Camaro still a sales mystery

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Originally Posted by MontyCarlo

Have you not seen the production #s? The Camaro is the top ponycar in numbers built and numbers sold since its debut. Production is as high as it can get without bringing on a hire-today-and-fire-in-March 3rd shift of workers.

I think this is a lot of it... It's not a "3rd" shift though, they are only running one shift right now. Producing ~440 cars a day, 6 days a week.

But, you hit the nail right on the head - GM doesn't want to go through the trouble of working to add a 2nd shift that they may not have work for by next summer.

[DGthe3]

Originally Posted by larietrope

I watched the History channels presentation of building the Camaro and anyone should be impressed by the technology, build quality, and pride in the production of this car.
However, wer have passed the one year date when this car could be ordered and yet there is a glaring shortage of cars on the ground for sale.
They began production in March and have recently crossed the 60,000 unit mark.

I know, some dealer has eight, etc. That's called spot sales and the average dealer, like mine, needs cars to put on the lot to sell.
He has pre-sold 17 and has not had one for inventory. The reps in the production made it clear the factory has the ability to put out cars but they aren't out there.
Your dealer should have known that he wouldn't be able to get all those orders quickly. He would have known a rough estimate of his allocation and has gone way over it. Now there are 17 people waiting a looooong time because of him.

Why do I want cars out there ? Because I want Chevrolet to get back on it's feet and be the performance leader once again. I want to see Camaros rule the streets where there are now Mustangs everywhere.
But not 2010 Mustangs. I have seen maybe 3 or 4 on the streets and probably close to 10 Camaros (aside from the get-together in Oshawa)

I want to see people come in the dealership for performance parts, looking at fun cars, and being generally excited about doing business with Chevrolet.
Don't give me the exclusivity thing, Camaros, Chevelles, and Novas, ruled the streets in numbers back in the day and no one though about exclusive.
More cars mean more parts, more after market products, and putting a car in the hands of people who want a car for the old fashion love of a car not just vanilla transportation that the government and others have forced upon the public.
A growing percentage of the population want appliances to get them to the places where they need to be. Enthusiasts who love cars are a dying breed.

There ought to be a Camaro in NASCAR Nationwide Series racing next year but Chevrolet has said no. Fans will see Impalas racing Mustangs and Challengers. Thats real PR.
No, thats fake PR. I love Nascar but it has been years since the cars had any real resemblance to their street bound counterparts. The Nationwide Mustang is little more than a mustang decal on their existing car. It has to be that way because of the templates. Plus, Nascar fans are pretty much guaranteed to already know about the Camaro anyways.

reply in bold

[GaryTucker]

How is it a sales mystery? Take a decent selling "iconic" car, drop production for 7 years, reintroduce with a hell of a lot of hype...

Case solved!

Think of the dedicated F-body buyers that used to buy a car every 3 years...they've either had to buy something other than an F-body or they are in a 7+year old car and they want out. Its instant demand that is guaranteed to outstrip supply.

If Ford were silly enough to do the same thing, they'd have the same result.

Reason we aren't seeing this with the Challenger is that it was gone for so long.