Two Years Later, The Camaro Still Gets Clicks

I am just happy they are going to produce it!

Although I am a Mustang fan, the new aggressive Camaro design is strikingly good-looking. Let’s hope the base version is affordable enough to boost sales and help GM recover from the automotive sales slump.

The Camaro could have been a great car for GM… five years ago. This car is too late to market to make a significant dent in sales for GM. In addition, the endless parade of spy photos has already taken a lot of the shine and anticipation away from the introduction of the model (whenever that is).

Prediction:
1.) There will be a big splash and spike in sales at introduction, mainly from early adopters and baby boomers with a LOT of money.
2.) After about two years of price-gouging by starving Chevy dealers the incentives will begin (witness the current incentives on the Mustang).
3.) After 5 years and no styling updates GM will begin to wonder what went wrong. 4.) After 7 years the model will be cancelled with no successor planned.

Make it already! Thousands are waiting to buy one. Big V-8 please with six speed! Buy American!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have always been a GM guy at heart, growing up in Pontiac Station Wagons as a kid. I would take a 69 Camaro over a 70 Challenger however, I need to see this new Camaro actually on the street. Having seen both at Cobo over the last 2 years, I think the Challenger is simply fantastic. The Camaro interior promises to be considerably better than Challenger, but the Dodge is just so clean looking. Really gorgeous. The Camaro isn’t a Gorgeous car or shape, but is damn attractive. We’ll see what the Street says when they both hit it…

Might be pretty, but it looks like it’s a little too short on glass area for me to be able to live with it. I’m not a fan of high beltlines and short roofs.

GM will price it out of the “every man’s” reach, think Corvette prices and wonder why no one is buying them. I am not too happy with GM when they said there wouldn’t be a Firebird to go along with the Camaro. Of course they might make a El Camino version of the G8. Thanks GM! They wonder why people don’t buy their cars.

I wish them well but can’t help feeling the Camaro will wither after the initial interest dies down. Fact is, the base model will need to be by far the most successful model in the lineup to make it a sensible business case, and I don’t believe this will happen. That’s the reason the Camaro/Firebird went away in the first place. The base model Mustang sells very well to women, driving sales thus allowing for the other hi-po models. Also unlike the Mustang, the Camaro has significant negative brand equity from years of being seen as a car driven by dregs. I hope I’m wrong for all of us who care about American cars; maybe because the platform will be shared by more GM models this time around it won’t need to sell in as great a quanity. I hope for us enthusiasts that’s the case.

Give it a HO V6 backed up with a manual 6 speed and make it black. Offer the Turbo 4 thats in the HHR SS 260 HP. Give it the HO V-8. Lets see more than one model. Have somehing fun to drive if your and Avg Joe or his boss. I don’t mind being a bit slower than the V-8 getting better mileage but make it handle as well. The Turbo 4 could be the RS the HO V-6 coud be the SS and the HO V-8 could be the new Z28. offer a decent V6 for the base or maybe even a decent 4 or both. Have a manual trans in each package. Don’;t just offer it in the HO V8 and auto everythign else. Then wonder why no one wants one. Make the dealers stock the Manual cars and not just one or two. Coud be fun to have a turbo 4 with 260hp.
I don’t know but I do know once this car comes out I will be test drving one… I would say not buying one but I could see doign that

Everyone can talk about V8’s to their hearts content. But with gas prices going up, few people will actually want to buy one. The Camaro needs a good V6 for fuel economy and to keep the retail lower. If they cannot compete with the Mustang’s many price ranges, it will not succeed.

To WS:
That’s an interesting theory…I didn’t know Chevy dealers were starving, and I know of a great long list of dealers in my area who have promised me in writing not to charge a “market adjustment”, otherwise known as a dealer markup.

GM plans to make a great number of these cars, and if the 500,000 calls they received from the Transformers DVD insert says anything, it’s that there IS a demand for this car reaching far beyond the Baby-Boomer generation.

To Scott Brauer:
I wonder where you get you’re information about pricing, because it is to be priced close to the Mustang, it’s number one competitor…not the Corvette. WHICH, by the way, is doing EXCELLENT in sales numbers.

