Automakers: Page 412

TOYOTA DEALERS TO USE NEW SYSTEM

Toyota Motor Sales is assembling what it expects to be the largest virtual network in the automotive industry Dealer Daily. Once this new system is installed and operating in most Toyota and Lexus dealerships, the manufacturer expects to use it for the bulk of its dealer communications, which will eliminate reams of paper and, as the system develops, save time and money. Dealer Daily will replace

By Tim Keenan • March 1, 2001

FAMILY WAY KEEPS FORD STORE FLYING

It's all in the family at Tom Holzer Ford, a repeat Ward's Dealer Business Top 500 dealer in one of the most top-heavy Ford-dealered markets metro Detroit. One would expect to find mom, pop and the kids dealerships in far smaller regions than the Motor City and its environs. Holzer Ford, northwest of Detroit, serves the cities of Farmington Hills, Farmington and Novi in one of the state's fastest-growing

By Maynard M. Gordon • March 1, 2001

Explore the Trendline➔

Artificial Intelligence

Automakers and dealers alike are increasingly seeing the use case for AI within their operations. Explore some use cases in this trendline.

By WardsAuto staff

Corolla is a Rightful Car of the Century Nominee

TOYOTA CITY When the Car of the Century winners were announced last year, a conspicuous loser was the Toyota Corolla, the Japanese auto industry's all-time top seller, and specifically the 1993 version, judged by some the best compact ever built. The project manager, Akihiko Saito, still beams when he reminisces about the car. Now 60 and head of product planning, Mr. Saito, son of former Toyota chairman

By Roger Schreffler • March 1, 2001

U.S. Fans Rally Around Impreza WRX Turbo

SAVANNAH, GA Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd.'s Subaru automotive unit has been tempting U.S. sports-sedan fanatics for years with the possibility of bringing the Impreza WRX Turbo to this side of the ocean. It has generated such a faithful fan base largely because of the vehicle's performance on the World Rally Circuit. Rally racing joining soccer as a sport Europeans revere and Americans ignore involves

By KATHERINE ZACHARY • March 1, 2001

New NADA chief offers advice to Big 3

New NADA Chairman Robert J. Maguire urges GM to stop blaming dealers for corporate miscues, prods DaimlerChrysler to meet more often with NADA leaders and scolds Ford for its controversial Blue Oval program. He says in his inaugural speech that factory/dealer relations are a major concern, which has seen significant improvement in the past year. The NADA leadership meets 3-4 times a year with top

March 1, 2001

DaimlerChrysler Restructuring Plan Highlights:

Suppliers to cut costs 15% over two years. Workforce cut 20%, or 26,000 jobs, over three years. Included are 6,800 salaried jobs, of which 1,800 are on contract; manufacturing will lose 19,000 workers in a 15% reduction in capacity. Plants to close include Mound Road, Detroit, engine plant (1,000 workers) in December 2002, its work shifted to the two Mack Engine plants in Detroit; Mexico's Toluca

By Compiled by Alisa Priddle • March 1, 2001

Global Automakers Aggressively Consolidating Platforms

The concept of sharing platforms among different automakers isn't new, but the flurry of automotive mergers, acquisitions and alliances over the past several years now is starting to produce definite plans. Just last month Renault SA and Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. announced they have started co-development of the C-platform, part of the companies' planned platform-sharing project. Renault and Nissan, which

By KATHERINE ZACHARY and ANDREA WIELGAT • March 1, 2001

Kentucky dealer’s Goodwrench Service Center goes after service customers who left the flock

Dealer Tom Gill believes in tracking data. In doing so, he learned one part of his store's operation was way off track. If you track it, you can manage it; otherwise you're dealing with perceptions, not facts, and then it's just a guess, really, says the owner of Tom Gill Chevrolet in Florence, KY. Data told him his dealership failed to keep many service department customers long term. Because I track

