By the time you read this, the North American International Auto Show (NAIAS) will have come and gone from Detroit's Cobo Hall. You will have read all the hype surrounding the new Chevy Camaro and Dodge Challenger concepts, and by now you are thirsting for more real information like "when" and "how much." The truth is, I don't know the answer to these questions, but more importantly, neither does GM or Chrysler. That's a good thing, because it gives us the opportunity to influence matters before both models become set in stone.
I don't know about you, but I love Detroit's new musclecars. I've got an '05 Mustang GT and would love to add a new rear-wheel drive V8 Camaro or Challenger to the garage. But I'm not a lemming. Potential buyers are not going to run out and scarf up these new ponycars just because they have a magic name badge. They need to be the right cars mechanically, economically, and stylistically. So with that in mind, I'm issuing a manifesto to GM and Chrysler. To GM and Chrysler, I say follow these eight steps, and success is guaranteed. Ignore them at your economic peril.
1. Price it right-There are already plenty of mid-range and high-end performance cars on the market and even more in the pipeline. Many of us have mortgage payments and kids we want to put through school, so a $30,000 V8 ponycar will most likely be out of the question. Younger guys won't have that kind of cash either. They'll just get a Scion tC. You'll need conquest buyers to make your ponycars work, so the bang-for-the-buck quotient better be high. Thinking about low volume and high pricing for these cars? Forget it. Ford will eat your lunch with the Mustang. On the subject of rebates: You won't need them if the car is designed and priced right.
2. Keep it lightweight-Extra weight is a downward spiral from which engineering (and the ET slip) cannot recover. The more weight you add, the more power the engine needs just to stay even. Then you need a bigger fuel tank, bigger wheels, bigger brakes, bigger tires, a stiffer chassis to carry all that, then an even bigger engine to haul all that around. Now the car is 15 percent to 20 percent heavier than when you put pen to paper. Keep the gingerbread out of the car. If people want DVD players, nav systems, million-watt stereos, or seat heaters, let 'em buy a 300C. Musclecars-and ponycars in particular-are about putting the biggest engine in the smallest car. Let the Trailblazer SS and the SSR be your poster boys for how not to do things.
3. Keep it simple-Back in the day, you could order a Camaro or Mustang with heater and radio delete. Guys didn't care, they just wanted to go fast. Offer a low-cost, low-option version with the V8 (like Ford did with the Mustang LX 5.0) to go along with the loaded ones. Use a solid axle, make a manual transmission standard, make the V8 an option available on the entry-level package, and don't force us to buy $3,000 of extra crap to get the V8.
4. Stay with the formula-A ponycar needs V8 power, rear-wheel drive, a solid axle, and two doors. (We're repeating, but you OEMs need to get this through your heads.) A ponycar is a small coupe with coupe styling. If it's anything but this, you already make it in some form or another, and we don't need another heavy sport sedan. Don't clinic your cars to death-the only customer focus group you need is hot rodders, not soccer moms.
5. Follow Ford's lead-Like before, Ford has done all the hard work and taken all the risks by being first. Now that you have the advantage of knowing the market behavior, don't screw it up. Cop the attitude that "it wasn't invented here" and you could be slapping heavy rebates on the hood and laying off workers by the thousands. Ford got the price right, they got the power right, they got the simplicity right, and they got the looks right. Could they have done things better? Probably, but that's where you come in. Just don't screw with the basic formula.
6. Get it to market fast-We're tired of OEMs continually floating concepts by us year after year without bringing anything to market. The Chevy SS concept was a prime example of lots of sizzle, but no steak in sight. We don't know if you're serious, or just baiting us. You have a lot of long-term loyal customers, many of whom bought your cars back in the '60s and '70s. The longer you wait, the more customers float off to that great drag strip in the sky-or that assisted living home across town. Seriously, if people have to wait until 2009, they are just gonna buy a Mustang instead.
7. It needs to look cool-It costs the same amount of money to build a cool-looking car as it does an ugly car. Most people who buy performance coupes already own an ugly car to commute in, so they're not going to spend disposable income on another ugly car. Draw from your rich heritage and the beautiful designs of the past ('69 Camaro and '70 Challenger) to bring back old customers while winning over new ones. And just so you know, boxes are not cool-looking.
8. Don't write "styling" checks your "manufacturing" bank can't cash-Stay faithful to your concept when you go to production (unless the concept sucks, in which case, we'll tell you). We're on to OEM bait-and-switch tactics. Dodge pulled that one on the world back in 1999 with the swoopy Charger concept. When it finally came to market, it looked like a Frigidaire. GM did the same thing with the Buick Lacross. Ford did it with the 427 concept (renamed as the Fusion). You've got great designers, the only problem is that you let your manufacturing engineers dictate style to you. And for what, to save a few pennies at a stamping station? Instead, do it like Pontiac did with the Solstice. There are no compromises in the street version of the Solstice; it's a faithful rendition of the original concept.