And while the loss per vehicle will shrink as more are built and sold, GM is still years away from making money on the Volt, which will soon face new competitors from Ford, Honda and others.
GM's basic problem is that "the Volt is over-engineered and over-priced," said Dennis Virag, president of the Michigan-based Automotive Consulting Group.
And in a sign that there may be a wider market problem, Nissan, Honda and Mitsubishi have been struggling to sell their electric and hybrid vehicles, though Toyota's Prius range has been in increasing demand.
GM's quandary is how to increase sales volume so that it can spread its estimated $1.2-billion investment in the Volt over more vehicles while reducing manufacturing and component costs -- which will be difficult to bring down until sales increase.
But the Volt's steep $39,995 base price and its complex technology - the car uses expensive lithium-polymer batteries, sophisticated electronics and an electric motor combined with a gasoline engine - have kept many prospective buyers away from Chevy showrooms.
Some are put off by the technical challenges of ownership, mainly related to charging the battery. Plug-in hybrids such as the Volt still take hours to fully charge the batteries - a process that can been speeded up a bit with the installation of a $2,000 commercial-grade charger in the garage.
The lack of interest in the car has prevented GM from coming close to its early, optimistic sales projections. Discounted leases as low as $199 a month helped propel Volt sales in August to 2,831, pushing year-to-date sales to 13,500, well below the 40,000 cars that GM originally had hoped to sell in 2012.
chicago tribune link above, story by reuters
what the wire service is basically saying is the volt has an unusually if not exorbitantly expensive production cost
AND
it's simply, bottom line, NOT a good product
ie, why was production suspended this year?
TWICE?
reuters answers---unequivocally---in paragraph 13: "weak sales"
govt motors
hopes to break even in year 3, reports reuters, with it's next gen model
it's all about, according to reuters, the volt's "unique parts," identified as "battery packs, electric motor and power electronics"
ie, "richer content, complex technology and low production volume"
that latter is elaborated on: "suppliers also impose cost penalties... because production remains well below projections"
"according to industry analysts contacted by reuters"
the volt has moved 21,500 cars, net
2/3 of sales in july and august---not many sales, by the way---were leases costing $279 per month, some as low as $199
toyota's prius, in contrast, sold 164,000 this year
anecdotally, the piece visits a dealer in toms river, NJ, who sells 90-100 chevy's a month---he has moved one volt in all 2012
raymond chevy in chicago deals 1000 vehicles per month, only 3 to 7 of em being obamamobiles
munro: "i don't see how gm will ever get its money back on that vehicle"
in other words, the taxpayers won't get THEIR money back
tax cheat in chief tim geithner's treasury dept: public to lose 25B on gm
the ipo was $34, it needs to get to 54 to make us whole
it closed today at $23.15
of course, "the production cost will come down as more are sold"
which, if you're in toms river, means one obamamobile per year