California Inventory levels are killing Volt sales

We need someone like you for Volt/Ampera sales in the UK. I don't think they've hit 500 combined sales in the last year! But it's not surprising. The car costs £35,000 - £5,000 government grant but Vauxhall advertise the car at £35,000. It's almost like they're trying to put off purchasers. £35,000 can buy you a nicely speced BMW or similar.

Then there's the second hand costs which are either more than new or equal to new! Why pay £30,000 for a 10,000 mile example when you can get new for that. OK I could understand that if there was a demand, but with just over 350 sales for the Ampera (50 Volts sold) in 12 months, that can't be the reason.

So it's a nice car that just sounds like it wants to be killed off, at least here in the UK. Bizarre really as petrol is over $8 a US gallon.

Combined stats (4 models) VAUXHALL AMPERA - How Many Left?

CHEVROLET VOLT E-REV1 CVT - How Many Left?

 

How about - "Its' an election year"? Tout all you want on the Prius vs C-Max, vs Volt. The Volt has been, is, and will be driven by the force large than its' EV mode - politics. The buying of that car is less of an American thing and largely a GM thing. I know I am rehashing an old subject, but the Volt has already been a huge success for GM.

Even before the 1st Volt left the assembly line, GM got what it wanted: $$$$ (read bailout money) from the taxpayers. That in and of itself was exactly what GM masterminded: Lining their coffers with other peoples' money and not having a an immediate product to sell.

Ah, the shear brilliance of it all!!! Hat's off to GM!

DBCassidy

 

GM being it's own worst enemy is nothing new. Assurances about supply matching demand have been abundant. Production shared with existing high-volume traditional vehicles was suppose to provide an advantage. That's proving to not be the case.

Volt doesn't share much with other vehicles. That adds to cost in every regard. Starting fresh by building an upgradable platform wasn't the approach taken; instead, it was to deliver a vehicle with end-state performance hoping prices could be dropped quickly. Unfortunately, opportunity is being lost in the meantime.

Ironically, a weakness about the plug-in Prius frequently sighted by pundits could very well end up being top rollout benefit and is pretty much an extreme from Volt... it's too similar to the regular model. Volt has no hybrid counterpart. Prius does and it high-volume. Volt doesn't even have anything remotely close in comparison. It's stands alone.

That means it isn't realistic to expect anything resembling mainstream sales for awhile still... ironically, what some of us were saying for years prior to rollout. But it doesn't matter anyway. History can so easily be spun and everyone seems to be on the same page finally. Demand doesn't matter if there isn't supply.

 

very slow server caused this extra post, it's obviously a Monday

 

There were no "assurances" supply would match demand; GM made statements they would be matching supply to demand mostly in reply to questions about sales goals. That was mostly their way of saying they were no longer setting a particular sales target.

And we don't know if shared production is an advantage or not... you've presented no data suggesting its not. It is true sales for a few months were impacted, but if that is the price for improve long term profitability, it would still be an advantage.

Yep, we are all on the same page -- that the volt is sales are solid, still outselling all other PHEVs combined, and is more supply constrain than demand.

Only a uninformed zelot would have though it realistic to expect total EV sales, across all sellers, to be resembling mainstream sales in the near term. I don't even think the politicians calling for them to sell well believed they would, but often one has to set the bar higher to move the needle.

 

Maybe the Cadillac ELR will be more successful in Cali, than the Volt restricted inventory?

DBCassidy