20 years ago, GM ranked first in global car sales, and last year it dropped to fifth place, behind Hyundai Kia. In 2020, its global sales volume was 6.36 million vehicles, which is not only inferior to the sales volume of 20 years ago, but even less than the sales volume of 60 years ago. One of the main reasons for this is the gradual loss of the US market, and to the surprise of Americans, the company's hegemon for more than 100 years has a market share that is mainly supported by the Chinese market in another hemisphere.
According to statistics, in 2020, the Chinese market has accounted for 45.6% of its total sales, and in the past 20 years, the Sales of General Motors in the Chinese market has increased by about 50 times, so the successful results can almost be attributed to its team in China, including saic-GM's team, because whether it is products or marketing, they have done localization very perfectly, and are a model for the joint venture.
However, with the overall setback of SAIC in recent years, GM's best-selling brand Buick in China has also encountered some problems in its development.
(1) Products: The main models have been "killed" one after another
The GL8s whose security is questioned
When it comes to Buick, the first thing that many people think of should be the GL8, an American car that belongs only to Chinese. When it was launched around 2000, it was developed for the Chinese market. During the period, it was once introduced back to the United States because of its excellent performance in the Chinese market, but unfortunately it was not sold well, and the background was stopped. So at present, this Chinese god car is actually not sold in the United States, which is also a rare situation in the joint venture brand.
As the annual business MPV sales champion, Buick has a broad mass base, and has always been able to completely crush the same level of opponents, last year's sales
157,000 vehicles, peers are not as good as its fraction, and now has accumulated sales of nearly 150 vehicles, is China's well-deserved MPV king. However, it is such a blockbuster car, a mature model that has been on the market for many years, and the well-known test of The China Insurance Research Institute has surprised everyone and become the worst performing MPV in the crash test in history.
At that time, the model adopted by China Insurance Research Institute was the 2017 model of GL8, what was the specific performance difference? There are two main points that are not good in safety: the first is that in the side collision, the root of the B column is about 25% torn, first of all, it has a "general" rating; the second is that in the frontal bias test of the "main driver 25%", the A column has been greatly bent, and the worst result is "P grade", that is, Poor, because the A column is seriously deformed and torn, resulting in the impact on the dummy's head, the steering wheel has a displacement in the process of collision, and the front airbag does not play a role in protecting the dummy's head. The head airbags on the sides also do not unfold normally, in this case, the dummy's head will hit the steering wheel and fixed objects such as A-pillars, and the chance of survival is less than 10%.
According to statistics, in the history of China Insurance Research And Evaluation, it has been disclosed that a total of 73 models have been collided, of which only 8 cars have been rated as "P-grade" in the most tested safety project of the positive 25% bias collision, and the Buick GL8 has unfortunately been recruited, and it is also the most expensive car among them. In the safety crash test, Buick regrettably has more than one car. Zhongbao Research Institute for Buick's models, a total of three crash tests, in addition to the above 2017 GL8 in the main car 25% project to take "poor", 2018 Encore took "general", 2019 Regal took "good", all models can not achieve "excellent" results. Therefore, the regrettable model is not only GL8, some netizens are worried about the safety hazards shown in the collision experiment, which may involve more models, and also greatly reduce the impression of "leather" and "safety" of American cars.
Heroes who are plagued by three cylinders
In addition to the impact of safety on sales, the biggest impact on Buick's sales in recent years is the problem of the three-cylinder engine. 2017 is the peak year of Yinglang, sales exceeded the 400,000 mark, that year, the same level of cars, second only to Langyi, a model can reach such a level, can be described as quite successful. In 2018, due to the use of new technology three-cylinder engines, it collapsed in an instant, and sales were almost cut to the waist, plummeting to the bottom.
The Buick model using the three-cylinder engine is not only Yinglang, but also Kaiyue, Weilang, Yuelang and so on. But fortunately, the general people are more rational, see the situation is not good, immediately turn around, so that the ending is not so ugly. In contrast, the same American car Ford, it seems to be a bit "a tendon", until now still insisting on the three-cylinder engine road, Forres's "tragic" is obvious to all, so that fans can be described as love and hate.
(2) Character chapter: Personnel adjustment is like sending charcoal in the snow
Gu Yebin, who was in danger
In 2014, Bao Ye took over shi Hong's baton and served as the director of Buick's marketing department, opening the road to upgrade the Buick brand and also opening the road for Buick's sales to climb again. Unfortunately, the good times did not last long, and by the time he left office in mid-2019, Buick had already shown a downward trend. Gu Yebin, who took over the position of new minister, was in danger, and it was not simple, after he was the general manager of SAIC-GM Wuhan Branch, managing a production capacity of 300,000 vehicles per year. After taking office, after a sustained decline, it led Buick sales to bottom out, especially in the second half of 2020, sales almost returned to the order of 600,000, giving the brand a booster.