The decision to not produce a Pontiac Firebird was undoubtedly one made because the Firebird would have stolen sales away from the Camaro, resulting in neither car being profitable at all. As much as I like the screaming Chicken…it was a smart call on GM’s part.

To Chris D:
Of course interest and sales will settle after a while, they did with the Mustang, too. But GM is putting A LOT of emphasis on the base V6 model; in both marketing and engineering. They are not going to market the Camaro as a “muscle car” (even though it is ), which should assist in negating some of that negative association.

The V6 is to have a near-perfect 50:50 weight balance, and class-leading fuel economy, AND performance. The big V8, although going to be an extremely well performing car, is going to be less stressed this time around.

As a good friend, and asset to the Camaro enthusiast community constantly iterates:
“Keep the Faith” This car will NOT be a ‘failure’.

Ugly, Rick Wagner killed the first design which was a lot better looking.

I’d like to offer an opinion on what seem to be the three biggest issues around the Camaro - price, trim levels/motors, and life expectancy.

Price - From what I’ve read as coming straight from GM execs the Camaro will be priced ABOVE the Mustang. GM is trying to build and market the car as a better, nicer, more comfortable, and more up-level car. My gut feeling about where this puts prices is that the base Camaro would probably start somewhere around $23k (roughly $3k above the base Mustang). Since they’re talking somewhere around 400hp for the v8 I would peg the starting price for that car around $33k (seems like they’re aiming straight for the Challenger SRT8 and skipping right over the Mustang GT, which actually makes this price lower than that competitor). A 4-cyl turbo car could bring a low priced model back down to base Mustang v6 prices.

Trim level/Motors - If we’re going to bring back old trim levels then let’s be consistent with the styling of the Camaro and keep them in line with the trim levels of ‘69. The RS was just an appearance package and was available on NAY Camaro regardless of the motor. So that would not necessarily be a 4- or 6-cyl car. SS was the big motor Camaro in ‘69 - 350, 396, etc. - so this would be most appropriate to use on the v8 Camaro. Z28 was actually a small displacement, road course-ready, track car for the street that focused on higher revs and better balance. With that in mind this designation would best fit the v6 in a 3-motor line-up. Even without a 4-cyl in the mix this could be the HO version of the v6 (think 260hp base v6 with a 300 hp HO v6 a la CTS). Then if the market called for it you could really get crazy and offer the 550hp supercharged 6.2L from the CTS-V as a ZL-1. I would imagine the most likely range to be a 260hp v6, 400hp v8, and maybe a 500ish hp upper model later on. What I would LIKE to see is a real ‘69 style line up - 240 hp turbo 4-cyl base car, 260 hp v6, 300 hp HO v6 (Z28), 400 hp v8 (SS), and a 550 hp v8 (ZL-1).

Life expectancy - I really don’t see a problem with the Camaro lasting many years (even many model generations) with the above model possiblities. Especially if they offer a turbo 4-cyl car and a v6 car. Thos would account for most of the sales and would help to satisfy the CAFE standards while still allowing for a lower production run of v8 cars to satisfy those of us who are willing to spend more on gas in order to hear the beautiful song of those 8-cyl orchestras.

So that’s my rant about the Camaro. I hope you found it interesting. And just in case you’re wondering - I have no affiliation with GM and don’t actually KNOW anything. I’m just making some educated hypotheses.

To: Bob Wong. Buy American? It’s made in Canada!

I think GM was wrong to cancel the Camaro/Firebird, in the first place - how stupid to take away models that competed with the hot selling Mustang.
Looks like the new car has promise, IF we ever get our hands on it! GM, please don’t repeat the 82-84 F-car era by offering a woefully underpowered 4-cyl base engine - that was an embarrassment to the Camaro/Firebird heritage! would be kind of nice if GM would put the fuel filler on the DRIVER side. I’d like more info on the convertible - last I read, no decision had been made whether it was going to have a folding hardtop, or softtop; either way GM, PLEASE don’t design the top to fold into the trunk! Convertible tops used to fold behind the back seat, not effecting trunk space (except for the Ford Skyliners). My wife and I have two new convertibles (Miata & Mustang), neither of which lose any trunk space with the tops down.