they "could" shake the earth with a new F5 if it comes out like Ford shook it when they introduced the Stang.Im still going off of the Chevelle coming next not a F5 which so many seem to not want to believe.
I mean why would GM have the 70 Chevelle @ NAIAS for?

 

...as usual guoinM!

I personally think the best reason for GM to "see through the smoke" so to speak, is the new Mustang Concept and the buyers it will attract on top of the enormous sales the Mustang already enjoys.

You just simply CAN NOT allow a competitor to have nearly 200k in sales and NOT have something to offer.........just like back in the 60's.........these two cars will always be linked.

 

GM should realize that the Camaro can be a high volume car or even higher volume than some of their new cars.

Hopefully GM will 1 day again take over the full-size market with a B-Bodylike car also.

 

Thank you, GuionM. Again you bring the discussion back down to earth.

Like it or not, everyone here has to accept that hard times have come to F-body Land.

I'll have mine for at least a few more years. Maybe I'll be driving a Stang for a little bit after that....who knows. I might even be that guy at the car show in 2020 that still drives his classic 1996 Camaro Z28 around. LOL!! That would be the day!!

 

So, we can't put together this 3
2005
Retro Camaro
2004 NAIAS it will had showed up the next Camaro
yesterday I did a search over the internet, and found that this was the "most" probable scenario

I read that they were working on a Camaro but not a official program on it.. but to me know seems like it will be back 2007 or even later
In my house GM hast lost 2 customers know. because my father was telling me that GM would not let Ford be the only one with the Mustang, but looks like he was wrong also
now he is waiting for the 2005 GT or Cobra and will trade in his Pathfinder.
My car will be paid for Nov of this year, and I was planning to save some $$ to put down on a new Camaro.. ain't going to happen
I will keep mine forever..
This is why the Mustang is always leading in sales.. they have interest in they loyal buyers GM doesn't.. they are proud on the Mustang GM doesn't
and they will let the world know that there is a Mustang.. Gm never did it in the 90's 2002
Sad but true

 

Thanks Doug, and you just brought up something I missed, Mustang.

Unlike the old MN12, the LS chassis was meant from the start to serve as the basis of the new Mustang, UNLIKE the CTS (look at the cowl of both LS & CTS and you'll notice the LS's cowl is very low compared to the tall CTS).

Ford made the commitment to Mustang early in the game, and developed it's lineup accordingly. The LS was initially to spawn the Fairmont, a sub-LS sized Lincoln, the Thunderbird, and a Lincoln coupe as well as Mustang. However, the CTS chassis was planned not only just for Cadillac, but bigger Cadillacs as well (ie: STS, DTS, SLX, and briefly, the XLR).

Ford is a much smaller company than GM, and has alot less dealers than Chevrolet has. For a car like Mustang, that's out selling all F-bodies 2 to 1, that means the dealers are making a heap of money on Mustangs that Chevrolet dealers could only dream of with Camaro... alot FEWER dealers selling TWICE the volume (that even factors in rentals).

Stangs are cash cows for Ford dealers. As such, even if Ford was loosing a little money assembling Mustangs, dealers would demand them to the marketing guys, and the marketing guys would demand them from the company. In short, Mustang has an ironclad business case Camaro didn't. If you imagine Chevrolet dealers (remember they greatly outnumber Ford dealers) selling over 210,000 Camaros per year, that would equal the impact & importance of Mustang to Ford dealers. Instead, our dealers sold 42,000.

That solves the mystery as to why Chevy dealers seemed to hate Camaros (except higher profit SSs), and never kept any in stock towards the end!

The fairly expensive LS was to be the chassis of the Mustang till Ford had a financial meltdown a year and a half ago. Since then, Ford has carved out all types of expense out of the new Mustang (my understanding is that most all of it out of the rear suspension), and they are looking at spreading the cost even further by developing other cars off the chassis here & abroad. So a car that started as a great business case, is now even better.

Back in the mid 90s, both Ford and GM sealed the fate of their pony cars. Unfortunately, when everything is done, it would have taken over 10 years to repair the damage of one company's mistake, while the other one may end up with a great car & alot of positive press just when they need it the most.

 

Just a note to all GM "cost cutters" out there salivating at the fact that Ford saved some cost on Mustangs' IRS...and wondering what can be SLASHED from a Camaro program.

When the CBS IRS replaced the DEW IRS on the Mustang..this was a grand slam for Ford.

In one fell swoop..the Control Blade Suspension, was:

1). Cheaper
2). More compact
3). Lighter
4). Performed better

Now that's smart cost cutting !

 

Originally posted by guionM

The actual painful truth is GM is a business. If a small segment of customers of a car that sold less than 25,000 (actually less than the high profit, low production Corvette) for at least each of the past 2 or 3 years turn grumpy and threaten to jump ship, do you honestly think anyone is loosing sleep over it?


