The air is certainly different on Planet Saturn

By John LeBlanc

November 9, 2004 - A recent Automotive News article spelled out General Motor’s grand frommage Rick Wagoner’s strategy to fix the down-and-out Saturn brand. According to Mr. Wagoner (BTW, no relation to Lyle Wagoner from the ‘70s variety classic The Carol Burnett Show. – Ed.) solving Saturn’s long-standing sales stagnation is as simple as moving the company’s products "slightly" upmarket. Competing with import brands such as Volkswagen and Honda, according to Mr. Wagoner, will increase Saturn’s current sales of 270,000 up to over 400,000 by 2007.

What?

First, "We’re going to broaden out the range considerably," Wagoner said. The first of these new "upscale" Saturns will appear at the Detroit Show this January in the form of a Pontiac Solstice-clone rear-wheel-drive roadster and a sedan from the midsize Epsilon platform that already holds up the Opel Vectra/Signum, Malibu/Malibu Maxx, Pontiac G6 and Saab 9-3.

Huh?

Second, subtly admitting that Saturn’s offerings have had external styling on par with, say, a Kenmore side-by-side, and that it will be really hard to sell unattractive "upscale" cars, Mr. Wagoner, will give Saturn "better-looking cars" by borrowing a number of styling cues from Opel’s lineup.

Pardon me?

Finally, Saturn officials described their aspirations to market Saturn to the similar position once occupied in the Gee Em lineup by Oldsmobile. "The entry-level Saturn is not going to be cutting the same price point (as Honda and Volkswagen)", says Rick, "but let's look at Saturn priced a little higher than Chevrolet on a product-to-product basis."

Whoa! Whoa! And double whoa! Slow down Cowboy Rick! We need to reset The BS Meter before we continue.

Please, oh faithful straight-six.com reader, take a minute to re-read Mr. Wagoner’s three part Saturn revival plan again, and let’s see if you can come up with as many holes in this new "strategy" as I did:

Cowboy Rick says: Broaden the product range
The BS Meter says: How about fixing the crappy cars that are in the Saturn showrooms right now? I know a two-seater, halo car looks good under the auto show floor lights, but the existing Saturn customers are a fairly dour bunch—how many existing VUE owners are itching to jump into a hot, little roadster? Guys, remember the Australian-built Mercury Capri? Thought not.

And with rumours of Cadillac jumping on the Epsilon bandwagon as well for their own Euro-only sedan, does the market really want another bland front-wheel drive car like the disappointing Saturn L-Series? (Go ask a Saab salesman. – Ed.). Kind of reminds me of the dark days in The General’s past where badge-engineering ruled and the only difference between a Malibu/Monte Carlo/LeMans/Grand Prix/Cutlass/Cutlass Supreme/Regal/Century was the width of the plastichrome wheel well trim.

Cowboy Rick says: Opel turtlenecks to the rescue!
The BS Meter says: In Germany, where Opel is supposed to go hammer and tong against VW, things are going from bad to worse The General grimly announced they will cut down 12 000 workers in Germany and Sweden. Yup, sounds like Opel is the wagon I want to hitch my Saturn horse up to.

Cowboy Rick says: Replace Oldsmobile in the Alfred P. Sloan School of Gee Em Hierarchy
The BS Meter says: If I were a Saturn dealer, I wouldn’t be too trilled with the idea of attempting to replace a corpse. Does Rick even know why Olds was killed?

As for pricing Saturns above Chevys: the only folks seconding that motion would be the Bow Tie guys. The Cobalt already appears to be of a more quality piece than its Saturn Delta-platform sibling Ion, and the VUE (save the Honda-engined model) can’t hold a candle to the newer Chevy Equinox cute-ute.

Mr. Wagoner moving Saturn’s products "slightly" upmarket is like calling an expedition up Mount Everest without Sherpas a "slight" day hike. Or maybe he means ‘slight" as in the "slight" gaps between the trademark composite body panels found on most Saturns.

It seems though that history really does repeat itself on Planet Saturn, as Honda and Volkswagen were the original targets boasted by a former Gee Em CEO, 41-year veteran Roger B. Smith, when he announced the Saturn brand in 1980.

So here we are having lived with the Saturn story for almost a quarter of a century, and no one who has actually driven, or sat in, a Saturn Ion actually thinks its made by the same species who puts together a Honda Civic. Let alone that the car would be competitive with only "slight" improvements.

What I do know is that Saturn no longer competes with just medium-priced products from Volkswagen, Honda or Toyota. Premium brands moving downmarket (Volvo V50, Audi A3 Sportback, Mercedes-Benz B Class, BMW 1 Series, Saab 9-2X, et al) and some new competition that wasn’t a gleam in anyone’s eyes back 25 years ago when Saturn was being conceived (Hyundai, Kia, Subaru) has firmly put Saturn in its current deserved place in the minds of today’s consumers.

- John LeBlanc, Publisher, straight-six.com