By Steve Finlay • March 1, 2001

Campaign Marks Ford Racing Centennial

All eyes will be on the Antiques Roadshow in coming months. That's because Ford Motor Co. is on the lookout for a lost heirloom that signifies its storied racing heritage. In 1901, desperate to advance his fortunes as a car builder, 38-year-old Henry Ford challenged the day's pre-eminent racer. In the first and only race of his life, Mr. Ford drove his two-cyl., 26-hp car christened to victory over

March 1, 2001

Bridgestone/Firestone Keeps Rolling with New Tire Tech

PHOENIX In the computing world there's Pentium, Pentium II and Pentium III. In the tire world there's UNI-T, UNI-T/AQ and UNI-T/AQ II. And although tire engineers don't move as quickly as their counterparts in the computer industry, tire technology advances just as inexorably. Consumer and automaker demand for tires that ride better, last longer, perform better as they wear and provide more grip on

By Tim Keenan • March 1, 2001

Leaf Relief

DETROIT If there's one thing this industry reveres, it's a cheap and effective design. How else to describe the rear suspension of every pickup truck and most truck-derived sport/utility vehicles (SUVs) currently sold? Solid rear axles and leaf-spring suspensions have been around since Daimler met Benz, and that fact is what helps trucks and SUVs to be such huge profit centers: They use century-old

By Bill Visnic • March 1, 2001

Suburban Collection opens Honda and Acura points in Michigan

The Troy, MI-based Suburban Collection, owned by David T. Fischer, opened two new stores Suburban Honda and Suburban Acura in Farmington Hills. The facilities are built on a nine-acre parcel close to several major highways and expressways in suburban Detroit. The project cost $9 million. The Suburban Collection now encompasses 15 dealerships selling 16 domestic and import brands.

March 1, 2001

Youth club honors Beau Boeckmann

The Boys & Girls Club of San Fernando Valley, CA, presented their Community Hands Award to Galpin Ford Vice President Beau Boeckmann, son of Galpin's owner Bert Boeckmann.. We salute Beau for his long-time commitment, not just to our club programs, but for his total involvement in working for the betterment of our youth, says Leroy Chase, Jr., president of the Boys & Girls Club.

March 1, 2001

Sharpen those pencils!

Is an Oldsmobile franchise worth less for multi-franchise dealers than for the country's 63 exclusive Olds dealers? Yes, says General Motors Corp. which is phasing out the brand. GM's transition financial assistance package (TFAP) sets a sliding scale of $1,500 to $2,900 per vehicle unit for determining amounts payable to Olds dealers. The largest amount which was initially $2,400 per vehicle before

March 1, 2001

Putting a New Spin on DaimlerChrysler Corp.

What will a profitable DaimlerChrysler Corp. look like two years from now? Will it still be an integral part of DaimlerChrysler AG? Will its products retain styling edge and regain segment domination? Will the historic merger be deemed successful? The architects of the megadeal and their successors insist the economic reasons that prompted the merger continue to hold true. But talk of spinning off

By Alisa Priddle • March 1, 2001

Ram-bunctious!

DETROIT The grille is unmistakably Dodge. The hope is loyal Ram fullsize pickup buyers will remain equally true. The '02 DaimlerChrysler Corp. Dodge light-duty Ram headed for production in July and to U.S. dealerships in the fall headlined this month at the Chicago Auto Show (see p.84). The new and restyled beast boasts a pair of new-to-Ram engines, an even higher hood, and a larger cab in a concentrated

By Alisa Priddle • March 1, 2001

Dale Earnhardt worked hard as a dealer

When the black No. 3 Goodwrench Chevrolet Monte Carlo crashed into a concrete wall at the Daytona 500, the dealer community also lost one of its own. Dale Earnhardt, 49, who died in that crash, made the most of his NASCAR earnings by investing in many businesses, not the least of which was Dale Earnhardt Chevrolet in Mooresville, NC. In a 1998 interview with Ward's Dealer Business, Mr. Earnhardt showed

