General Motors Canada employees at the CAMI assembly plant officially took to the picket line this past Sunday after Unifor and GM failed to reach a new labor contract. It’s quite possibly the worst possible plant to strike, too, since it’s responsible for building the hot-selling 2018 Chevrolet Equinox.
One full day into the strike, analysts have begun to crunch numbers to see how the lack of 2018 Equinox production will put plenty of pressure on GM, and it’s not a good situation. The Detroit Free Press reports GM will lose 872 units of Equinox per day as the strike carries on. For potential car buyers, that means a very limited supply of 2018 Equinoxes and not many choices of trim levels. This, of course, makes it more likely for shoppers to head to competing automakers to get what they actually want.
To put the Equinox’s popularity into numbers, GM sold 28,245 of the compact crossover last month alone.
GM does build the Equinox at supplementary plants in Mexico, but the facilities are not fully online and still continue to ramp up production. The plants won’t make up for the massive numbers of lost production, according to Joe Langley, an automotive production forecaster at IHS Markit.
Workers at the CAMI plant in Ingersoll, Ontario, Canada, shook after GM announced the plant would lose the 2018 GMC Terrain as a core product. The automaker moved Terrain production solely to Mexico and hundreds of jobs were lost at the plant. Now, CAMI workers want to know their future is secure and a major portion of the bargaining process has been to secure new investment at the plant.
For now, it’s probably best to shop a 2018 Equinox now. Some analysts believe the strike may not be over very quickly.
Comments
If I were UNIFOR, I wouldn’t get too cocky.
The last time that UNIFOR threatened a GM launch, GM tooled up the Impala in two plants — Oshawa and Hammtramck.
Now the Equinox is tooled up in three plants — two in Mexico, one in Canada. Yeah the Mexican plants aren’t fully up to speed yet ….. but if you do force GM to push production there, it isn’t coming back to Ingersoll.
… And China too…
AutolineTV said that General Motors does have a factory in Mexico which builds the Equinox; thus while the strike in Canada continues, there will be a second or even third shift for the factory in Mexico to try making up inventory.
So settle already and get on with it.
If GM were smart, they would temporarily move all production to mexico, build a new plant here and tell UNIFOR to go f#@k themselves.
Hopefully that will happen to Henry and his job one day.
I only work for / support open shop labor man.
just remember if the VIN starts with 3, leave it be