Good night, Oppo

"AMC/Renauledge" (n2skylark) 09/18/2015 at 01:07 • Filed to: None

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But before you drift away into dreamland, I’ll take you back to a time when Buick sold cars like this Opel Manta Rallye out of its showrooms and no one found sporty cars out of place there.

themanwithsauce - has as many vehicles as job titles > AMC/Renauledge 09/18/2015 at 01:30

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Okay, I will preface what I am about to say with a statement that I love the manta. I love opel in general. It is awesome. However.......

People DID find sportier and more basic opels out of place at buick - that’s why we stopped importing opels and selling them in buick dealerships.

AMC/Renauledge > themanwithsauce - has as many vehicles as job titles 09/18/2015 at 01:37

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Nope. They stopped importing Opels because the Deutsch Mark got too strong and they couldn’t make a profit on them. Buick used to sell a lot of Opels until they weren’t profitable anymore due to exchange rates.

Which is why they replaced the Manta with the Japanese Buick Opel Isuzu fastback in 1976. Sold alongside the Skyhawk hatch. Until both were replaced by the J-body, Opel-shared 1982-89 Skyhawk.

themanwithsauce - has as many vehicles as job titles > AMC/Renauledge 09/18/2015 at 02:41

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Right, not enough people bought them. MSRP got a little inflated due to currency, but the base problem is not enough sales to keep the idea alive. See - cadillac allante. It didn’t fail because the exchange rate got funny when it came to shipping those stupid bodies across the ocean, it tanked because it wasn’t what cadillac buyers wanted and it was at a price that was uncompetitive. Likewise, while some buyers enjoyed the idea of a simple, sportier car being sold in their buick dealership, not enough did so to justify the brand once the automotive industry hit some problems in the 70s.

The whole “Opel by Isuzu” thing didn’t really last and wasn’t ever a strong seller compared to the mainstays of the brand. My proof is that GM is never one to throw out a simple way to milk money. If Opel was really a good business idea in terms of sales volume, they would find some way to milk it for all they can. THey stopped trying because no one really “got” opel in America. Same with the Bitter cars.

tl;dr - buyers did find sporty “buicks” odd in the 70s. It was an idea (a smaller buick with good handling and balance) they never really revisited until the regal GS of the mid 2010s.

Jobjoris > AMC/Renauledge 09/18/2015 at 06:19

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You actually got that in the US? Awesome, never knew. Just the Manta A?

AMC/Renauledge > themanwithsauce - has as many vehicles as job titles 09/18/2015 at 10:13

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The idea lived for 14 model years. There were plenty of sales to keep the idea alive. Buick just replaced the low-margin Manta with the H-body Skyhawk, which was way cheaper to build.

If importing Opels had profit potential, if all that held them back was Buick dealers, why didn’t GM import them under a different brand instead? They imported Toyotas and Isuzus and Daewoos and Suzukis all over the place.

They didn’t try importing Opels again until the 2008 Saturn Astra, which wound up a one year-only model because exchange rate issues killed its profit margins.

And the Opel Isuzu died for three reasons:

1. The (Opel-derived) J-body Buick Skyhawk replaced it and wound up selling quite well for its first 5 years.

2. Isuzu was about to launch the I-Mark, themselves, at Isuzu dealers in America and didn’t want to supply Buick their own car anymore.

3. The only Opel smaller than the J-body at that point was the downsized FWD Kadett D, which was too small and low-margin for Buick.

Also, Buicks WERE focused on handling balance at the time. The GS package included major handling improvements as well as power upgrades.

GS was replaced by handling-focused S/R packages after 1975. By 1977, the Sport packages Buick was offering filled that niche.

So did the T-Types - especially the Skyhawk and Skylark.

And the reason GM dropped packages like that for Buick in the 1980s wasn’t because they failed to sell. They were trying to reposition each brand and wound up focusing Buick on “traditional American luxury” instead of handling or performance.

GM had just blown up their divisional system and their cars across divisions were all too much alike. So they had to separate the brands with marketing and Oldsmobile wound up the division that focused on import-like handling balance with their International Series cars in the late 80s/early ‘90s.

themanwithsauce - has as many vehicles as job titles > AMC/Renauledge 09/18/2015 at 10:29

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....TIL about the t-type package on the skyhawk and skylark.

Never knew that even existed. Knew about the lesabre and obviously the regal. Googling and wikipedia have led to new discoveries