When General Motors discontinues the Chevrolet Cruze in the first quarter of 2019, it will cease manufacturing the compact car range at the GM Lordstown plant. That much the automaker announced this Monday, and the move will result in the Ohio plant becoming unallocated. But now comes news that Chevy Cruze production will also cease at another GM plant – the GM Ramos Arizpe complex in Mexico.
“The end of the production of this model [the Chevrolet Cruze] at the Mexican plant will occur by March. Instead, the complex will increase production of the new Blazer”, Teresa Cid, GM Mexico Communications Director, was quoted as saying.
Allegedly, the decision will not result in the firing of personnel in the Mexican plant, at least for the time being. “We believe that the arrival of this new SUV will allow us to maintain union jobs in the plant”, Cid added.
As such, Chevy Cruze production will end next March simultaneously at both the Lordstown and Ramos plants, resulting in the discontinuation of the model in the United States, Canada and Mexico. Any remaining units of the vehicle in inventory will likely sell out by the end of 2019.
The news comes several months after Cruze production ended at the GM Gunsan plant in South Korea as the automaker shuttered the facility as part of its South Korean restructuring.
However, the second generation Cruze will continue to be manufactured at two other plants:
- GM Norsom II plant in China
- GM Rosario plant in Argentina
The developments are part of ongoing business restructuring efforts at GM that were announced on Monday. The efforts include idling operations at two assembly and two powertrain plants in the United States (for a total of four sites), one assembly plant in Canada, discontinuing six sedans, plus reducing salaried staff and contractors by 15 percent. GM also announced that it will idle two other plants outside North America by the end of 2019, without specifying which ones. With these cuts, GM hopes to realize a cost savings of approximately $6 billion by the end of 2020, according to a company statement.
Idled Assembly Plants:
- GM Oshawa Assembly in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada
- GM Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly in Detroit
- GM Lordstown Assembly in Warren, Ohio
Idled Propulsion Plants:
- GM Baltimore Operations in White Marsh, Maryland
- GM Warren Transmission Operations in Warren, Michigan
Discontinued Models
Stay tuned to GM Authority as we bring you the latest Chevrolet news and Cruze news.
Comments
GM does not have the engineering, design, or manufacturing talent to compete with other modern vehicle companies. So management retreats to countries not so competitive, China, Argentina, Vietnam, Brazil. All this while management pays itself larger and larger bonuses. Mary Barra alone has been awarded over $66,000,000 in the last 3 years for dismantling and retreating to an ever smaller smaller product base. Cowardly and selfish and greedy!
the europeans and asians sell cars in all of those markets. so how uncompetitive can those markets really be?
Mary Barra apparently learned all too well from her mentor Roger B. Smith how to dismantle GM. She is continuing what he started by refusing to spend sufficient money to build world-class products that would sell and then blaming plant closures on poor sales of the inferior products developed on her watch. Maybe its time for Michael Moore to follow her around and chronicle her lifestyle and compare it with the average GM worker and then outline how GM has bought back $10.6 billion in stock in the last three years while seemingly not having having enough money to invest in the products to make the company competitive. Stock buybacks benefit Barra and other executives who are compensated with GM shares while terrific, competitive products that sell would benefit everyone at the company AND the stockholders.
Machete Mary learned well! I parallel her fantasy of autonomous cars to the debacle of the C/E/K cars of the mid-1980s- the Eldorado, Seville, Deville, 98, Tornado, Rivera and Electra. They were conceived in 1980 under the premise of Roger Smith thinking gas would be $3 a gallon. They were to have come out staring in MY 1983 but were delayed two years. Well, the cars for the most part failed especially the Rivey, Toranado, Eldorado and Seville. In fact, these four cars were shown to numerous focus groups with the common theme that they are way too small and way too pricy. Well GM went ahead anyway and the sales tanked to the tune of 50-60 percent decline year-over-year. To Roger Smith’s credit, he did spend $40 Billion (in 1980 dollars) over five years to rebuild and replace older plants. Machete Mary was bosting how GM spend $22 billion in 2010 dollars over the last ten years in their plants.
I have yet to understand how gutting your engineering and design staff, allowing your plants to grow obsolete by cutting capital spending, dropping product without any replacement, and have gaping holes in your product lineup vis-à -vis the competition will have any medium and long-term benefit to GM’s shareholders, customers, dealers, and employees?
The GM E/K program was one of the biggest blunders in American corporate history. The E/K cars were the Tahoe/Yukon/Escalade of their day. They were GM’s cash cows. The company lived off of the money that came in from the three big coupes, the Seville and other high-profit Cadillacs.
