General Motors has idled its Fairfax Assembly Plant — the birthplace of the Buick LaCrosse and Chevy Malibu — and is going to prolong the shutdown for an extended period during the Christmas and New Year’s holidays.
The normal holiday break consists of a seven day shutdown, but since the plant is not scheduled to resume production until January 7 of 2013, the facility will enjoy a total downtime of 20 days.
“We have strategically built Chevrolet Malibu stock levels based on scheduled downtime and a strengthening vehicle market,” GM said in a statement. “This idle time gives us an opportunity to conduct scheduled facility projects aimed at improving the plant’s future competitiveness. Additionally, we are hosting select employees for training and carrying out standard maintenance work.”
So, are slow Malibu sales to blame? GM declined to comment on whether increasing inventory of the Chevrolet midsize factored into the longer-than-usual production break. As of December 1 2012, GM’s inventory of Malibus reached a 164-day supply.
Completely redesigned for the 2013 model year, the new Malibu arrived at dealer showrooms in August. And while year-to-date sales are up four percent through November, the growth lags behind the industry’s 14 percent. What’s more, sales seem to be on a downward slope, with November sales down 0.4 percent.
Only two years ago, the Malibu was the second best-selling vehicle produced by GM, behind the full-size Silverado pickup truck. It has since slipped to sixth place. Since its launch, the Malibu has been criticized by some pundits for a lack of rear-seat legroom. However, the vehicle will receive several updates next year, including a new 1.6 liter turbo-charged engine and revised front-end styling — which, in our opinion, is one of the aspects of the new Malibu that should be left untouched.
Located in Kansas City, Kansas, GM’s Fairfax assembly plant opened in 1987 and currently employs roughly 3,500 hourly and 315 salaried workers. Normally, the plant operates three shifts running Monday through Friday.
The GM Authority Take
Before jumping to any hasty conclusions, let’s remember that one of the pillars established by the leadership team of the New General Motors has been to keep production (supply) in line with sales (demand). Keeping this in mind — along with the fact that the new Malibu launched with the more expensive mild-hybrid Eco model — it may be too early to tell whether or not the extended shutdown is the result of slow sales and growing inventory.
We’ll likely find out whether the Malibu is truly a slow seller in the next several months, but as of this writing, it doesn’t seem that the vehicle will be outselling Toyota’s Camry anytime soon.
Comments
To start, I understand that the Malibu is supposed to be a global product, which is probably why the wheelbase is so short. But I can’t imagine that the new markets it’s being sold in would count for a large number of sales as opposed to what could have happened had it been optimized for the States–where its largest market lies. Or GM could have offered a “long-wheelbase” iteration for the States, because (as evidenced by the Buick LaCrosse and Cadillac XTS) the Epsilon II platform is to some extent stretchable. Nevertheless, GM’s decision to shorten the Malibu while competitors have grown seems counterproductive. I’ve sat in the new Malibu and the biggest cost-for-space argument against it seems to be its smaller brother, the Cruze.
The other thing that seems to be wrong with the Malibu is the packaging. When it was first released, it was offered only with the Eco trim, which–unlike with the Cruze–does not offer any real fuel gains over a competing sedan, or even the 2.5 and 2.0T powertrains. Without any other engine choices available, Chevy dealers wouldn’t have had an answer for buyers looking for something more, and I can just imagine how off-putting that must have been to quite a few consumers. Moreover, GM should have taken a cue from Ford with its MyLink/IntelliLink system. With Ford, any car that has MyFord Touch can quickly be equipped with navigation by opting for a $795 SD card…either during or after the purchase. In this way, Ford minimizes the risk of driving off buyers because of having too many or too few cars with navigation in its fleet. It also means that buyers can purchase navigation on lesser trims, too. Sure enough, not only does GM offer a separate MyLink system for navigation the Malibu, there is a shortage of such cars in its inventory…and the same is true for the 2013 Camaro. Add to that awkward color and packaging options, and I can see why a customer would be driven into a no-nonsense Honda dealership.
As far as I can tell, GM’s entire execution of the Malibu was quite poor…and that’s sad, because its competitors have never been better. The only major launch that I’ve seen go worse in the late was that of the Dodge Dart, which first had an overwhelming number of manual-transmission cars in its inventories. The good news is that with supplies as high as they are, I’m sure there’s plenty of negotiation room on a 2013 Malibu…provided you can actually find one with the options you want.
Kyree — a hat tip in your general direction for a great analysis of the issues experienced by the Malibu.
I would only take issue with the assertion that the new Malibu’s global nature is to blame for its shortcomings; you may not have implied this in the first place, but I just want to get this out there.
The Malibu’s non-palatial rear-seat legroom is a by-product of a short wheelbase. It’s a mistake initially made by Opel with the Insignia, and then repeated by Chevy with the Malibu.
What I mean to say is that the new Malibu could remain a global vehicle with a longer wheelbase (longer by 2-3 inches), while maintaining its current exterior dimensions (more or less). One excellent example of this practice is the new Fusion/Mondeo. The wheelbase is long(er than Malibu), yet the vehicle itself has roughly the same exterior dimensions as the Malibu.
In addition, I personally don’t believe in “optimizing” a vehicle for a market as it relates to size. With the exception of market-specific anomalies (U.S. truck fanaticism, long wheelbase A4s in China for chauffeurs, etc.), it is possible to engineer mainstream cars in such a way so as to make them class leaders in any global market. Again, the Fusion/Mondeo is a great example.
Ultimately, I blame the rear seat legroom imperfection on the architecture, and hope that GM doesn’t bifurcate the next-gen Malibu as VW did to the Passat (with one version for North America (and China) and another for the rest of the world).
On a side note, GM could have also engineered Epsilon to optimize cabin space. For instance, the (Euro) VW Passat (and the CC) has noticeably more cabin space and slightly less trunk space than the Malibu, despite a slightly shorter wheelbase.
At the end of the day, I see the next-gen Malibu (and Insignia) staying the same in exterior dimensions, but increasing the length of the (regular/non-extended) Epsilon wheelbase by 2-4 inches. This should make each vehicle more competitive around the world, not just in the States. Would love to hear your opinions on this.
There’s spin and then there’s the above both the author and GM’s PR. It’s not just the Malibu, The Cruze, Trucks… go check GM’s production #’s and compare to sales. Total vehicle inventory is way ahead of what was planned.
GM got caught with it’s pants down; I just wish they wouldn’t try and insult peoples intelligence with the BS. You would have to be a cheerleader in the extreme to buy the spin.
Are the trucks, along with the Cruze, having an *extended* holiday break?
http://blogs.wsj.com/drivers-seat/2012/12/04/general-motors-cutting-production-to-control-inventory/
Take a look at production and sales:
http://www.gm.com/content/gmcom/home/company/investors/sales-production.content_pages_news_us_en_2012_dec_gmsales.~content~gmcom~home~company~investors~sales-production.html
http://gmauthority.com/blog/2012/12/gm-u-s-sales-grow-3-percent-in-november-2012/
My answer with a WSJ and GM production/sales link seems to have went poof? Oh well, wasn’t anything that was secret. 😉
I still think this car needs to have a V6.
what Kyree said…