News: Dodge will cancel the Grand Caravan! WTF

DannyITR

DannyITR

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http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/winds...nd-caravan-jobs-said-to-be-at-stake-1.2633467

Chrysler announced on Tuesday it will stop producing Dodge Grand Caravans. Instead, the company will continue to build only its luxury model minivan, the Chrysler Town and Country. Chrysler's flagship vehicle will continue to be built at the Windsor Assembly Plant in Windsor, Ont.


The Caravan was the original minivan, launched 30 years ago by Lee Iacocca in Windsor. Al Gardner, the head of the Chrysler brand, said the Dodge division of the company will focus on building performance vehicles only.

Gardner said the significant changes are designed to eliminate "excess product" in its product line. The changes are also meant to streamline their production and "do what we're good at," Gardner said. When the 2016 Chrysler Town and Country is launched, the Dodge Grand Caravan will be phased out.


U.S. sales of the Chrysler Town and Country increased 45 per cent from 2009 to 2013. Gardner is hoping to carry that on through the next few years.


The announcement was part of a marathon day of media conferences at Chrysler's headquarters in Auburn Hills, Mich., where Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne unveiled a five-year plan for the automaker.

Auto analyst Tony Faria, a professor at the University of Windsor, said Chrysler will be "hard-pressed" to keep making 300,000 minivans annually in Windsor.


"The worst-case scenario is that we lose a full shift at Windsor Assembly Plant. That could eliminate 1,000 jobs and even more supplier jobs," Faria warned. "What I really hope is that we see a new product come into the Windsor plant. There will be space for another vehicle."


Dodge Brand CEO Tim Kuniskis said the end of the Grand Caravan - and Avenger, also announced Tuesday - will lead to a temporary drop in Dodge brand sales. Chrysler has only committed to producing minivans in Windsor for the next five years. It had been seeking government assistance to pay for retooling the plant in Windsor and its plant in Brampton, where the company makes the Chrysler 300, Dodge Challenger and Dodge Charger.Kuniskis said Tuesday that Charger sales are outpacing segment growth.

Ontario PC Leader Tim Hudak called Chrysler's request "ransom." Marchionne eventually withdrew the company's request, saying the entire process had become "a political football."
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What a terrible move. Let me ask you this: Have you ever decided not to buy a sports car because that brand also produced a minivan? Ex: When you bought your S2000, did you care that Honda also offered the Odyssey?

You can't buy name recognition like the Caravan has. It was the original minivan and remains the best. All other manufactures try to emulate it. I'll bet as many as half of Caravan buyers don't even know the Chrysler Town & Country even exists!

That Dodge thinks this is a good idea is astounding. Hopefully they'll come to their senses, fire some people who obviously have no clue what their doing and reverse the move before 2016.
 
Quelle décision bizarre.
Pourquoi ne pas garder leur version de base qui est la Grand Caravan au lieu de garder la Town & country?... Les familles qui ne désirent pas payer trop cher tournent le dos aux Odyssey,Sienna (et feu Quest), Chrysler était le seul dans le secteur des mini-fourgonnettes "abordables" avec la Grand Caravan....
 
C'est quoi cette mentalité que sous un même nom on ne peut pas avoir des chars différents allant de l'éconobox, au char sport, à la minivan, au pickup et un supercar?

Mes parents ont déjà eu un 2001 Chevrolet Venture minivan qui était dans les même prix et a été le premier char que j'ai conduit à vie. Ils avaient acheté un démo full equip à moins cher pour sauver, le Town & Country n'aurai jamais été une option.
 
Good move IMO. Minivan buyers have moved upscale, people who buy them have big families and want luxury features.

The lower end of the market today (sub 30k), thinks minivans are lame. They rather drive a SUV/CUV. IMO killing off the minivan will just increase sales for Jeep products and the 2016 Journey.
 
Jvoit pas ou est le probleme le town and country est tjrs la. Il vont surement faire une version plus de base.
 
They will probably offer a cheaper Town and Country and sell more gay Jeeps marketed at your wife.
 
This brand streamlining excuse doesn't make sense to me. When you bought your Corvette Z06, did you care Chevrolet offered the Uplander minivan?
 
Ce que ton article ne dit pas c'est que la prochaine incarnation du Caravan serait categorise comme un Cross Over
le prochain duo Caravan et Town&Country partagera une base commune
le T&C sera un minivan conventionnel luxueux c'est le gros vendeur actuellement aux USA ou les bannieres Chrysler et Dodge sont souvent separees chez les dealers contrairement au Canada mais les Canadiens auront doit a une version depouillee entry level qui ne sera pas disponible aux USA pour compenser et vu que les dealers sont Chrysler Dodge lici e monde qui veullent un Caravan vont trouver un minivan dans la cour de leur dealer favori
le prochain Caravan remplacera ala fois le Journey actuel et le Caravan actuel en une sorte de SUV Cargo qui se comportera comme une voiture plus qu'un camion
la prochaine incarnation du Journey sera un vrai SUV

le groupe Fiat refait l'image et le positionnement d toutes ses marques
Chrysler sera la division "people mover"
Dodge sera la division "youth" et reintegre la Viper
Ram est la division "truck"
Fiat sera la division "econo" sur les marches mondiaux
Lancia sera la division "people mover" en europe
Alfa Romeo sera la division "upper scale"
Maserati sera la division "high end"
Ferrari restera ce qu'elle est toujours
 
