“Bittersweet” defined

I leased my first Chevy Volt, on August 3, 2012 and my world changed almost immediately. I started blogging. I started going to car shows and EV club meetings. I began reading about EVs as much as I could. 14 months later, I became the “EV-angelist” for my Chevy dealer, Classic Chevrolet. 3-1/2 years later, Classic opened our EV & Hybrid Sales Center, which we nicknamed, “Electric Avenue.” During my tenure at Electric Avenue, we sold out of Bolt EVs three times and sold out of Volts once. Life was exciting but challenging, in that building, due to inventory struggles as well as public awareness of both the vehicles and the purpose of that building. I recently moved back to the main showroom, where I started, to have more customer engagement opportunities.

The big news of January 13th was that, in a earnings call, GM announced that the “disproportionate share” of the twenty new BEVs GM will produce by 2023, will be under the Cadillac brand. Apparently, they (as are all luxury auto makers) are feeling the heat of Tesla competition and GM wants a line of vehicles that can compete in that market. Also, the way the government subsidies were originally structured, as well as the fact that GM has hit the 200,000th plug-in vehicle, triggering a phase-out of the $7,500 Federal Income Tax Credit, the BEV market may remain the playground of the more wealthy buyers, for the short-term.

I get that and it makes sense. However, as much as Chevrolet has contributed to the promotion and production of plug-in vehicles, it pains me that I may have access to very few plug-in vehicles, in the near term. One thing that felt good was the pride I felt when I saw the images GM released of the first new Cadillac plug-in. It looks a lot like a very sexy Chevy concept vehicle I remember…

The new platform, called BEV3, is like a skateboard, with battery capacity configurable by dropping more “ice cubes” into the tray positions. The motors are also part of the platform, allowing front-, rear- or all-wheel-drive variants to be easily produced. It sounds a lot like the GM Autonomy “skateboard” chassis from 2002.

The BEV3 concept should allow GM to quickly produce new EVs, by just dropping a different vehicle onto the skateboard.Just a few days ago, I commented on how a Buick BEV concept, shown at the Beijing Auto Show early last year, looks a lot like the new Chevy Blazer, which will start arriving in dealerships shortly. The skateboard strategy should help decrease time-to-market for new designs, so I am hoping that Chevy, being the pioneer, will get some of the design iterations as well. It certainly seems GM’s presentation showed the same hope.I have been wondering if I’ve done all I can do to promote plug-in vehicles at the dealership level. Should I be looking for the next step, in my career, to improve my ability to reach more people? The answer will depend on the future, which is not yet set.

Patience is the keyword today.