The headline of the automotive industry over the course of the 2023 calendar year has been vehicle inventory levels, or the lack thereof. This was partly due to logistics challenges in shipping said vehicles to the dealership. Now, in an effort to help alleviate this bottleneck, GM is paying its dealers to pick up vehicles directly from its assembly plants.
According to a report from Automotive News, General Motors is paying upwards of $1,050 per vehicle for its dealerships to pick up completed vehicles from one of four assembly plants, including the GM Arlington plant in Texas, the GM Wentzville plant in Missouri, the GM Fort Wayne plant in Indiana, and the GM Oshawa plant in Canada.
It’s worth noting that the level of compensation depends on the distance of the dealership from the assembly plant, as the payout increases with further distance for a maximum of $1,050. With this in mind, some dealerships are regularly driving great distances in order to cash in on this new incentive.
Upon first glance, it may seem as though this unusual shipping option may not make a huge difference in the bigger picture. However, General Motors higher-ups have stated that the number of vehicles being picked up isn’t insignificant, and that the extra volume may be showing up in sales figures.
“One unit is one more spot on a rail [car], it’s one more spot on a truck,” Chevy Global Vice President Scott Bell claimed. “It does help the overall capacity. Every one we move is one less that we’ve got to worry about finding a home for in the constrained logistics chain that we’re dealing with.”
Interestingly, this development comes a few months after The General saw an increase in inventory levels across the United States. More specifically, inventory levels jumped four percent during Q2 2023 to 427,972 units, as compared to 412,285 examples in Q1 2023. Although Q3 2023 figures have yet to be released, it’s likely that U.S. inventory levels rose once again in Q3 2023.
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Comments
Now let customers pick up their cars at the assembly plant and we will have something. I would be willing to pick up my new car from the factory, save 500 bucks or something and drive it home!
They already let Corvette buyers do it in Bowling Green – and even charge them extra for it. Obviously, they get a little bit more than just being able to pick up their Corvette, but you get the idea…
museum delivery. look it up. it is a thing..
Yes museum delivery IS a thing – but the customer does not save – they pay an extra $1,495 for that…. PLUS destination charge of $1,595…
I mean if you are wanting to do it because you want to save, that will never be a thing. its up to you to fight with the dealer for them to lower the price to cover delivery etc fees.
just like when bmw/mb had european delivery.. did you think they paid your plane tickets and expenses to go there? no.
it is for the experience and picking your car at the factory unmolested by a car carrier bouncing it around is benefit enough.
Yes, take off the destination charge and ill be there first thing in the morning. Its not insignificant.
Seams to me GM is using this as a way to further reduce costs. A 1750 destination charge-1050 for the dealership means theyre pocketing 700$.
UP TO 1050. this is probably factored as 1050 to gnome alaska :))
if they cannot get car carriers to pick up their cars that means they are paying well below industry rates so the vehicles sit. i have shipped a few cars. longest i had to wait for a carrier going my way with space was a week. same day if i wanted to hire a dedicated one (that is expensive!). i cannot in good faith comprehend how gm cannot move vehicles for months at a time. unless they want to pay 1cent a mile or less…
this will probably only make sense for dealers who just have to get the cars on their lots; many will probably spend more money than what gm pays them. interesting times ahead.
GM has HD trucks sitting in Canada. I know of built sold orders that have been sitting there for three months with no ETA. Most CEO’s get graded harshly for this level of incompetence. Not at GM, it’s a badge of honor. When do the 2022 buyers get all of the chips they were promised??? The retrofit was going to begin in the summer of 2022. The summer of 2023 has come and gone and still no chips for 50% of my customers.
hopefully never. that should teach them to accept delivery/give money for an incomplete product. a good learning experience for people who bought incomplete vehicles. gm is laughing
“they bought the promise of retrofit while we sold them stuff without modules lolol. and they paid 10k over msrp cause “covid” lolol”
yep.
We got our retrofit chip on 2022 SS Camaro June 2023. There was a $50.00 credit on the window sticker when we bought car Aug 2022. Wasn’t a big deal, went to dealer & went for a walk while they did install/reprogram & everything good.
Odd thing was, that when we got the notice the part was available, I dropped by dealer to arrange install time, & found out the chip was in stock, but a little plastic part that needed to put in at same time was not. Took couple more weeks for that to come in. Just seemed weird how GM does these things. But since June 2023, wife happy, so everything is great.
You have to be a union trucking company to pick up cars from GM lots….GM pays well to get their cars hauled. Union trucking companies are having a hard time hiring people. After Covid and the chip shortage truckers had to find other means to compensate for the loss in hauling new cars. Coupled with the fact that nobody wants to work anymore hence the problem with getting new cars delivered.