By Tim Keenan • March 1, 2001

Hyundai XG300: Dare to Reach

MONTEREY, CA Hyundai Motor Co. Ltd. leads the charge in the Korean automakers' climb up-market with its new-for-North America '01 XG300 sedan. The XG300 imparts a look and feel more tailored to the Korean domestic market than for export unfortunate, since the car is Hyundai's first export foray into the luxury market. The reach and Hyundai officials acknowledge that it indeed is a reach is a timid

By KATHERINE ZACHARY • March 1, 2001

Searching for Style

Style. U.S. automakers had it to spare in the ’40s, ’50s and ’60s. Then they lost it. Now they want it back. Bad. Along with every other car company. It has little to do with a new aesthetic sense growing at automakers worldwide, although that indeed is a trend. Rather it is a dollars and cents issue. Suddenly styling – not just sound design – is separating winners from losers in the marketplace.

By Drew Winter • Feb. 16, 2001

European Ecoplants

Green concerns driving new assembly plant design Small footprints are ecological bragging points of two new European assembly plants now in the pilot-production phase. Volkswagen AG's plant for its new W12 "D" luxury car is in the middle of downtown Dresden, Germany. It rises three stories into the air to remain compact. Toyota Motor Corp. built its Yaris plant in the middle of huge acreage in an

By William Diem • Feb. 1, 2001

2001 NAIAS

Automakers try `rational exuberance' to stare down a likely U.S. dropoffDETROIT - What the organizers of last month's North American International Auto Show (NAIAS) in Detroit really needed, amongst all the usual glittery and expensive vehicle-touting displays, was a mock graveyard.That way all the automakers could've whistled as they passed by.That was the overwhelming feeling at NAIAS: that although

By Bill Visnic • Feb. 1, 2001

UAG BUYS METRO DETROIT DEALERSHIPS;SONIC BULLISH ON FORD, NOT CHRYSLER

UnitedAuto Group joined the dealership buying wave in a market hitherto scorned by most consolidators - metro Detroit.UAG purchased two GM dealerships owned by Kevin Rinke - Rinke Cadillac and Rinke Pontiac-GMC, Warren, MI. UAG also purchased dealer Mel Farr's Toyota-Mazda-Volkswagen store in Bloomfield Hills, MI.In other consolidator news, AutoNation Inc. obtained a Toyota franchise for its former

By WARD'S DEALER BUSINESS STAFF • Feb. 1, 2001

ANOTHER DETROIT LINCOLN MERCURY STORE BITES THE DUST

A second LincolnMercury point folded in the Detroit market.In Farmington, MI, Jack Demmer LincolnMercury closed three years after it was purchased from Robert Dusseau.Owner William Demmer says the franchise would be consolidated with that of Krug LM in Dearborn, another Detroit suburb. Mr. Demmer, who also has a Ford dealership in Wayne, MI, is president of the Detroit Auto Dealers Association.Mr.

By WARD'S DEALER BUSINESS STAFF • Feb. 1, 2001

AUTONATION’S CEO REPORTEDLY SAID `NEIN’ TO CHRYSLER OFFER

AutoNation Inc. CEO Michael J. Jackson reportedly was sounded out by his old boss at DaimlerChrysler to fill the suddenly vacant top spot at DC's Chrysler Group.A highly placed source in DC management and several DC dealers say that before assigning the Chrysler presidency to long-time Mercedes-Benz executive Dieter Zetsche, DC Chairman and CEO Juergen E. Schrempp offered the job to Mr. Jackson.The

By WARD'S DEALER BUSINESS STAFF • Feb. 1, 2001

DCC LOOKS FOR SALES BOOST FROM ITS ALL-NEW JEEP LIBERTY

DaimlerChrysler Corp. is looking to sell 200,000 new Jeep Liberty sport/utility vehicles (SUVs) annually, about 40% more than sales for the outgoing Cherokee it replaces.The all-new '02 model small SUV was unveiled at the Detroit Auto Show. The Liberty goes on sale in the spring. Prices have not been announced but are expected to start at $18,000 and top out at $25,000 when equipped with a V-6 and

By WARD'S DEALER BUSINESS STAFF • Feb. 1, 2001