Sorry it has been so long between posts . . .you know how summer can get in the way of best intentions . . .Tony
Sometimes in the course of history it becomes essential that a group of individuals take a risk and amass an effort toward a goal that is many years off and difficult to obtain. Like raising a child; you never know how they will turn out, you just know they are worth the effort. Such is the challenge for the workforce at Orion Assembly, U.S.A.
It was 1967 and the first of several oil embargoes was underway. A new loose-knit group of Arab countries had banned together under the acronym OPEC and they were collectively reducing the oil supply of the Western World as a pay back for the Arab/Israel 6 Day War. Oil as a weapon was a new term and our lives, as oil consumers, would forever change. These events caused great concern in the West as oil prices went through the roof and the lines at gas stations were long and gnarly. The General Motors fleet of hefty vehicles was lucky to hit 14 MPG, putting us at a great disadvantage in the marketplace where the Japanese were hawking 30 MPG Datson’s and Civics’. These cheap, gas sippers suddenly became a convenient alternative to the 1967 Pontiac Bonneville that weighed in at a svelte 4,167 lbs of curb weight. The camel had his nose in the tent and we were not paying attention. Not to worry, the Big Three had the answer.
In the early seventies the Detroit Trio answered with the Chevrolet Vega, the Ford Pinto and the Chrysler Gremlin. I could list the reasons why these cars were not to be trusted but it will suffice to say they were a less than stellar part of automotive history. These vehicles were trash and we, in the domestic auto industry, have all been trying for a very long time to make these mistakes right with the automotive gods, not to mention our poor customers with who, up until that time, we could do no wrong. General Motors had 50 percent of the American Market. For every two cars that were sold, one was a General Motors’ Product. Times were great. How could we screw this up?
There are many ways to destroy your own image as a car company, we are watching Toyota do that every day recently, but one of the worst is to sell an inferior product to your entry level buyers. Those who are just getting to know you but have not yet become loyal customers over a period of time. And that is exactly what the domestics did. In the farming community it’s referred to as eating your seed corn. Actually these small cars sold quite well for a few years; as a matter of fact the Vega was named “Car of the Year” in 1971 by Motor Trend, a mistake that magazine was still trying to live down when it said recently “Surviving Vegas are like a fossil record of everything that was wrong with the American auto industry circa 1970.” Soon after, GM decided to bring out a second generation compact called the Chevette. When financial margins became less and less on small cars, GM cut corners on the products to keep the profit margin at or near the same level. The Chevette and cars like it shooed Big Three customers away in droves. What was the Big Three’s response? Build 'em overseas. By the early eighties anything called a sub-compact and most vehicles considered small were produced off-shore to save money on the production costs.
Now let’s push forward 30 years.
It is 2009, the economy was tanking, on a colossal scale, and General Motors and Chrysler needed money to stay afloat. They had long since eaten the seed corn and some congressmen were calling for their demise. The American people were still mad at the General but with their last bit of rational thought they realized that America would be better off with General Motors than without it. A visionary within the United Autoworkers Union, Ron Gettelfinger placed a call to the White House. A brand new president, Barack Obama, and his staff listened to Ron’s ideas and created a plan, a plan to bring small car production back to the United States, back to Lake Orion, Michigan, U.S.A.
As the story goes the General got his money and the visionary was able to retire a happy man. But what became of the plan and what about the folks at Orion Assembly, U.S.A.? That story remains to be written. Much rides on this American comeback and the world watches and waits. Some scoff at the very idea of building a small car in America and making it for a profit. But the nay-sayers’ don’t know this hearty group of car-building individuals who make up the workforce at Orion Assembly, U.S.A. and UAW Local 5960. Many times in the past the leadership of GM and the International UAW have called with mountain-sized tasks and the Orion workforce has always come through and they will come through again. The “Plant You Can’t Ignore” has but one chance to get this right. With every vehicle that rolls down the assembly line our reputation will ride with it and that reputation means a great deal to each one of us. This small car production is not an experiment, it is an opportunity, an opportunity to make things right for our company, our union and with the American consumer. It’s an opportunity to lay down our footprints for others to follow. The Orion/UAW 5960 workforce will be the architects of the future for all UAW/GM and the entire domestic auto industry.
When our children are young we plant our trees so that when they are big enough to climb those trees the branches will be strong enough to hold them. But at the time of the planting we are unsure exactly when this will take place we only have faith that it will happen over time. Such is our conundrum at Orion Assembly. And so we plant our trees under whose shade we may never sit but we still plant our trees.
