General Motors will sell the all-new, 2018 Chevrolet Traverse full-size crossover in Russia, according to a report from WardsAuto.
After pulling the Chevrolet and Opel brands from the mainstream segments of the Russian market in 2015 due to a weakening economy, GM’s presence in the country has been limited. Currently, the automaker’s lineup consists of three models each from Chevrolet and Cadillac.
| Chevrolet | Cadillac |
|---|---|
| Tahoe | Escalade |
| Camaro | CTS/CTS-V |
| Corvette | XT5 |
| Niva* |
- The Chevrolet Niva is not a product of “GM proper”, but rather that of the GM-AvtoVAZ joint venture
The Traverse name is not well-known in Russia, but The General is hoping to capitalize on Russians’ demand for utility vehicles. Despite Russia’s economic issues, sales of utilities have held steady. In addition, vehicles from U.S. automakers are in high demand due to American auto brands being held in high regard in the country.
GM is not discussing projected sales volumes, but analysts in the Russian Ministry of Industry and Trade predict that the Traverse may sell between 1,000 and 1,200 units in its first year on the market.
Comments
Didn’t we just pass some huge trade sanctions against Russia? How is this going to play out even trying to sell vehicles there.
The trade sanctions were directed mainly against Germany to hinder the completion of the second string of the “Northstream” gas pipeline transporting Russian gas thru the Baltic Sea to Germany so that the Europeans should buy fracking gas from the USA instead.
All I know is that the ability to buy Molot and Kalashnikov weapons, cheap surplus weapons and nice cheap Russian ammo has been killed off!
They will all be black ones and used by the Government to cater to the generals and security for Putin .
They are the only people that have any money , I mean the Russians don’t have much discretionary money for a big CUV .
How many Rubles does one of these cost ? One Ruble = 0.017 US Dollars .
Zach – having lived and Russia for over a decade, I can tell you that you’re way off the mark.
What you describe was true back in the 80s and 90s. It is completely not the case today.
Today, Russia is not a third world country… it exists somewhere between first- and second-worlds. There is a large and growing middle class that buys new cars or slightly used cars from American or European brands in Europe and drives them to Russia. There are entire services and infrastructures/ecosystems set up to facilitate this these kinds of transactions.
Here’s to calling it how it really is… rather than how it was two decades ago.