DannyITR said:
This brand streamlining excuse doesn't make sense to me. When you bought your Corvette Z06, did you care Chevrolet offered the Uplander minivan?
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Je pense que ton exemple est trop poussée. Je pense plutot que le constructeur raisonne en se disant : de plus en plus de gens envisage la Corvette Z06 de prime à bord. Or, ils ne considerent même pas la Uplander. Je ne pense pas que c'est stupide d'un point de vue nord-américain, les gens aux states check tout de suite la T&C, il ne s'attarde plus vraiment à la Grand Caravan. La decision est justifiée selon moins. Quoique oui je trouve que c'est relativement précipité comme move, mais elle fait du sens.
 
C'est sûr qu'en promotion à 20 000$ à l'année longue, les marges de profit devaient pas être énormes.
Mais c'est sûr que les ventes vont dropper d'une shot, je ne sais pas à quoi ils pensent.

Mais je suis quand même rassuré de savoir que quand j'achèterai ma Dart, cette dernière ne sera pas associée à une image de famille gentille mais bien de muscle car.
 
I think they want chrysler to become a luxury brand and as for dodge, the entry level brand. (200c, 300c lineups....) Therefore, elimating grand caravan and use chrysler's town & county to compete luxury vans like sienna, oddysey , ect ... The grand caravan has been sold a tons because it was cheap (starting at 18-19k$) for a HUGE van .... They sell a lot , yes. Do they make as much as honda and toyota with their vans? While odyssey and sienna were easily over 30k+ and 40k$+ fully opt.

Sent from my GT-N7105 using Tapatalk 2
 
Ayashifx55 said:
I think they want chrysler to become a luxury brand and as for dodge, the entry level brand. (200c, 300c lineups....) Therefore, elimating grand caravan and use chrysler's town & county to compete luxury vans like sienna, oddysey , ect ... The grand caravan has been sold a tons because it was cheap (starting at 18-19k$) for a HUGE van .... They sell a lot , yes. Do they make as much as honda and toyota with their vans? While odyssey and sienna were easily over 30k+ and 40k$+ fully opt.

Sent from my GT-N7105 using Tapatalk 2
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Chrysler will be the "familly" car division with the new 200, 300C which will be tamed down , the luxury T&C, the upcomming D car (a smaller RWD sedan) and an expected return of the upper scale Imperial model

Dodge will be the "enthusiast" division with the racier cars and SUVs they will have exclusivity of the Hellcat engine, a 6.2L 650+ hps supercharged hemi

they already moved all Dodge trucks under the newer Ram brand plus Ram will also get the north american version of the small Fiat Doblo to complet the ford transit connect
 
Ayashifx55 said:
I think they want chrysler to become a luxury brand and as for dodge, the entry level brand. (200c, 300c lineups....) Therefore, elimating grand caravan and use chrysler's town & county to compete luxury vans like sienna, oddysey , ect ... The grand caravan has been sold a tons because it was cheap (starting at 18-19k$) for a HUGE van .... They sell a lot , yes. Do they make as much as honda and toyota with their vans? While odyssey and sienna were easily over 30k+ and 40k$+ fully opt.

Sent from my GT-N7105 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...

The thing is that people who buy a Honda or Sienna buy those for the better ride quality and mostly reliability image. The T&C is just a Caravan with a bunch of useless gadgets, it's not a truely better car. Good if it works in the USA, but they don't seem to sell that much in Canada so far.

Like you said, they sold caravan for the price, but I think that most caravan buyers would buy the Sienna/Odyssey over the T&C if the cheap caravan isn't avaiable anymore, or they will scrifice some room and get a cheap Crossover.

Alain95i4 said:
Chrysler will be the "familly" car division with the new 200, 300C which will be tamed down , the luxury T&C, the upcomming D car (a smaller RWD sedan) and an expected return of the upper scale Imperial model

Dodge will be the "enthusiast" division with the racier cars and SUVs they will have exclusivity of the Hellcat engine, a 6.2L 650+ hps supercharged hemi

they already moved all Dodge trucks under the newer Ram brand plus Ram will also get the north american version of the small Fiat Doblo to complet the ford transit connect
Click to expand...

What's going on, no french anymore? And it would be about time that they import the Doblo, with a diesel and a manual gearbox hopefully (one of the two would already be nice). But if they sell the Doblo at the price of the Ford it won't really work. The base grade Caravan was also quite cheaper than the "ram" Caravan, they are killing the caravan to sell Fiat piece of crap for more money (with less room probably) and an overpriced Caravan (T&C).
 
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