“Domestic” shop? Better not be.

All the former Big Three tried importing European models under domestic nameplates, but dealer indifference, little or non-existent technician training and poor marketing support made them a side show.

The transporters were lined up six-deep on the small side street at the rear of the local GM dealership the other day. They were hauling away the new cars, a sure sign that the end was near for the Chevrolet store that had been a fixture in suburban Toronto for something like fifty years. They had recently moved to smaller premises, occupying a building built for a Ford dealership that also failed. The location was prime: a few blocks from a new Toyota store that’s the size of a factory. Just down the street is a Honda shop that’s similarly huge. Consumers are voting with their wallets, and the implications for the aftermarket are considerable.

Why are the domestics continuing to lose market share? The reasons are many, but history has a lot to teach us. The domestic three have been historically weak in the small car segment, which in Canada, is crucial to success. GM, for example, launched the Vega in 1970 with an unsleeved aluminium engine block that wore its bores so fast that it destroyed the nameplate forever. The same car with the Iron Duke four, however, was a reliable machine. The first iterations of J-body, Cavalier and Sunbird, were also poorly executed, but were improved dramatically over their production run. The damage, however, was done. For Ford, the Escort and Tempo/Topaz models had a similar history, weak reliability initially and then better cars once the initiative had passed to the Japanese. Now both manufacturers build world-class cars, but carry the stigma of lower quality, a stigma which lowers resale and lease residual values, further contaminating the brands. Perhaps the biggest indictment is that both Ford and GM had (and have) global resources and strong European and Japanese engineering teams to help them design small cars for the North American market. All the former Big Three tried importing European models under domestic nameplates, but dealer indifference, little or non-existent technician training and poor marketing support made them a side show. Remember the Cortina?

That, however, is “water under the bridge.” How do they salvage this situation? I believe that Ford and GM need a quantum technological leap that puts them out front, soon. The Chevrolet Volt concept is an idea, namely practical electric cars; hybrids are “owned” by the Japanese, namely Toyota, and although they’ll grow as a segment, leadership will have to come from a radical new technology. Fuel cells are a possibility, although Honda already has a small test fleet on the street, racking up real-world mileage. GM had a prototype in 1966! For the repair aftermarket, if you’re a “domestic” shop that defers to “import” shops for part of the work, you’re in trouble. Toyota, Honda and Nissan are now “domestics” from a repair perspective, so “all makes service” had better mean something in every shop.

Yes, it’s expensive to train and equip for dozens of different models, but even in rural light truck country, the Japanese brands are making inroads. Technologically, light vehicles are now pretty much the same. Aluminium is no longer an exotic metal and rear engines, air cooling and incomprehensible, exotic fuel systems — the baffling early Bosch Jetronic system is an example — are gone from mainstream cars and light trucks. Unless you’re into Wankels, its all aluminium blocks and heads, overhead cams, computer engine control and port fuel injection, so experience translates better now than ever before across brands. “Import” shop? Maybe for luxury European brands, but for every other successful shop, there are no “imports” anymore.