Goodbye Chevrolet Kodiak
After years of looking for a buyer, General Motors is scaling back its medium-duty truck line, and the company will not produce the Chevy Kodiak or the GMC Topkick anymore after next month.
General motors last month announced that it would discontinue franchise agreements with 789 dealerships, and with fewer places to sell its products, it appears GM must scale back its product lines.
Shrinking company, shrinking cars
Last week, GM announced that it would sell the Hummer brand, yet another sign that GM is scaling back on production of large vehicles. GM has already exhausted the number of unsecured loans it can take out, so it has moved on to new ways of saving money.
Consumers are increasingly turning to hybrids and more fuel-efficient cars. Of course, that means sales of large vehicles like the Chevy Kodiak and the GMC Topkick have slowed.
A word from General Motors
GM did issue a statement regarding its decision to stop producing the Chevrolet Kodiak and GMC Topkick. However, the fact that they’d stop making them was pretty much all they gave us. Here’s the statement from GM in its entirety:
GM Statement Regarding Wind Down Of Medium Duty Truck Production
After four years of working with multiple potential buyers, General Motors has decided to wind-down its medium-duty truck operations. Production of the Chevy Kodiak and GMC Topkick medium duty trucks will cease by July 31, 2009.
What happened with Navistar?
Some avid followers of Gm news and truck news might remember that in 2007, GM announced that it would sell its medium-duty truck line, including the Chevy Kodiak and GMC Topkick to Navistar International Corporation.
However, the companies report that the “memo of understanding” between the two “expired and was not renewed,” according to examinter.com. According to Wikipedia, Navistar:
is a manufacturer of International brand commercial trucks, MaxxForce brand diesel engines, IC Corporation brand school buses, Workhorse brand chassis for motor homes and step vans, and is a private label designer and manufacturer of diesel engines for the pickup truck, van and SUV markets.
Kodiak and Topkick history
The Chevrolet Kodiak and the GMC Topkick were both introduced to the GM line in 1980, according to Wikipedia.
The Chevy Kodiak and GMC Topkick are produced at Flint Assembly in Flint, Mich. Other trucks, including the GMC Sierra and Chevrolet Silverado are also produced there, and those vehicles will remain in production.
Other GM news
As GM puts an end to production on the Chevrolet Kodiak and the GM Topkick, the company looks toward the future at its new battery lab in Warren, Mich., reports the Detroit Free Press.
The new battery production facility “will expand the automaker’s research and development capabilities for the electric-powered vehicles of the future,” according to the Free Press.
Keeping up with the times
The Detroit Free Press reports:
The new lab, located in the Warren Technical Center, takes up 33,000 square feet and is four times larger than the automaker’s previous battery facility.
The company says more than 1,000 engineers working on advance batteries and electric-driven vehicles will use the lab.
While parts of the lab came online last January, it became fully functional in May, the company said. It is equipped with 160 test channels and 42 thermal chambers that can replicate extreme real-world temperatures.
“We must respond to the demands of society and the demands of consumers with the right level of technology and with technology that can actually get us to the future we all aspire for,” Fritz Henderson, GM president and CEO, said. “This facility is intended to do just that by advancing GM’s knowledge and capabilities and testing skills in new battery technology.”
The C-Series medium trucks were probably 99% work trucks (e.g., U-Haul moving vans). The TopKick Pickup Conversion I wanted probably accounted for high hundreds or low thousands of sales a year. Honestly, how often do you see one? This is another sad day for GM.
First off, we are still in a recession. People are looking for ways to save money, not spend it. Secondly, have you not noticed the slight spike in gas prices? If you haven’t then be aware that it is slowly climbing back up and will probably continue to do so until it gets out of hand. Everyone knows that trucks and larger vehicles in general consume a lot of gas. Who really wants to be stuck with a gas guzzler?
I don’t see how these vehicles could be called “medium.” They aren’t medium, unless of course these things are being compared side by side to a tractor trailer, or an aircraft carrier. It is kind of unfortunate, but you aren’t going to be able to sell a lot of those things to public consumers as daily drivers, but fleet sales are definitely going to suffer. GM is going to be reduced probably far more in scope than a lot of us thought they were going to be. Which is of course unfortunate, because if GM reduces further than they already have started to, it’s going to take forever for them to pay back the American people and the enormous loans that we’ve made to the company. Same thing with AIG, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.