Posted on 07/23/2009 9:07:28 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
No..........1976
“Penske bought Saturn, and he’s looking for places to manufacture them. He is already in talks with foreigners, and looking at some locations in the South East.”
I got the impression that Penske didn’t want to deal with manufacturing. It sounded like Penske’s focus was the dealer channel and service, customer relations type stuff. It sounded like he just wanted to be the supplier for an as yet undetermined Korean manufacturer to rebrand as Saturn.
Is the NUMMI plant in Pelosi’s congressional district?
If so, expect it to get some SERIOUS consideration, just like that parts depot in Bwarney Fwank’s town.
That plant is gone, and new buildings are already being built for the airport.
I’ve had experience working with the Penske team on a joint Penske-Yamaha deal, although in a limited way, and I can tell you, they define “top notch”.
They are so well organized and “pre-thought”, each and every member has a sole task to accomplish. They come in, accomplish their task, and you don’t even see them leave, they’re like Ninja’s in business attire!
Team Penske could teach 6 Sigma a few things.
If Penske wanted to go in there, it would truly a victory for free market enterprise, and not unions, Government, or GM.
Yeah, there is - California does not have a Right To Work law and is a closed-shop state. Surprise!
Nothng is set in stone, and he’s looking for several locations for different assemblies.
You underestimate the California bureaucracy and legislature. He won’t win.
More likely he won’t try. There are plenty of plants elsewhere he can buy or rent.
My next door neighbors in Simi Valley both worked for GM in Van Nuys at the Firebird plant; he quit to start a home construction business, went bankrupt during the height of the Carter malaise and thet north to work in the new plant there in Fremont.
They probably built the Geo Prism my daughter owned for years, it’s still going strong with 300,000 miles on it after selling it to an in-law.
Lost track of my neighbors over these years but they are close to retirement service, certainly.
I think you’re confusing a new business with an existing business, or union work agreement? That doesn’t make unions mandatory. If a new business goes in, the union will have to organize a new effort.
Penske has operations in Cali, large ones, and none of them are union that I know of. Have you ever been underground at Longo?
“You underestimate the California bureaucracy and legislature. He won’t win.
More likely he won’t try. There are plenty of plants elsewhere he can buy or rent.”
No, I don’t underestimate them, at all. The point is as you said, there are plenty of plants elsehwere. If he decided to try, and saw he couldn’t have his way, he would’nt hesitate to seek one.
What’s his name, might know him.
Anyway, meetings done. No more news from internal NUMMI folks, except we have committed orders through the end of August. No concrete decisions have been made.
I expect we’ll hear lots of up and down until then.
I wonder if this means the end of the Pontiac Vibe, too? Well, I guess Pontiac is going away anyway, but they could have turned it into a Chevy. By many accounts it was one of GM’s best cars, and possibly a better, more interesting car than the Toyota Matrix. Although - I had a Matrix XRi (or something like that) rental a few years back on a trip to Whistler and didn’t much care for it - funny driving position, buzzy engine, felt unstable.
I have a picture somewhere that I had published in 1969, I think, taken at Sonoma in California on the Trans-Am circuit.
It was interesting, Mark Donohue, the late driver is there in the shot along with a couple of mechanics and Penske is examining a sparkplug just pulled after a run.
He’s peering at it through a loupe with an obvious scrutiny that spoke volumes about his attention to detail that allowed his team to win in both Camaros and later, in AMC Javelins.
Rich McNeil.
Sonoma and Grand Am (and Lagna Seca) brings back amazing memories of life in Cali. when it was still a paradise.
I’m dyin’ here...LOL
No its in Fortney “Pete” Stark’s district. Pelosi’s district is the City and County of SF.
The Vibe is already canceled the last one is scheduled to roll off the line at the end of August.
Doesn’t ring a bell, hopefully he’s already retired...
Amen, Brother Republic. President Bush didn’t walk on water, but I would have voted for him before McCain or Obama. I have little doubt that whether he was right or wrong, it was from the heart.
I lived at the intersection of Del Ray Oaks, Seaside and Monterey at the time, worked at the U.S. Navy Postgraduate School and my wife was a secretary at Fort Ord.
Ah yes, lovely; I could’ve bought a Shelby 500, 427 side-oiler Blue/white stripes in Los Gatos for $3,000 — wife said no, ended up with BMW 1600.
Went back east for three years; went back to Simi Valley, went back east for four years; went back to Canoga Park; earthquake kicked us out in 1994, ended up here in Nashville (?); can’t go back, it’s all gone.
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