Many people on these sites want to put GM down every chance they get and most don’t truly know that facts. The facts are that all Union auto companies are having same issues with deliveries on new cars not just GM.
they were always pocketing the money , where have you been , if they paid $1500 to the carrier there would be no problem , the problem would fix itself. they probably need to raise the destination fee so they can give more to the carrier until then the carrier will drag there feet and give them excuses about a bottleneck that dosnt exist
BLozano: I’d do that.
GM used to do this for employees back in the 70’s.
i picked my corvette at the factory but you still have to pay the shipping charges. it is in the teamsters contract
There is a work preservation agreement in the contract between the company and the teamsters. In other words, the teamsters agree to transport the cars, but the company then can’t use other unaffiliated car carriers, subcontractors, etc. Better deal for consumers who live far away from the auto plant but pretty common with a variety of products. If you bought a car, then hired your neighbor to go pick it up, who then beat the crap out of it on the way to your home, who would be at fault if it squeaked like a cheap mattress? I just wonder how transport charges are determined. Is it by weight, volume or other?
Our National Corvette Museum delivery consisted of a one-on-one nearly 3 HOUR bumper-to-bumper vehicle orientation with an extremely knowledgeable Corvette expert. And a personalized museum tour. Well worth the $995 back in 7-2021. Got a rain check on the factory tour as it was still closed to visitors due to Covid restrictions back then.
What was NOT worth it was the fact that the So. California dealer where we ordered the C8 STILL charged their Dealer Destination fee of nearly $1200 despite the fact that WE delivered the vehicle to the dealer for its first service after the cross country road trip!
Upon complaining to both the dealer and directly to GM all we got was finger pointing by each, who insisted it was the “policy” of the other party responsible for this “non-delivery” delivery charge.
Guess it did even out as the was no dealer mark-up back then. So still worth it.
Article about dealers picking up cars that the assembly plant and the first 2 pictures are of the Trax and the Trailblazer.
Don’t think that anyone is going to go to Korea to pick any of those up
Or mexico for that matter.
If the dealer picks up the car, are they going to flatbed it or drive it?
Customers might not be too happy when their new car has hundreds of miles on it because the dealer was trying to save a few bucks.
flatbed it. the only time they drive is when moving used stock between near dealers..20 miles wont do much on a used vehicle with 70k on it
It won’t be a flatbed. I work for a dealer. They will be driven. You can deal with it or do without. In this market.
used maybe, new, no way in hell. as i said it varies depending on a lot of things how they move them
I can wait.
Flatbed gives you the advantage of netting ~$10,000 in one dealership run.
actually sometimes they will hire a literal flatbed (you are thinking of a car carrier) like a tow truck company to shift stuff around. depending on distance it can be like 100-200$ per vehicle.
best is if you can send an employee to move the car there and return with another from that dealer, much like how rental companies move cars between offices.
it really goes every each way with used, but brand new vehicles are not driven on the roads outside of test drives by customers. be assured.
Our 2013 Camaro SS was in Tulsa, OK & our dealer in Lawton told us while we were doing the paperwork there would be the miles on it to Lawton, & we agreed.
On our 2022 Camaro SS, our dealer worked with another dealer in OKC that had allocation, & when it came in, the OKC dealer sent our car down on a small 3 or 4 car trailer. I just happened to have stopped in to check when they pulled in so I got to watch it get unloaded.
Less factories over the years means further trips to pick up your car. Go to Mexico for your Silverado?
No, Ft. Wayne, Indiana.
Our American Sierra 1500 diesel was built in Mexico with a Malasian built engine. Sheesh.
Where did you see that the diesel engine was made in Malaysia?
The LZ0 and the LM2 are both made in Flint, MI and I don’t think that there is another plant in the world making them.
UAW workers want 46% pay raise and a 4 day work week. Keep in mind they are already paid higher then other American hourly factory workers……When companies are forced to pay higher wages then their competitors it’s not an even plying field.
If you can build a quality product in another country with a competent work force and ship it to the USA for less cost then if you built it here why wouldn’t you.
Us Americans want to get paid well for are work, however we are not willing to pay out of are pockets for American made goods, instead will by the cheaper t-shirt made in a developing country for less money.
We do it to are selfs
Are you kidding me. GM ain’t making T-shirts and the amount of profit they make per vehicle would make your heart skip a beat!! In the early 2000s in Oshawa, the truck plant was pushing out 450 trucks per shift on 3 shifts. The profit per 4×4 was as high as $14,000 depending on options. I can’t even fathom what it is now. Wages are a fraction of overall costs. I’m a GM/CAW pensioner. I haven’t had a raise in 7 years, but inflation is up close to 35%!!!! Time to share the wealth a bit.
No Chis I’m not kidding you, the salary non union workers seem to put the effort in. The union workers will just use any extra money they would receive to buy more weed or other drugs. If you worked in a union factory you know I’m telling the truth. The increase is pay should be merit based not based on unions holding companies hostage. If you are a valuable employee company’s want to keep you! Also if companies aren’t paying enough to get quality workers to do the job you will have to increase the wages to attract the needed workers ….not pay some dope head more money to work less and get high.