Sometimes in the course of history it becomes essential that a group of individuals take a risk and amass an effort toward a goal that is many years off and difficult to obtain. Like raising a child; you never know how they will turn out, you just know they are worth the effort. Such is the challenge for the workforce at Orion Assembly, U.S.A.
It was 1967 and the first of several oil embargoes was underway. A new loose-knit group of Arab countries had banned together under the acronym OPEC and they were collectively reducing the oil supply of the Western World as a pay back for the Arab/Israel 6 Day War. Oil as a weapon was a new term and our lives, as oil consumers, would forever change. These events caused great concern in the West as oil prices went through the roof and the lines at gas stations were long and gnarly. The General Motors fleet of hefty vehicles was lucky to hit 14 MPG, putting us at a great disadvantage in the marketplace where the Japanese were hawking 30 MPG Datson’s and Civics’. These cheap, gas sippers suddenly became a convenient alternative to the 1967 Pontiac Bonneville that weighed in at a svelte 4,167 lbs of curb weight. The camel had his nose in the tent and we were not paying attention. Not to worry, the Big Three had the answer.
In the early seventies the Detroit Trio answered with the Chevrolet Vega, the Ford Pinto and the Chrysler Gremlin. I could list the reasons why these cars were not to be trusted but it will suffice to say they were a less than stellar part of automotive history. These vehicles were trash and we, in the domestic auto industry, have all been trying for a very long time to make these mistakes right with the automotive gods, not to mention our poor customers with who, up until that time, we could do no wrong. General Motors had 50 percent of the American Market. For every two cars that were sold, one was a General Motors’ Product. Times were great. How could we screw this up?
There are many ways to destroy your own image as a car company, we are watching Toyota do that every day recently, but one of the worst is to sell an inferior product to your entry level buyers. Those who are just getting to know you but have not yet become loyal customers over a period of time. And that is exactly what the domestics did. In the farming community it’s referred to as eating your seed corn. Actually these small cars sold quite well for a few years; as a matter of fact the Vega was named “Car of the Year” in 1971 by Motor Trend, a mistake that magazine was still trying to live down when it said recently “Surviving Vegas are like a fossil record of everything that was wrong with the American auto industry circa 1970.” Soon after, GM decided to bring out a second generation compact called the Chevette. When financial margins became less and less on small cars, GM cut corners on the products to keep the profit margin at or near the same level. The Chevette and cars like it shooed Big Three customers away in droves. What was the Big Three’s response? Build 'em overseas. By the early eighties anything called a sub-compact and most vehicles considered small were produced off-shore to save money on the production costs.
Now let’s push forward 30 years.
It is 2009, the economy was tanking, on a colossal scale, and General Motors and Chrysler needed money to stay afloat. They had long since eaten the seed corn and some congressmen were calling for their demise. The American people were still mad at the General but with their last bit of rational thought they realized that America would be better off with General Motors than without it. A visionary within the United Autoworkers Union, Ron Gettelfinger placed a call to the White House. A brand new president, Barack Obama, and his staff listened to Ron’s ideas and created a plan, a plan to bring small car production back to the United States, back to Lake Orion, Michigan, U.S.A.
As the story goes the General got his money and the visionary was able to retire a happy man. But what became of the plan and what about the folks at Orion Assembly, U.S.A.? That story remains to be written. Much rides on this American comeback and the world watches and waits. Some scoff at the very idea of building a small car in America and making it for a profit. But the nay-sayers’ don’t know this hearty group of car-building individuals who make up the workforce at Orion Assembly, U.S.A. and UAW Local 5960. Many times in the past the leadership of GM and the International UAW have called with mountain-sized tasks and the Orion workforce has always come through and they will come through again. The “Plant You Can’t Ignore” has but one chance to get this right. With every vehicle that rolls down the assembly line our reputation will ride with it and that reputation means a great deal to each one of us. This small car production is not an experiment, it is an opportunity, an opportunity to make things right for our company, our union and with the American consumer. It’s an opportunity to lay down our footprints for others to follow. The Orion/UAW 5960 workforce will be the architects of the future for all UAW/GM and the entire domestic auto industry.
When our children are young we plant our trees so that when they are big enough to climb those trees the branches will be strong enough to hold them. But at the time of the planting we are unsure exactly when this will take place we only have faith that it will happen over time. Such is our conundrum at Orion Assembly. And so we plant our trees under whose shade we may never sit but we still plant our trees.
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