Considering that they were so loyal to GM that they bought a poorly manufactured car of a 10 year old design with zero marketing, you'd think someone would take notice.. especially when Camaro's direct competitor was the 11th or 12th BEST SELLING PASSENGER CAR IN THE US (http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0883576.html)

Besides, you can't blame the customers for not buying an outdated product you failed to invest in (unless you're GM).


Camaro's production simply isn't big enough to make it's return anything more than a matter of pride and a marketing tool for the Chevrolet Motor Division. NOT because a small portion of a small group of enthusiasts get angry & beat on our chests.

Camaro's production isn't big enough because GM f'ed up. Not because the market isn't there. There are LOTS of buyers out there - ~~200K bought mustangs alone. Most have gone elsewhere - that small group of enthusiasts getting angry and beating on their chests are all thats left - the most loyal, you might say...

It would suck to lose those people, because the "replacements" buying those other cars might not be as loyal.

They could do a lot to keep them by saying "We F'ed up, but Camaro WILL be back in ___ years" rather than playing this secrecy crap when the whole automotive world knows their lineup through 2007.

 

They can't say ANYTHING now. Then it would really take a while to get it back.

 

It was poor product development. Terrible marketing. Not to say there was no marketing whatsoever (one might think that), but what marketing was done was absolutely terrible. There is absolutely no reason that Chevrolet could not have kept the Camaro on the leading edge, and when the smaller sporty cars like the RS-X/Integra and Celica began really catching on, they could've began targetting that crowd with the car. Not to say turning it into a jazzed-up Cavalier is a good idea, but reducing its dimensions and edging up the styling a bit is. Picking a new/evolved chassis somewhere along the line might not have been a bad idea, either.

It seems to me like too many mistakes were made early on in the 4th generation's life cycle, and it was probably obvious from maybe 5 or more years ago that the only thing that could be done was to let it run itself out of energy and then kill it off.

 

Corvette is selling around 33000 units currently, camaro/fb/ta were much higher than this in 02-probably around 75k combined

 

Anybody that uses the camaro's last year volumes ( or even last several years) as a guide for business case, market potential, etc. is kidding themselves. It is very normal for sales volumes to drop off once the death sentence of a product has been announced. GM stopped all funding, they pulled the cars out of their commercials, they pulled all motorsport sponsership and they stopped or cut back their coverage at the various auto shows. Addtionaly, there are many people that, for what ever reason, actual have reservations about buying a product that is being discontinued.

Back in 97 and 98 before the "announcment" the F-cars were selling around 70,000 vehicles per year and were the second best selling sport coupe (in their price range) sold in america. Keep in mind that these are also historically low volumes for these cars. If you also look at the volumes that mustang sells, there is no reason that an F5 could not easily sell 50,000 to 80,000 vehicles per year if it is done correctly. Now, you may still say that this is low volume, which it is. But GM has recently invested millions on multiple programs that have predicted sales volumes either similar or lower than this.

[/B][/QUOTE] Camaro has to have a RWD chassis. The primary reason there is no new Camaro is because GM-NA has NO RWD chassis to put one on![/B][/QUOTE]

I know I have stated this before, but: the Soltice needs a RWD platform also, there currently is not one available, and this project just got the green light? Why is a lack of platform not an issue for the Solstice? Have you checked the predicted sales volume of the Soltice lately? I gaurantee you its lower than 50,000 per year. Did I mention this program got the green light!

[/B][/QUOTE] This means that even considering those of you so angry at GM over Camaro that you never buy another GM product, your absence will more than likely be made up when not only from new buyers when Camaro comes back, but by the multitudes of people who will be buying RWD Impalas, GTOs, CTSvs, and the improved FWD cars and crossovers that GM will be bringing out in the next few years. [/B][/QUOTE]

I think it safe to say that many Fcar buyers also have other vehicles. I personally have a GM sport sedan, a GM truck, and a Camaro. This issue has definely caused me to reevaluate my loyalty to GM as not only an F-car buyer but as a car and truck buyer. The truth is, it's never a good business decision to **** off your customers and ignore their wants. Unless GM plans on getting into the boat business, they really should stop burning bridges!

[/B][/QUOTE] The actual painful truth is GM is a business. [/B][/QUOTE]

GM is a business. They also recently made the brilliant business decision to invest over 300 million dollars to develope the SSR which is only predicted sell 10,000 per year max. There is no business case for a new Camaro but there is one that explains the SSR fiasco? The truth is, if you compare apples to apples and look at Gm programs with similar volumes and for image type vehicles, you have to work hard to not find a business case for the Camaro.

 

holeshot, you make some excellent points!

 

Everything I have heard has teh sales projections for a new Camaro (the one being worked on) at around 120,000 units....that isn't nothing to laugh at. Keep in mind...even with little investment the F-car sold 75,000 units last year....that is near the top of it's sports coupe class.