While there has been a drop in total Hummer sales recently, the GM division is actually planning to grow its sales by about 250 percent in the next couple of years, and a pair of Canadian executives are behind that drive.Susan Docherty and Maureen Kempston Darkes were huddled around ''a farm line phone'' at the Kariega Game Reserve in South Africa for a recent media conference call to announce that Hummer would use GM's Struandale factory in Port Elizabeth to manufacture the upcoming H3 model for markets outside of North America.
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| Susan Docherty (photo : General Motors) |
According to Docherty, who is Hummer's general manager, with the production from that US$100 million investment in South Africa, the brand will be selling about 80,000 units a year by 2008, which is up from 30,000 or so it sold in 2004.''This program will be very significant when we look back on hummer's history, in our strategy to make Hummer into a global premium brand,'' Docherty asserted over the phone. Hummer has an iconic status in North America and abroad, and GM plans to capitalize on that. There is no better place to do that than here in south Africa.''Docherty said the H3 is ''right-sized for the international market, and you need to have right-hand-drive and a diesel engine to do that,'' which is of course what the Struandale facility will contribute.Where the brand goes in sales volume after that if it follows the obvious development process and brings out a smaller and less-expensive H4 model nobody knows, but Docherty freely admitted to the media listening in that ''I want the H4 as much as you guys do,'' so it's probably a significant amount.For the time being, Hummer's growth will come from the H3, which will be smaller and less expensive than the original H1 or the more civilized H2 and is expected later this year in Canada, Mexico and the U.S. Vehicles from the new plant won't be available for global sales until late 2006 or early 2007, however.
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| Maureen Kempston Darkes (photo : General Motors) |
According to Darkes, who is a GM group vice-president and the president of GM's Latin America, Africa and the Middle East (LAAME) division, when South African assembly begins it will involve components originally produced in GM's Shreveport, Louisiana plant. ''The new assembly operation in South Africa will focus on the implementation of revised content -- such as right-hand drive -- exclusively for H3s sold outside North America,'' said the former president of GM of Canada. It will also be essentially the same vehicle that's sold in Canada, and with the same quality ratings, she promised.While the H3 will certainly look like its large and more expensive siblings, said Docherty, it will differ from them markedly in the way in which it will appeal to consumers. While the H1 is a fourth vehicle for its owners and the H3 maybe a third set of wheels, Docherty said from South Africa, the H3 will be ''their primary vehicle'' for their work or private lives. As for the idea that Hummer sales might be held hostage by the ever-rising price of fuel, Docherty said that's not really an issue. ''Hummer is a strategic and personal choice for our customers, with great capabilities and iconic design. The price of gas is not driving the purchase of the Hummer.''