will be pretty difficult to get through I guess cause everybody wants to call on Monday. If you do, pls share the details.
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I agree , expecting to sell 15thou a year by 2015 was being a bit hopeful , they needed to aim at figures more along the likes of the French cars in our market and build their image with the aussie buyer over time .Also I think they needed to aim their advertising at being more a premium brand than with a funny accent idea they ran with .
It seems to me that the reasons Opel are citing for their departure, should have been the very factors taken into account when considering whether to launch in Australia. I think there was very few people who believed that Opel could sell 15,000 cars a year by 2015.
Anybody heard of any big discounts on remaining Corsas?
Yeah. there are quite a few. Spoke with a complete douche today at a dealership down east (its obvious they have lost all care since the announcement), and he said that all of the prices are being dropped. Anything they dont sell is going back on the boat and a reimbursement given
A lot of things need to be cleared out. Example, if holden will honour fixed servicing and warranties - holden have significantly less fixed service cost on the updated cruze Sri/sriv models that have the same mechanicals as the astra select and sport, so why should opel owners pay the premium service of opel when it's going to be serviced by holden?
I am trying to think of a more retarded, less thought out and short lived foray into Australia by a manufacturer than Opels effort.
Alas I cannot....even Seat make Opel look good.
OK, this will be a bit of a vent post - but it needs to be as I was with Opel from day 1 to closure (one of few). I was and am very passionate about the brand hence I am with Opel and on OpelAus long before Opel as a brand were here. These are only my thoughts so do not reflect any other Opel employees/dealers etc.
- To anyone saying the cars were not cheap enough or dealers did not discount them enough...they were. At the current prices, an Astra had about $2000 left for the dealer before any discounts. With the average buyer wanting $3k off a car or they would another X brand, this was a big challenge. Cheaper prices were just not possible! No profit = no point in selling cars here. Competition is very fierce, a lot of the time it came to fighting against other Opel dealers which didnt benefit anyone.
- BRAND AWARENESS. None! Concentrated on reducing the price too much, rather than building a BRAND and an image
- Lack of ads, little advertising.
- No plan. 15 000 cars by 2015?? Pfff, that was picked out of the sky!
- Didnt give it enough time. It was picking up slowly, but closing down after 11 months on the market - what did GM expect in 11 months?!
- Internally at a corporate level = useless. To get any action or answers, took repeat emails/phone calls etc.
The product is great, value for money was too compared to semi European brands. It is a shame, they will be rare gems on our roads.
The Mid Ja price was the same as it was for months. The original pricing that was released last August changed around December and stayed there. Mid Ja was basically a promotion about the reduced pricing (and introduced free service on Astra). But yes, a lot of dealers were selling at a loss, made it very hard to compete. I had customers wanted to buy a car from us but we simply could not match a price that was offered by another Opel dealer on carsales etc. A lot of those 'cheap' dealers relied on overall numbers for a bonus from Opel at the end of each month...silly to do and very hard to compete. These same dealers now have 20+ demos in their dealerships that they sold to 'themselves' to hit monthly targets.
Opel doesnt really exist here anymore and I am not saying anything 'private' so meh.