“Chrysler dealers argued the Michigan automaker used unsound business practices to decide which dealers stayed and which dealers got the boot.”

I’d say so. Just looking at all of the dealers here in Iowa that got the boot from Chrysler, I’m gonna have to drive quite a distance to by a Dodge, Chrysler, or Jeep; Though, it’ll probably be a while before I consider doing that again.

Why is it every time I hear something about the bad Chrysler I wonder if they’re bringing back the Aspen and Volare?

Are you a good witch or a bad witch?

Ain’t that a Bittch!

… don’t forget the Cordoba!

The mutts that broke the “Old Chrysler” made the decision to cut these dealers…its the biggest theft of good capitalistic businesses I have ever seen. Mark my words, these losers they call themselves leaders, will be gone within a year from now. Many of the dealerships now will have to file for bankruptcy themselves. Bailout Nation…its such a shame.

Single brand or not, CHRYSLER should have bent over backwards to preserve their best dealers and maybe forced them to be All-in-one dealers.

CHRYSLER also should have ceased production when it was clear they were not moving product fast enough, if at all at times, instead of forcing dealers to buy more from them.

Even If, by some improbable set of circumstances, CHRYSLER and GM were to make the mother of all comebacks, I doubt those dealers would EVER consider carrying their vehicles again. They would rather carry YUGOs before DODGEs again, I’d wager.

Blakkar, you are right: remember Yugo was 20 year old incarnation of FIAT 127, just guess what Good Chrysler will be selling?

My organization has Chrysler and Dodge as well as many other franchises, yet Chrysler had a single point Jeep dealer only a few miles away. Before the **** hit the fan in September we had an average of 50 used Jeep sales per month while this pretender was delivering 3 to 4 new Jeeps per month. Where is the logic in that. Do you want your best product on a lot with 4000 vehicles in one location that sells 1200 cars per month? Or, do you want your best product on some old bastards lot that gets off by having something for his ego. This is the unwritten story in this context, and we will stock 500 of them jeeps soon enough.

Velvet, I am deeply entrenched in the auto industry and after seeing how the media/politicians treat/report on it really am wondering how accurate/truthful other stories are.

Misinformation is everywhere. There was NO government influence on what dealers were closed yet all I hear is how republican donors were hit. Idiots!!. Dealerships are small business’s and most all SBs, no matter what the type of business they are in, are republicans so of course a large percentage of closed dealerships are Republican donors. It goes on and on.

For years all the domestic 3 have been trying to update/clean up their franchises into combining/closing/updating/etc. and have spent billions doing it. Now is their chance to do it right for free, in Chryslers case, or at a much lower cost, in GMs case.

The right course of action would have been to stop giving the dealers cutbacks. Make the dealer buy the car outright and force the dealers to follow service and cleanliness standards. If the standards are not followed, the dealer is cut. If they can’t pay for the cars up front, the dealer goes out of business. Sure, it would have take longer to reduce the dealer numbers, but it would have been a lot fairer than the sh1t that was done.

Where I live Bob Dance lost his Dodge and Jeep/Chrysler dealership. Serves him right for screwing every customer he had.

Whether that was the reason of course nobody knows, but he was famous for his dealer tags that added $1k of BS fees to the cost of the vehicle.