Perhaps many people do not realize how important this is, thinking that sales fluctuations are not large. But if you compare the development of Changan Ford, which is also an American car, in recent years, you will understand Gu Yebin's greatness, although he has not been in office for a long time, but it can be said that he has made great contributions to Buick. Due to comprehensive factors such as three cylinders and personnel changes, Changan Ford's sales have declined from 2017 to 828,000, 377,000 in 2018, and 186,000 in 2019.
On the other hand, Buick, if it were not for SAIC-GM making personnel adjustments in time and provoking the beam by Gu Yebin at a critical moment, then it is likely that another American brand will follow in the footsteps of Ford, and what is more valuable is that it was also seriously affected by the epidemic in the first half of 2020 during this period. So now, although Gu Yebin only took Buick for a short year and a half, he went to Cadillac, but it is enough to prove his outstanding ability and contribution.
Mention of Gu Yebin, this person, has the characteristics of typical SAIC-GM leading cadres, from research and development, production, and then to market sales, over the years in the SAIC-GM system, step by step solidly, the growth trajectory and the current SAIC-GM general manager Wang Yongqing is very similar, and even if Wang retires a few years later, choosing Gu Yebin as a successor, it will not be too surprising. Of course, within SAIC-GM, which is now full of talents, there must be more than one successor candidate, such as Jiang Jiong, who also served as the general manager of the Wuhan branch and is currently the deputy general manager of GM, and Zhou Peng, director of chevrolet's marketing department, who are not inferior. The only regret is that Gu Yebin's tenure in Buick is too short, but fortunately, the new minister Niu Feng, who has taken over, can also be described as young and promising, so the talent echelon construction of SAIC-GM is still worth learning from other domestic car companies, and the future can be expected.
(3) Development: Niu Feng's new era is still full of variables
Regardless of any car brand, in the next few years, the biggest challenge will come from the development of new energy vehicles, and the same is true for Buick. In the current situation, it has obviously lagged behind in this regard, and there will be two challenges in the future if it wants to catch up.
The first is the product, at present, Buick has two pure electric vehicles, namely the micro blue 6 and the micro blue 7, both based on the general BEV2 platform model, which has been on the market for almost two years, and this year's sales are still almost no improvement. Among them, the pure electric model of the micro blue 6 has basically maintained monthly sales of about 1500 vehicles, while the sales volume of the micro blue 7 is basically negligible, and the vast majority of months are less than 100 units. Compared with the public, the two electric vehicles based on the MEB platform, ID.4 and ID.6, although they have just entered the country this year, but the monthly sales have exceeded 10,000 units, and the gap between the development speed between the two brands is indeed very large.
However, with the recent release of GM's new electric platform "Aoteneng", it is more advanced than the BEV2 adopted by the earlier Micro Blue 6, although the first model of the platform is Cadillac's LYRIQ, but I believe that Buick's new platform model will not wait too long, in terms of product technology, it is still possible to chase back.
The second is the market, the current new energy market fight for "bloody rain", from traditional car companies to new forces, from traditional marketing means to new marketing ideas, are rapidly evolving, the next three years, who stopped, or even slow pace, it is likely to be eliminated, because the top people in China and even the world are constantly concentrated in this market, otherwise Tesla will not break through the trillion DOLLAR market value, BYD will not become the third value of the car company. In contrast, the current Buick marketing aspect will be weaker, from the past period of time to put forward some of the ideas, more or less have some traces of "according to the cat to paint the tiger", the cat is the so-called "new forces", and for the combination of their own characteristics of the market innovation is insufficient.
However, within a period of time, this situation is still inevitable, the current Buick marketing department minister Niu Feng, sales background, business ability is outstanding, but for the market sea, land and air all-round combat work experience is not very rich, but also can be understood. Previously, there have also been media reports on Niu Feng's ascension, which is somewhat "out of line", because the position of Buick Minister is crucial, before Bao Ye, Gu Yebin, etc. were transferred by "local officials", in contrast, Niu Feng's qualifications in this regard are indeed not so deep. This year, he led Buick's sales in January to September, which was not as high as the sales volume from January to September during the epidemic last year, but the good news is that it did not decline much, which completely stopped buick's sales decline. Although for Niu Feng, the new job type is more challenging, and it still needs to be slowly learned, practiced and improved step by step, but I believe that after a period of time, it is still possible to prove that he is not worse than Gu Yebin, at least not too much worse, has the ability to be competent for the post, and it is also a confession to the person who has entrusted him with heavy responsibilities.
At present, whether it is Buick's Aoteneng, or Niu Feng's team, are preparing and running-in, I believe that soon they will usher in an unprecedented hard battle, but Buick, whether in the current product or team, the most needed is time, whether it can smoothly keep up with the pace of industry development, win this hard battle, the end is still difficult to predict, let us wait and see.
Write at the end:
Some friends joked that new energy is a good era for Buick, because others no longer have to worry about its high fuel consumption.
This article is the original of "Car Review Network", author: Observer Xiao Liu, editor: Zhang Gangfeng, may not be reproduced without permission. Pay attention to the "car review network" and focus on in-depth reporting of the automotive industry.