"They avoided the typical 'big business' reflex of censoring, denying and spinning, and for that they get extra points."

They weren't spinning with that comment? That whole comment you excerpted was spin.

They certainly praise their products way too much, but what are they gonna do?

By not spinning, I meant that they didn't do the usual: "We were victims of eco-terrorism/a small group of extremists/hackers, etc"

At least they recognize that some people don't like SUVs and they don't censor entries except the vulgar ones, they host and pay for the bandwidth of anti-GM ads, some of them mentioning cars from other companies, and that's a pretty bold move considering how they and others handled things in the past, IMHO.

No car as small as the Aveo should only get 34mpg. GM is laying down on the job of fuel economy.

And E85? That's a token effort. It shifts the responsibility to the consumer to do the right thing. If I buy a Chevy, there's NOWHERE for me to get E85 in all of PA, let alone nearby.

"No car as small as the Aveo should only get 34mpg. GM is laying down on the job of fuel economy."

Yeah, that's pretty bad, especially considering it's the highway figure.

The problem probably is that the Aveo was designed by Daewoo and they simply don't have the engine technology to compete with small cars by companies like Honda or Toyota.

I almost feel like they created this contest knowing it would create controversy. Then, they could come out with this response, knowing full well it would get free publicity...

Here Here Kaz!
You beat me to it.
This smacks of premeditated marketing like crazy.
Think about it - they admit anticipating the response from the green sector, let it run its course and then leverage the opportunity to make treehuggers look like ignorant alarmists (while concurrently dropping a nice ad for the Aveo). Offering up solutions to our concerns such as "Fuel Management" technology doesn't even come close to addressing the underlying issues. Sadly, if the automotive press decides to run their blog statement, undoubtedly there will be many poorly informed people that come to believe GM is actually making real progress on the green front and that SUV's perhaps aren't such a bad idea - as long as they've got Fuel Management Technology that shuts off 4 of the oh-so-necessary 8 cylinders...
Some GM marketing exec out there with an understanding of the blogosphere ought to be ashamed, they're using their knowledge to further wrongdoing and destruction.

SUVs are still far more dangerous to occupants of cars they strike, pedestrians and cyclists - but apparently this doesn't come under GM's definition of "responsibility".

Funny thing is the way the MSM responded we certainly were not seem like 'ignorant alarmists' -- green is hitting the mainstream.

It's spin.

If they are telling the truth about the majority of ads being 'pro - SUV' -- they should host all of them and let an independant media group audit the claim.

"overwhelming majority of the 22,000 submissions thus far have been earnest attempts at creating positive advertisements."

"If they are telling the truth about the majority of ads being 'pro - SUV' -- they should host all of them and let an independant media group audit the claim."

1: They didn't say "pro SUV" they said earnest attempts at positive advertisements. While that means that the ad's are against SUV's it doesn't mean they are pro SUV. One ad could be about the benefits of transporting a large group of people in one larger vehicle instead of 2 smaller ones, of which there are MANY. Not advocating suv use in unreasonable places but advocating its uses where applicable.

2: If you think that most of the ad's are not positive towards suv's I'd be willing to bet a significant amount of money you don't get out of your social circle very often. The green movement is growing but there are still very few people that connect sustainability to their life styles.

GM is going to get considerably more attention from these anti-SUV ads than they would if they only played the pro-SUV ads.

As the old adage goes "negative attention is better than none at all".

GM is reality-based. There are many factors which cause growth to slow if adoption of new technology lowers margins. Their company succeeds or fails based on shareholder value. Once the market dictates cars with 180 MPG fuel efficiency, they'd be fools to continue selling cars with drastically lower efficiency and their shareholders would dump them.

A flex fuel Tahoe will use less gassoline than a Prius.

You just need a lot more E85 pumps and a more efficient way of producing ethanol to make it practicle and financialy sound.

"GM is reality-based."

LOL!!

March 24, 2005

Executives said yesterday that GM was taking a number of steps to right itself.

They said that the company is reallocating engineering resources to rush the next generation of large sport utility vehicles, like the Chevrolet Suburban and the Cadillac Escalade, into production by the end of the year.

GM also is planning to hasten introduction of its new large pickup truck models and midsize sport utility vehicles like the Chevrolet Trailblazer and abandoning some planned small and midsize sporty cars.

"When you hit a rough spot, you have to decide where the real priorities are," said Robert A. Lutz, GM's vice chairman, adding that the SUVs were "where the company makes, frankly, high margins."

Lutz dismissed concerns that volatile gas prices would mean that large SUVs might not be the savior they have been in the past.

"Everybody thinks high gas prices hurt sport utility sales. In fact they don't," he said, adding that buyers of big SUVs like the Suburban, GMC Denali and Cadillac Escalade were well-off enough to be insulated from rising gas prices.

"Rich people don't care," he said.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20050324/news_1b24gm.html

cf.

DETROIT, Oct. 3 - The heyday of the giant sport utility vehicle keeps moving farther away as gasoline prices loom larger.

In September, industrywide sales of large S.U.V.'s were down 43 percent from a year earlier, according to Ward's AutoInfoBank. That is particularly bad news for General Motors and the Ford Motor Company, which are dependent on truck-based S.U.V.'s.

Last month, G.M.'s overall sales fell 24.2 percent and Ford's declined 20.3 percent, compared with the same month a year earlier.

In contrast, Japanese carmakers reported increases last month, propelled by passenger cars and smaller S.U.V.'s known as crossover vehicles. Toyota's sales rose 10.3 percent, Honda's increased 11.7 percent and Nissan's, 16.4 percent....

For the moment, though, big S.U.V.'s are bearing the brunt of consumer discontent. While sales have been diminishing all year long, September was particularly ugly.

At Ford, sales of the Explorer, Expedition and Lincoln Navigator fell more than 50 percent compared with the same month a year earlier. The company also built its last Excursion in the month, ending production of its largest S.U.V.

At G.M., sales of the Chevrolet Suburban and Tahoe fell more than 50 percent, while the GMC Yukon was down 46 percent and the Cadillac Escalade fell nearly 23 percent, with the supersize Escalade ESV falling 40 percent. Sales of the Hummer H2, made by G.M., fell 32 percent.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/04/automobiles/04auto.html