Very profound predictions: will Buick be around in 2011 to receive Opel?

Bad idea

Please Buick, don’t call it a Skylark.

gerhardt, they can’t. Burned that bridge with the last two (remember those, the Cavalier clone in the 80’s and the Achieva twin in the 90’s). Although if anyone is arrogant enough to try and pull it off it’s GM. Too bad, I always liked the name Skylark. My grandfather had a ‘69 2 door.

JJT -”Bad idea”
I dont see how. Buick needs smaller more youthful cars in the US. As long as its sold as a 4 door and a coupe with a trunk this will fall nicely into the entry level spot at Buick

Buick w/ a 3-door ‘hatchback’, r u serious?! The next-gen astra needs to end up as the a rebadged aveo replacement in the form of 3/5-door hatches. Buick only needs the basics: some nicely designed mid & full-sized luxury, or “semi-luxury” ,-), crossovers and sedans along w/ a mid-sized coupe/convertible or foldable hardtop convertible. Anything else would be too far a stretch for the Buick brand!

GM should replace the Chevy Aveo with the ASTRA. It would sell much better in a Chevy showroom,
and the Aveo needs to be replaced.

Everything Buick does is embarrassing. The Astra rendering looks pretty slick. IF GM is going to bring the Astra here, keep the Opel name plate like Toyota-Scion.

Problem with the Aveo idea is that the Astra is more in line with the VW Golf and Mazda3, so it’s priced way out of the Aveo line – althought he Corsa is a good Aveo replacement (Could even call it the Corsica – get it?). I agree it shouldn’t be a Buick and knowing this was going to happen like I mentioned before is why I had the most problem with GM getting rid of the Pontiac division. Strip it to just the G8 and Solstice – but you need the youthness to that brand to make these Opel products successful in the US.

Actually, that’s the best news I’ve heard from GM for a long time. I’m happy this the Astra is coming back – the next gen is going to be a great car no matter the name on it – which still should be Pontiac and the Insignia still will come (hopefully).

Some other questions this brings up:

Where’s the Insignia going to go?

WTF is Adam Opel vs. GME Europe AG? Are all they doing is selling the name and dealer network then?

its to bad they are getting rid of Pontiac. The next-gen Astra coupled with the G8 and Solstice would have given GM a nice sporty line to sell along side less exciting buicks and GMCs….oh well.

Buick desperately needs a next generation Grand National, and boattail Riviera.

I’m going to have to agree with tripleonefive on this one fellas. GM needs to lower their customer age bracket if they are going to have any kind of serious chance in todays market. The younger segment has grown up and now they have jobs and families but the still want something sporty yet semi luxurious. An entry level Buick like this sounds like it will bring people younger than 58 into buick show rooms. As long as GM doesnt do their usual ‘badge engineer the hell out of it’ scheme and market it correctly it will sale. I’m all for GM downsizing and utilizing their resources both foreign and domestic.

For the love of all that is sacred, please offer an Opel conversion kit through the dealership.

And the reason the original astra didnt “set the sales charts on fire” is because it was overpriced and undermarketed, and also likely because there was no Redline model. A 200hp+ astra for $19,900 is what they needed. The base astra should have been more in-line with the (gulp) Scion tC. Yes it has similar MSRP but the Scion has much better standard features, all the right features that someone in that price bracket would want, and acceptable performance for a $16-17k car. Not to mention the fact that the 3-Door version of the Astra is the most expensive, starting off at $19k. I love hatchbacks, but i dont want 5-doors if there is a 3-door option (cough cough, A3), and the current Astra’s pricing model is simply screwed.

^ Couldn’t agree with you any more A4. I think a little bit of me dies when I see a 4-Door GTI or A3 or Astra running around. Sure if you have a family – but then just but the GLI or A4.

It wouldn’t be a Skylark anyway because the Skyhawk was the entry level car/hatchback. Astra is a hatchback. Skyhawk would fit but GM isn’t using those names anymore. It will probably be called another weird name like Enclave, Lacrosse, Lucerne….. so it will something weird.

of course a buick model will be priced even higher than the overpriced saturn, so what is the point. its going to take another 10-15 years for buick to shake its “old geezer” stigma, so look for the same numbers that saturn sold and gm saying “geee, we really thought it would take off.” same old piss poor vision by gm, throwing anything on the wall hoping it will stick. does anyone here truly believe buick is jut going to take off and sell here in the u.s.? of course not, just more of our money thrown out the window, much like the continuing saturn ads that make it seem like all is fine in saturn land. all this after canning the “youth, performance, and excitement division”, whats next on the moronic decision list?

Guys, what am I not saying???

Buick old geezer image to take 10-15 years? They already are selling at an average age of 55, just 4 years older than Honda. And only 7 years higher than industry average.

All it takes is the right products. The Enclave is selling way below 55. The new LaCrosse will also sell well below. Buick by this time next year will be average of 50, same as Honda.

let get the gt over here since the sky and solstice are basically gone

i saw i saturn astra on the road yesterday and it was the first one i saw on the road ever, so i took a pic of it cause i was so shocked. sales were so slow, that there is no 2009 saturn astra. dealers are still trying to sell 2008s.

Buick sold small and sporty cars before-skyhawk, skylark, grand national. It wouldn’t take long to change perception because Buick cars are known for reliability.
Heck, I would rather have a Buick tagged Astra over the Chevy Cruze.

Johnny, the J-body Buick was a SkyHAWK, the Skylark shared the N-body with the Olds Calais/Achieva, and Pontiac Grand Am since 85 or 86 when the FWD N platform replaced X body Citation/Phoenix/Omega/Skylark models.

I think Skylark would be a great name for for Buick Astra… or maybe Skyhawk, because no one remembers what a Skyhawk was anymore, as you proved, Johnny.