The parallels are not quite the same because today’s big utes use a common pickup truck platform with very rudimentary components but sell for $60,000 + making them even more profitable than the E/Ks ever were with their unique and sophisticated underpinnings. None-the-less, these were money makers for GM. Cadillac Eldorado’s sales plunged 60 percent between 1985 and 1986 when the smaller, redesigned, and more expensive car was launched. Seville, Toronado, and Riviera also suffered over 50 percent sales drops. GM radically downsized them, eliminated all of the previous cars’ style and road presence and the three models never recovered. The impact on the GM balance sheet was substantial.
They took away the glamour and added tech for products that sold to buyers over 50, a serious miscalculation of the market and failure to understand their customers. Thus, the E/K cars went from being products that made GM lots of money to all being discontinued. GM said the market changed and buyers moved away from coupes. Perhaps there was a element of truth to that but coupes and the flamboyant Seville sold because they looked good. When GM stripped that away, yes, buyers moved on. Nobody wanted to pay big money for unappealing little cars that looked just like much cheaper cars, were difficult to operate, and more expensive than before even if they were still adorned with GM’s most prestigious nameplates.
All of that can be laid at the feet of Roger B. Smith along with another blunder, the W Bodies that followed E/K in 1988. GM’s best selling cars, including the top selling car in the country, the Oldsmobile Cutlass, were disastrously redesigned. It can easily be argued that GM has never recovered from the damage done by Roger B. Smith and these product redesigns. The Oldsmobile Cutlass’ winning formula of being not too cheap, not too expensive, not too sporty, not too stuffy, not too big, not too small, but just right in every way was commandeered by Honda with their Accord which became a perennial best seller and the Cutlass and the Oldsmobile brand never got back what was lost.
The markets you named as supposedly being not very competitive are actually VERY competitive, since cars are much more of a luxury in all but China (of the ones you mentioned). Meanwhile, China has significantly more automotive offerings (choices) than the United States does, which is the definition of competitiveness in the first place.
Poor Cruze. Instead of making the Cruze a better car to compete directly with the Japanese and Koreans. GM took the easy road and cancel it.
GM’s best move of all, CUT and RUN. Its the only thing GM truly knows how to do great.
Glad to see GM care for it’s Mexican work force by giving them the Blazer to make up for the loss of the Cruze. I don’t see why the Caravan wants to come to the US when all the jobs are right there in Mexico.
Because they are not coming here to work, but coming here for ALL the FREE giveaways !!!!!!!!
Whatever happened to the 20 new electric vehicles that Mary Barra promised or was that all just white noise to keep the shareholders from holding her accountable.
Well, every new GM car is guaranteed to have a battery in it, so she wasn’t completely lying.
Good point though – where exactly is GM going to assemble this plethora of new electric vehicles?
Here’s an interesting article from Ward’s Auto stating that the purpose of this restructuring may have been to save Machete Mary’s job at the expense of 15,000 jobs and 5 communities…
https://www.wardsauto.com/industry/uaw-caught-industry-turmoil-again
GM urgently needs to employ Carlos Ghosn as CEO
Let’s see some history on him.
GM is the biggest loser of passionate followers that I have ever known, this coming from a MN sports fan… I am a GM dealership sales and management employee for 17 years. I used to love GM. Since I’ve known them as a company, they are awful. They screw the dealer every way they can to make more money at the expensive of the franchise owners and consumers. They have lots across the US (the most commitment to the US they have) full of every model “in transit” to the dealers (once they are built a dealer is invoiced and GM is paid). They send emails to us blaming the “congested railways” last year it was blaming the “deteriorating US railways”. The new trucks are cheap inside and packaging sucks. I have no idea why I was involved in a dealer pilot study when the group agreed on everything that GM didn’t do. They cant build enough Traverse, Enclave is stale though new. They could have easily allocated all Cruze to Mexico and Blazer to Lordstown.. Don’t hold your breath on Lordstown getting future product. I’ve had 13 new GM vehicles in my 17 years. I’ll explore my employee options at the other brands that my dealer group owns next.
Wouldn’t it be nice if they actually expanded production in the US or Canada for a change?
What crap. Ramos production of the Blazer proves the Lordstown folks right. It could have been built there.
Betting the company on products that have yet to be proven or find a market is stupid. Machete Mary is in over her head.
Like really the Cruze gone over the Sonic & Spark !
All domestic car companies, formally known as the big 3, will be gone in 10 years as we know it today. Too big to fail?? No sir, just too big to adjust and get on track with something new. When is the last time any of these companies put out something revolutionary?? Seems like Kmart all over again. Had it all, but failed to make the changes that could make them competitive and leap ahead of the followers. Cutting staff is the short term answer but in the long run, it’s like a grocer eating up all the shelf stock to stay alive. Eventually you have nothing to sell. How does that work??
https://www.facebook.com/austintownlocalschools/videos/294511967934705/