“why does Pontiac need high volume sales?”
For profitability because Pontiac can’t exist any other way. That profitability made things like G8 and Solstice possible;
The G8 GXP’s collective development cost couldn’t be recouped from all the G8 GXP’s they sold. It had to be recouped from the sales of thousand of G3’s, Montana SV6’s, G5’s, and Torrents; cars themselves that had R&D costs to recoup.
If Pontiac sold just G8’s and Solstii, it wouldn’t be profitable because the demand for sports cars are always less than that of garden varrierty cars. Thus, the ROI would be far too slow, the annual balance sheet would turn red, and GM would have to dump more money into the pit to sell cars that the overwelming marjority of the public didn’t want in the first place. GM choose to seal off the pit and never look back.
It has nothing to do with “GM’s mismanagement of Pontiac”. The demand for “sporty cars” simply died, and what remained of Pontiac’s range was merely overlapping with what Chevy sold.
