Posted on 10/26/2008 6:12:06 AM PDT by jalisco555
BERLIN (AFP) – German carmaker Daimler, hit by falling demand amid the global financial crisis, plans to suspend production for a month beginning in December, a newspaper said in report due to appear Sunday. The break in production would begin on December 11 and last until January 12, Frankfurter Sonntagszeitung reported, citing a company spokesman.
Daimler, the first luxury car maker to present its quarterly results, unveiled big falls in profits on Thursday and issued a new profit warning owing to the global banking crisis.
"The financial crisis is turning into an economic crisis," Daimler chairman Dieter Zetsche told a telephone news conference. It provoked "in recent weeks a dramatic slump on our major markets," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
As for ride quality, I hate to say this (since I am on my second Benz), but I think BMWs are better. My girlfriend/fiance has one, and I have to say that the inside is better, and the outside looks more 'aggressive' if you know what I mean. If you compare class by class, the new 3 looks better than the new C (although the new C is such a major improvement over the older generations), the 5 looks better than the E, and the SUVs are better than the Benz analogues. The only place where Benz has an outright winner is when it comes to the S-Class (still better than even the new 7-series), as well as the sportier versions (e.g. the SL is just plain better than the M6). Also, anything from AMG or Brabus will win against anything from M or AC Snitcher.
However, for the lower range that I am currently in, I have to (very reluctantly) say that a Bimmer 3 and 5 is better than a Benz C or E.
“I have visited the Honda plant in Marysville (I think the motorcycles are built in Liberty or West Liberty, which is nearby)”
Honda recently decided to end motorcycle production in the United States, and consolidate the motorcycle-building part of its business back to Japan.
The former Honda motorcycle production facilities either were, or will be, converted to auto production.
- John
Thanks for the information. I was unaware of that. Have a great day.
Honda already announced over the summer that they will be moving all their motorcycle production back to Japan.
This could make them move the rest there, too.
I went to lunch in a customer’s 5 series BMW that he and his wife had picked up at the factory on a Euro delivery program with Lufthansa Airlines. It was a five or six speed manual with a map screen in the dash. Insert a compact disc for whatever continent you wanted. Very cool.
I ordered an air rifle from Feinwerkbau a while back.
They shut down their factory for a full month every year.
But then that was for Oktoberfest! ;^)
Thanks for the correction!
Several years ago I did a business case study of BWM vs. Mercedes. What you said was basically what we found out 20 years ago. More recently, both companies have had some problems in the US market due to what we expect our cars to be. In Germany, a car is a driving machine and everything is geared towards optimizing the enjoyment of driving at high speed. In the US, we want luxury too. So we demand cup holders, etc. On a humid day, cup holders with cold liquid have caused condensation INSIDE the the cup holders that were placed over critical electronic devices. Naturally, a lot of components shorted out.
It is important to know your market.
I didn’t see anything in the article, but any word if this will extend to their NAFTA Heavy-Duty truck production also?
There's a third reason. Ford brought in talented management that has a clear idea of what the problems are and how to solve them. Whether it's too late for them given the damage already done is unclear, but Ford has the best chance of the formerly Big 3 to survive. Personally I think both GM and Chrysler are doomed.
Don't know but I suspect yes. I agree the article was a bit vague.
Honda is actually moving all motorcycle production back to Japan. They said it had nothing to do with the local work force as almost all of the motorcycle production employees will be moved to their automotive units. The move is because of space limitations in the existing facility (capacity for 75,000 units per year) along with an immense new facility being built in Kumamoto, Japan with a capacity for 600,000 UPY. It just makes fiscal sense for Honda to consolidate production in the newer facility.
GM has eight brands and Chrysler has three. Put them together and you have a company that should reduce itself to two.
Right to work laws make sense. It is either that, or jobs go oversees and NOBODY in the US has a right to work.
A merger between GM and Chrysler is insane. GM is way too big as it is. It only makes sense in the context of getting a bigger government bailout, and I'm absolutely against any bailout of these companies.
Get rid of everything except Chevy and Cadillac at GM. Keep Jeep from Chrysler and that’s it.
This can only happen in the context of Chapter 11. Something GM should have declared in 2005, when they still had some time and some cash. Now I fear it’s too late even for this.
I have a solution for the GM and Chrysler problem.
Cerberus wants to exit the auto business. GM is running out of cash. That’s why they want this deal.
What do with the product lineup? The only thing worth retaining from Chrysler is the Jeep and van lines. The truck line is going to be rebadged Nissans anyway. GM needs to get rid of everything except for the Chevrolet and Cadillac lines.
The U.S. government has a huge auto fleet. Buy up all the excess inventory at 25 cents on the dollar. Title the vehicles as government only; not to be resold to the general public. (They could never enter the general auto market.) Scrap the old fleet and send them to the recycle centers to be broken down and resold on the scrap metal market.
GM won’t lend money any longer. Ford will and has told their dealers they will go all the way to 600 on the credit ratings.
This saves GM. Chrysler goes away which it should anyway. Ford has an existing lineup of vehicles worth saving and enough cash and management know how to make it through with more products in the pipeline.
Two domestic auto manufacturers can make it assuming the unions come to their senses. The next contract on the table is a “take it or leave it “ proposition. They leave it then shutter the plant and let the inventory dry up which will drive up demand. Ford can do the same. I believe the union will capitulate. In 1948 the railroad unions tried to break the U.S. economy. Truman issued an executive order he would draft the employees into the military. The union caved. Time to play hard ball. The old gravy train just ran off the tracks.
I have read all these car threads and no one has mentioned a big factor.
There is an element that wants to end autos... period.
With a government bailout, the greens will be in position to dictate exactly what kind of cars are produced.
Who needs cars? We should all use mass transit, right? After all if it works for Manhattan and DC it should work for Montana and Wyoming.
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