End Of The Line For GM In Australia — How Happy Are The Globalists?

Ford and GM squandered their opportunities in Australia beyond belief.

Did they have much of an opportunity there? Between Oz and NZ it is not a big market and it was quite hard to compete in the Japanese back yard.

Anyone who knows the history of GM (Holden) in Australia knows they received billions of dollars in subsidies and grants (an average of about $2,000 per vehicle they sold), they built cars consumers didn’t care for, and they treated their customers like dirt, systemically violating Australia’s consumer protection laws. GM (Holden) were practically a textbook example of how to be a bad business.

GM’s demise in Australia had nothing to do with Globalization. It was their own culture of greed, callous indifference (arguably contempt) for their customers, and years’ worth of bad business practices that led to the scenario we see today.

The “nail in the coffin” came a few years ago when GM demanded more money from the Australian government, and they threatened to pull out if they didn’t get it. Unfortunately, this happened around the same time when the Australian government had just completed its audit on its subsidies to the automotive industry, and they concluded that Australian taxpayers got exceptionally poor value for the many billions of dollars they handed to GM. The government saw Australian people got the raw end of the deal, and so they refused to throw “good money after bad,” as they say.

It is interesting to note that the ailing GM Australia still had it within them to send $150,000,000 to GM in the USA in the months leading up to the official shuttering and pullout from Australia. All this info has been publicly available for years. Google is your friend.

Once again, BobM opens and continues with a volley of hate, accusations and put-downs, Alt-Right style! Well played!

BobM: Do you read/view/listen to Australian media, just to know that US-centric view is not universal? Do you know what folks in the know – those being people who live and work in Australian – are experiencing and reporting and discussing? Are you in contact with any auto industry experts in Australia? I suspect not (BTW, I am via phone and email). You apparently embrace only those articles written by Americans *about* Australia as your “personal truth”… but only if the views expressed support your Alt-Right views.

If you use Google only to find what you already believe (while filtering out the rest), you end up looking like BobM. If you use Google to investigate what the rest of the world is doing, and their perspective on things (outside of your Alt-Right bubble), then you’ll see a significantly different story.

Hate on, BobM, and rage away. Up the stairs, first door to the right, one Tiki-Torch each.

Re “…Show me one article or paper that confirms your BS…”

What is the extent of your research? (Answer: None)

My response to you, Hateful Bob, is the same response I give to Fundamentalist Creationists who demand that I supply proof of evolution: If you haven’t even begun your homework, then I certainly won’t do it for you, only to have you dismiss it because it’s not what you believe.

In other words, don’t expect others to change *your* mind for you! They can’t! No “proof” to an Alt-Righter will make him suddenly switch from being a racist to a “regular guy”, or from being hateful to peaceful, etc. That requires change from within. Change from within requires one to desire change within themselves, or a willingness to see from a perspective that’s different from their own. And that is so NOT you, Bob :-/

Hate on, BobM. It’s the Alt-Right way to go. (This is my last post in this thread.)

While it is undeniable that GM Holden was poorly run - YOUR post establishes the most basic problem - even with subsidies - no company was able to make a profit - remembering that ALL mass production car companies have left Australia. Maybe GM might have - if they corrected their problems and produced cars that the Australians would buy in huge numbers - but that would have taken billions of dollars more - and even more losses before profits materialized.

As long as imported cars made in factories in countries with far cheaper labor are in the market - No company thought it was likely to make a genuine profit manufacturing cars in the country(even with subsidies) - so while people can say all they want about GM bad business - it really doesn't matter - they would have left anyway.

Wrong....then why all automakers shut down all their production in Australia? It is not about GM and Ford. It does not mean, Aussie cannot buy anymore on this brand. It's just they move the production in Thailand and Malaysia to take advantage of the cheaper cost in that country. Bad for Aussie employees, for sure they are compensated accordingly before losing the job.

-Courtesy cars
https://www.notmyfault.com.au/