Especially so when Buick has mostly foreign market rebrands in their US lineup - Daewoo and Opel being the primary offenders.
Would have been interesting if they let Buick be the international near-luxury brand while letting Oldsmobile be the US brand with Cadillac-lite and Buick-rebranded models.
Excellent points.
Going forward, GM won’t have rebranded Opels for Buicks. IIRC, there’s a two or three year window since the company sold off Opel to PSA. As for me, I think the only new GM car I would contemplate buying if I hit the lottery would be a Corvette. The rest of the lines do nothing for me.
Most likely, Buick will continue to be Cadillac-lite. Great, if you’re into that. A pal some years back bought a Lucerne spec’d out with everything the same line Cadillac had. He ended up paying $15K less, just because of the Buick name on the car.
Business schools should make GM *the* case study on how to destroy a strategy of differentiated brands.