The Aurora Killed Oldsmobile?????

[Marc]

A writer at www.transformmagazine.net/articles/2015/rewind-oldsmobile/ claims that the Aurora was the cause of Olds going under. I don't quite understand that. As he says there.........

Rather than reposition the Oldsmobile brand to remain relevant to consumers and distinctive from imports, Oldsmobile’s strategy was to mimic them, launching the Aurora in the '90s, the car that ultimately killed the brand.



The Aurora was everything that Oldsmobile was not. Even the adverts talked about “not your father’s Oldsmobile”. They were right on that front, the car had been de-badged, de-branded and de-positioned. The last traces of the iconic American brand had been removed and replaced with blandness.

Read the rest of his comments in the second column in that article.

[Toronado3800]

Olds needed more unique and popular cars to be worth keeping around. GM with their market share has a good number of bumper stickers. Honda only has a couple badges for example. They don't make 4 versions of the Accord which all compete with eachother for the same buyer (if I am keeping track)

[aj]

Who cares what those people thought about Oldsmobile and the Aurora. I love Oldsmobile's and my Aurora's also!

[human]

Those are interesting perspectives but I think Piers Guilar only got it half right. The Aurora didn't kill Oldsmobile. Oldsmobile's overall blandness and lack of a clear target market segment for the last quarter-century of its existence did. But in the end, as I've stated before, Oldsmobile was sacrificed at the altar of Saturn. GM's oldest marque began its final death spiral almost at the very moment the first Saturn rolled off the assembly line. In those first couple of years, GM understandably promoted the heck out of Saturn, but the resources to do so had to come from somewhere and they chose to siphon them from Oldsmobile, letting the brand largely coast during that time. Speculation on its possible demise began to surface as the 1993 models rolled out and Olds tried to stem that tide with a really lame ad campaign that basically said 'we're not dead yet' and used a photo of the as-yet-unreleased Aurora with the tagline "Coming in 1994" to back up the claim. But the brand was basically on life support as it limped into it's centennial year. I think the handwriting was on the wall as early as the mid-'90s when the time honored models with which the brand was most closely associated (Toronado, Ninety-Eight, Cutlass, Eighty-Eight) started disappearing one by one. At the time Oldsmobile's final shutdown was announced in December 2000, the oldest model names in the lineup were the Bravada and Silhouette. Could Oldsmobile have been saved? heck yes. Just look at Cadillac. At the same time that Oldsmobile was on its glide path to oblivion, Cadillac, which was also seeing its most loyal buyers age out of the market, trading in their Eldorados for electric wheelchairs, did a major 180-degree turnaround with an ad-campaign aimed squarely at affluent baby boomers, featuring the music of Led Zeppelin and looking more like an ad for Pontiac than Cadillac. In a year or two, GM had successfully repositioned the brand as an American alternative to luxury imports, something it tried half-heartedly but failed to do with Oldsmobile. Had they run an ad campaign like that for Oldsmobile instead of the death by a thousand cuts that was the "Not Your Father's Oldsmobile" campaign, Oldsmobile could have made it. The bottom line is Oldsmobile died because GM didn't care to see it survive.

Daily Driver: 2011 Impala LT
Weekend Toy: 1995 Aurora

[aj]

And GM kept on putting money into Saturn and they never once did make a profit from Saturn at all, then in 2000 they decide to buy Saab and HUmmer with the same problem, not making a profit at all. Buick also had a problem really themselves and Cadillac in the early 90's and until Oldsmobile demised after 2005 when Oldsmobile was gone they had to step it up! Buick is now basically where Olds left off along side with Cadillac. Oldsmobile in 2000 was more of a sporty, luxury division while Buick nor Cadillac was at all. It took them to realize we have a void with Oldsmobile customers that they dont have no division to buy from GM. The Bravada's and the Silhouettes sold more than when Buick got them as the Ranier and the Teraza.

When you walk in one of the factories in Lansing at LGR and Delta you still feel the pride and the workmanship and the quality of products that they still build because of Oldsmobile. The factories in Lansing always won awards and for quality products, even though Oldsmobile factories were at the time in 2004 was the oldest plant still producing cars with the old wood plank floors and still shipping off parts of cars to one plant , then to the Verlinden plant across the other side of Lansing, it was costly but they got the work done.

I guess what i am saying how was Oldsmobile bland to the rest of GM lineup? When Mr. John Rock went ahead and had Oldsmobile produce 2 different varient of engines made exlcusively for the Oldsmobile Aurora, and the intrigue, when almost every one of GM's cars had the 3800 series engine in them. I didnt see Olds bland in the 90's really! I liked the 98's, 88's, Toronado's, Lss and of course The Aurora! Oldsmobile's last products I thought the interiors were the best looking and mostly everything was standard on there cars.

Most of GM executives wanted to save Oldsmobile as the niche brand, but that stupid Rick Wagoner thought no, but at the end it cost GM over 2.7 billion dollars and at almost the verge of bankruptcy. If Bob Lutz had came in earlier he could have saved our brand but it was too late.

We still have Lansing, michigan and Oldsmar, Florida to honor their Oldsmobile brand and REO.

[Paulaurora]

I think GM went down so much after olds were closed. Chevy Buick are same thing Quality of interior is horrible for buick lacross they charge so much $ and its not even better than reg chevy.Even new cars from other brands has worse interior quality / design compare to Aurora . GM still charge extra for Rain sensor option sunroof etc. Unlike Volvo Jaguar BMW now days all come standard from like 2005-2008