Saturn was supposed to be the American answer to Japanese competition. Better cars, no-hassle pricing, superior customer support, and innovative marketing. When Penske pulled out of the bidding for the GM division, those aspirations collapsed and Saturn joined the waste bin of another failed American enterprise.The article by the CS Monitor provides a depressing reality for the little car company that could have, should have, but didn't succeed. A number of problems from insufficient models, inadequate attention to engineering high-quality vehicles, and internal dissidence from other GM divisions lead this company to die.
It started out with high minded goals
Created in 1985, the Saturn brand - launched with iconic commercials showing hordes of buyers in the Tennessee hills - represented a rare piece of forward thinking in traditional Detroit. But The Wall Street Journal chided the project for being too ambitious, requiring not just a new car, but a new plant, new dealers, and a new workforce.Even as late as 2007, the company was looking at a comeback to compete with Japanese imports
Saturn had begun to make a comeback with the new models in 2007, but was hit hard by the recession. At its high point, the company sold 300,000 cars in a year, more than current US auto market players like Subaru and Mitsubishi.
The good news is that GM's management and the UAW, which never embraced the cooperative structure of the company, will have their final wish in seeing the company die. As the Wall Street Journal elaborates:
I'm sure they will enjoy feasting on the ashes as more union workers join the unemployment lines and fewer people buy domestic vehicles.But make no mistake: The failure here isn't Mr. Penske's. Saturn was killed by its creators, GM and the UAW. The company starved Saturn for new products, and the union waged war against Saturn's labor reforms to keep them from spreading to other GM factories.
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