This is an odd thought.......

Here is something for all of you guys freaking out about what the 5th gen is going to be like.

Some guys from GM put there heads together and thought about why the 4th gen failed.... and thought "Hey lets change that about the 5th gen!" Or did you think they said "Hey the mustang is selling well, lets throw a 5th gen together and see if it sells"

TONY

Does any one have some Jack Handy "Deep Thoughts" quotes I can use?

What if a lot of the things that caused the 4th gen to fail are not an issue with the Mustang?

I cant remember this one exactly but its on my profile, goes like "If you are in a war, instead of throwing a hand grenade at someone, throw a little baby-like pumpkin, maybe it will make them think of how crazy war is, and while they are thinking you can throw a real grenade."

I think they toggled with the idea after they saw our demand for one, the blog, emails, letters, etc. It may have got kicked into high gear when the new Mustang came out but I think it had of already been in the process.

I wonder if any hardcore camaro fans are going to start a killing spree Jan. '06 when the camaro comes to the auto show and it's not what they expect.

TONY

Only if it looks like george jetson's car made it with a high heel shoe.

I'm sorry but I personally don't think the 4th gen "failed" nor have I ever seen anywhere that GM claimed it was a failure. Yes they didn't sell well, however the majority of that can be attributed to almost zero marketing at the tail end of its life. To write off the 4th gen Camaro as a complete failure is asinine if you ask me; especially when you consider that the quickest and most powerful Camaros in the entire history of the car where the last year LS1s.

:irk:

To write off the 4th gen Camaro as a complete failure is asinine if you ask me; especially when you consider that the quickest and most powerful Camaros in the entire history of the car where the last year LS1s.

:irk:

But that doesn't make it a success ;)

hmm i considered the whole "not making them anymore" a failure........


TONY

hmm i considered the whole "not making them anymore" a failure.......
And Ford no longer makes the Model A. I guess that makes them a failure in your eyes as well. :rolleyes:

Aztec??

I take that sales falling off by 100k units in less then 10 years being a failure.
The car become way to over the top. Tons of power, very low seating with LONG hood, horrible blind spots, awkward windshield rake, lack of interior space for large car. It really stopped being a Camaro and started to become a 4 seater Corvette.

And Ford no longer makes the Model A. I guess that makes them a failure in your eyes as well. :rolleyes:
Well it would be a failure in my eyes if GM, Chrysler and Toyota were still selling crankstart cars with great success. Otherwise, it's a sort of crappy analogy.

The bottom line is that the Camaro failed even as other cars in the segment fourished. I'm not just talking about Mustang (although that would be enough). The Eclipse and to a lesser extent the Celica also rose to cult status during the 90's. Many of the buyers for these coupes would have been driving F-bodies in the 1980's.

The 4th gen Camaro is my favorite car in the world, but it did not sell, and neither would a 5th gen if it followed the same design path. Sure GM mismanagement played in the sales decline, but most of the blame falls with the basic design of the car being incompatible with the needs and desires of the general public.

It sold alright for a few years, then they abandoned it in marketing, upgrades, and then completely. It wasn't a failure, it just wasn't a huge success. There is room in the middle.

I Think all are right. There was a lack of success in gen 4 because of marketing and the car was to far off from public need.

It sold alright for a few years, then they abandoned it in marketing, upgrades, and then completely. It wasn't a failure, it just wasn't a huge success. There is room in the middle.

How many ads in any media did the last version of mustang have in it's last few years? IIRC, not too many. Hell, ever since the initial launch there haven't been many ads for the new one either, they still sell great, and sold great even when it was a tired old SN95. Hell, people still bought SN95s even when they knew a new and improved version was coming out right around the corner. Now that's a great car and a true success.

If fbody wasn't a failure, they would have developed a replacement for it rather than kill it. If you'd rather term it somewhere in the middle, that's up to you, but it's pretty obvious what GM thought about it.

I'm sorry but I personally don't think the 4th gen "failed" nor have I ever seen anywhere that GM claimed it was a failure. Yes they didn't sell well, however the majority of that can be attributed to almost zero marketing at the tail end of its life. To write off the 4th gen Camaro as a complete failure is asinine if you ask me; especially when you consider that the quickest and most powerful Camaros in the entire history of the car where the last year LS1s.

:irk:

:bow:

I think the answer is yes to both ...

I also don't think the 4th gen failed. I believe it was a victim of circumstance: built in a plant too big for the production numbers in a location GM wanted to abandon, constricted by labour agreements, not sharing a platform with other GM products, not getting the updates it needed, etc. I believe from many conversations I have had that it will go down in history as one of the most underestimated and unappreciated automotive bargains in history.

I Think all are right. There was a lack of success in gen 4 because of marketing and the car was to far off from public need.


I find it strange, that 98-02 4th Gens Camaros often appeared as a sybol of caring about your car, or beauty. My example is this, I remember many different companys have a picture in a magazine where a hand is on the hood of a camaro with a spung and a bit of soap suds. Or the enterprise rental car comercial where they want to see the guy or girl in style in the 4th gen camaro. Or the Paint advertisements that use the Ws6/SS as a prime example of how a "their" paint job looks, or how a paint job ought to look. or the Interstate battery company has camaros on the side of their trucks showing reliablity, or the light company Sylvania uses a camaro to show their lights off in their advertisements...

Why was the camaro such a symbol in advertisement used by other companys but GM abandoned the car? even a 7 year old design is still being advertised as beauty, or a symbol of an owners care for his/her car?

I mean this is the reason we are all here, we care about the queen in our driveway. but has anyone else noticed that the camaro is used to advertise care? or beauty?

The bottom line is that the Camaro failed even as other cars in the segment fourished. I'm not just talking about Mustang (although that would be enough). The Eclipse and to a lesser extent the Celica also rose to cult status during the 90's.

HUH?!?! Other sports coupes "flourished"? Someone please post the decline in overall sports coupe sales in the 90's. It was pretty substantial. Of the two cars you mentioned, the Celica is dead (though replaced by the Scion tC, granted) and Eclipse sold in even fewer numbers than the "failed" 4th Gen Camaro. "Rising to cult status" doesn't mean you're a success, and if it does, you could consider the '93-'02 Camaro an even bigger "cult" success.

The problem with the 4th Gen near the end was that it was trying to succeed based on 1980's principles. Besides the skin and interior, the car was basically a 1982 Camaro. The low-slung, 4 seat Corvette idea that worked so well for it 20 years ago simply doesn't work today, if you're talking about selling a volume pony car anyway.

i still think that there were alot more things than we know about that contributed to the demise of the fbody. the labor agreement, the plant, etc. but i also think that the car was built as an ENTHUSIASTS car! the general public didn't care how well it handled or how much power it had. we did and thats what we got and look how it sold. i'll be the first to admit my 4th gen isn't a practical daily driver(thats why i have other cars) but it's fun as hell when i go racing or take it to the strip. unfortunately, the rest of the country doesn't share in the latter.

And Ford no longer makes the Model A. I guess that makes them a failure in your eyes as well. :rolleyes:
The only tihng that died was the name.

They replaced the model A with something new.

Camaro now equals..........

You got it. Nothing.

The only tihng that died was the name.

They replaced the model A with something new.

Camaro now equals..........

You got it. Nothing.

If you drink the Chevy marketing Kool-Aid, Camaro was replaced....by Cavalier/Cobalt coupe and Monte Carlo. :lol:

Is that like Jackson's Jesus juice?

Is that like Jackson's Jesus juice?


:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

now that WAS funny.