GM risks alienating its best customers
As yesterday’s column mentions, bailout backlash is one risk that General Motors faces. Some of its most loyal customers, the buy-America crowd, may be so angry about the government bailout that they’ll shop for a Ford or perhaps even a foreign brand. Autoblog reports today that some right-wingers are, indeed, trying to organize a boycott of GM, and a Rasmussen Reports poll indicates that they may find a receptive audience.
Rasmussen says 26 percent of survey respondents approve of the GM bailout, but 53 percent think it’s a bad idea and 17 percent would support a boycott. Here’s another poll finding that won’t help Government Motors:
However, 51% of adults are more likely to buy a car from Ford because it did not any take bailout funding. Just 12% are less likely to buy from Ford.
Of course, it’s one thing to express your frustration when a pollster calls on the phone. It’s much harder, if you’re a lifelong Chevy driver, to go out and buy something with a blue oval on front. And, as Autoblog points out, past auto-boycott efforts have come to naught. Clearly, though, the new GM has some big marketing challenges ahead.
(3 votes, average: 5 out of 5)
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David Nicklaus has covered St. Louis business for more than 25 years. His column appears three days a week on the Post-Dispatch business page. 
Why would you boycott the car company you like because the government saved it? For spite?
Not buying a Chevy is like not buying a Budweiser because the company changed onership. It’s a backlash that is directed at the wrong perpetrator.
I was a loyal Pontiac buyer, my problems with this brand were few and far between.
Honestly, my next car will probably be a Nissan or a Toyota.
Why boycott GM? Easy — because it’s now Government Motors, run by the Obama administration and the UAW.
We now have a president who wants to nationalize the nation’s businesses and end capitalism as he rewards unions and others who helped elect him. There’s no reason to support this sort of political sweetheart deal, and I’ll buy a Toyota or Ford before I set foot in a GM or Chrysler dealership (that is, unless the Supreme Court puts the brakes on the imperial presidency).
My family has always been GM people. I learned to drive (and “my night moves”) in a ‘60 Chevy; then learned to drive a stick in a ‘49. My first new car was a ‘71 Cutlass. Since then I’ve bought a Vega, a Bonneville, a Firebird, an Astro van, and three successive GMC Safaris vans. All in all, nearly million miles behind the wheel of a GM product.
Along the way, I’ve also owned a few other brands: an MG Midget (can you *say* that brand any more?), a K-Car and a Sebring, a VW Camper, and — catastrophically — a Ford Trellis (stet). But, I always seemed to come back to GM.
But I will *NEVER* buy a Guv’ment Motors product. Nor can I in good concience buy one from Chrysler, a company given by Obama fiat to his EU and UAW backers. And Ford shafted me so royally on that damned Trellis that I will rarely even ride in one of their products.
Thus my current plan is — sorta like the Cuban people had to do post-Castro — to keep my pre-bama Safari running indefinitely.
Or at least until this regime’s EPA officially declares driving to be a crime against humanity, and starts rationing gas for any but the most essential (i.e, Government and DNC) business.
Then, I’ll just have to live in my van down by the river, spending my days swilling BelgWiser, and feeding off the government teat.
Why would the bailout keep me from buying GM? If they have the car I want, I will purchase,just as I have many times.
what a dumb idea.
I was a diehard Pontiac driver; my reasons for my future boycott have less to do with the bailout and more to do with the fact that they’re killing the brand I know and love.
THERES A BRILLIANT IDEA, LETS NOT BUY AMERICAN CARS AND TRUCKS TO PROVE A POINT. BY THE WAY WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO PROVE? THAT FOREIGNERS NEED THE JOBS MORE, OR MAYBE YOU SEE THEIR HUNGRY KIDS ON COMMERCIALS BEGGING FOR FOOD AND IT MAKES YOU THINK THEY ARE MORE IMPORTANT THAN OUR OWN CHILDREN.
SO I GUESS ALL OF YOU THAT WANT BUY IMPORTS HAVE FIGURED IT OUT, JUST SHOW THEM HOW TOUGH YOU REALLY ARE “BUY AN IMPORT STARVE MORE AMERICANS” THAT SHOULD FIX THE ISSUE. WHY NOT BAN THE IMPORTS AND BUY WHAT WE MAKE AT HOME
SO MAYBE OUR CHILDREN HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY AT A BETTER FUTURE THAT WAS NOT TAKEN BY SPITE OF SOMEONE WHO HAS NEVER HAD TO EARN THEIR WAY. IF PEOPLE STOP BUYING FROM GM THEN THEY CAN NEVER RECOVER THE LOSS, AND THE GOVERNMENT SHOULD HELP FIX THEIR MESS. THE GOVERNMENT CREATED THIS ENTIRE MESS OF AN ECONOMY, THANKS GEORGE. BUT ANYHOW I STILL BELIEVE IN THE BUMPER STICKER I READ ON MY DADS ELCAMINO WHEN I WAS A LITTLE KID”
BUY AMERICAN EAT YOU IMPORTS” UAW LOCAL 2250 RAISED ME
When I was a kid growing up in the 1950s, I saw maybe one VW running around South St Louis. Today, imports are as common as, well, foreign-made TV sets. All those loyal Ford, Chevy, Plymouth, Pontiac, Rambler, DeSoto, Studebaker etc, etc buyers switched loyalties to off-shore brands somewhere along the way. I think people will buy whatever vehicle they think gives them the best value. Besides, we’ve got Chevys built in Canada and Korea, Fords built in Mexico, and Chrysler is no longer Chrysler. What’s there to be loyal to, the government bailout? It’s made of Chinese yuan! Oh, what a feeling!