That is quite possibly one of the stupidest comments I have ever read on here. Have you ever been in an auto plant? The line keeps moving. You have to install whatever assembly you are assigned to or lose your job. You are part of the machinery. You go at the pace they set the line. If anybody shouldn’t be paid like they are it’s the CEO, designers and accountants that continually work on cutting corners so there is more profit for the company. It’s all about shareholder value today. More money for the shareholder, more money for the CEO. BTW, many of the assemblies in an auto plant aren’t made in the auto plant. Assembly takes place there of often outsourced parts.
without shareholders there is no factory to work in. they sell stock to get money to build the factories
The Koch Brothers don’t have shareholders and they own factories all over the place. Nobody bellyaches when the company makes record profits, and the CEO gets a 40% raise. Then when the workers want a raise its bloody murder. How much did GM raise car prices since Covid? There are studies that indicate our inflation was caused by record corporate profits caused by unwarranted price increases. They will work this out. I just remember when I worked in a related company and come raise time the CEO said we came up short this year so raises would be negligible. Of course, he gave himself a big raise and bought a corporate jet so him and his girlfriend could jet-set around the country.
Here’s my question: Will these dealers then add yet another addendum to the car charging for that picking up from the factory? Will (if that happens) that be on top of the destination charge on the Monroney label?
I’d think this would be something this article would have stated. There’s zero way I’d ever pay nearly double destination for this.
If they do,,,, then that means people will drive down the road to another dealership that isnt. You arent confined to specific dealerships after all.
Maybe GM is trying to move as many as possible before a strike. Will haulers cross picket lines?
Truck drivers didn’t cross picket lines in 1999.
Bingo!
Possible, but could also be they are finally picking up on the fact that customers having to wait months for their vehicle might just end up costing them in the long run. If it wasn’t for my wife being dead set on a Camaro, I’d have tried to talk her into going with a different manufacturer.
Worked at Oshawa truck plant, ordered a new truck in 2006. Dealership was 3 miles away from plant and I had to pay full destination charge! The problem is will GM regulate what the dealer can charge the customer for destination. Dealership gets $1,000 to pick up vehicle and then tacks on another grand for destination. I can see a little double dipping in the near future. Then DOC fees and PDI plus plus plus!!! Yikes.
no double dipping. GM already charges 2k delivery fee. you pay that regardless (unless you bargain it down from the sale price)
you dont pay 2k + whatever gm PAYS the dealer… think a little
If you think the dealerships aren’t gonna run with this and add on a special vehicle delivery charge, you’re dreaming. “Mr. Smith, this is John Doe your car salesman and we can pick your vehicle up directly from the factory and you’ll receive it 1-2 weeks earlier than conventional shipping but there is a nominal fee for this.” Read the corvette post……IT’S ALREADY HAPPENED!!!!
I also worked at Oshawa Truck Plant and once a year they did a dealer drive away where dealers would get a tour of the truck plant then go get there truck to drive back to there dealership. Some years there where a couple hundred dealers show up and we would do PDI on them then dealer would put on dealer plates a off they would go.
I suggested this on this site months ago when it was first reported that there weren’t enough transport trucks available. Maybe Mary does read our comments??
Me too. They listened but not quite….we should be able to go get it! And they can split the charge back to us!
MARY HAS TOO GO.PERIOD.
They’re doing pick ups at more than just those 4 plants. I see 3-vehicle gooseneck trailers coming out of Flint Truck assembly as well. A lot of them. Good to see this happening at Ft Wayne; maybe our truck might get delivered. After the strike. 🤬
Mary ain’t going anywhere. She’s the golden girl of the globalists. Pushing pure EV propaganda instead of going with far more practical hybrids. GM is deeply in bed with the CCP. Can’t trust a word she says.
If the UAW go on strike I and 7 others will never buy a car of truck that UAW built, all I here is I want I want the highest paid factory worker in the country we have had it.
My truck was trapped in Oshawa for all last summer. Ordered it in April, it arrived early September. A 2022. Then 3 months later they were shipping 2024s…thanks GM. But anyway, I would have drove to Ontario to get it months earlier if I could have.
Unfortunately the customer can not simply buy the car at the dealership and then just show up at the factory and “drive it home.”
Yes, they have a special program for Corvette, but that is an extremely small amount of cars that are actually driven away from the CorvetteMuseum. Those Vettes have already gone through the Pre-Delivery Inspection process. A GM technician has to go through the vehicle and do a lot of things to it in order to allow the car to be driven more than 5 miles., which is the way less than the cars are driven from the time they roll off the assembly line to being delivered to the dealership. It also costs $1,500.
GM is not going to pay for a crap ton of technicians to perform these PDIs.
The dealerships will be using the cash to pay for an Auto Transport truck to pick up/deliver these vehicles to their dealerships and have them PDI’d by their technicians.
just wait till all the assy lines move to RTW states and all these illegals are building your vehicle.