There seems to be indications that the slow selling Buick Lacrosse will be cancelled after the 2008 model run.

Buick Lacrosse sales so far this year are off 27% with sales for the month of July down over 36%

GM over the next few years will combine Pontiac and Buick into the same dealer network, and according to plans layed out last year, will elminate vehicle overlap. The Pontiac Grand Prix and Buick Lacrosse both share GM's "W" body architecture. Although Grand Prix sales dropped a staggering 42% for the month of July, sales this year are off only 2%.

Grand Prix is expected to continue.

General Motors is expected to announce Monday it's plans to revamp their Oshawa plant in Ontario into a "flex-assembly" facility that will produce a diverse line of rear wheel drive cars that include large sedans for Chevrolet and Buick, and 2 coupes including the new Camaro. The plant is also expected to concurrently continue production of the current front wheel drive Impala and a refreshened Pontiac Grand Prix for a short period of time. There apparently are no plans to continue the current front wheel drive Chevrolet Monte Carlo or Buick Lacrosse when the current production run ends.

Buick's Lacrosse was introduced in 2005 as a replacement for both the Buick Century and Buick's Regal, however sales have not approached the combine totals of those 2 cars. According to General Motors Product Chairman, Bob Lutz, the Monte Carlo is scheduled to move to the new rear drive chassis, possibly as early as the 2009 model year.


The Lacrosse is called the Buick Allure in Canada. The Lacrosse name was chosen in an effort to lure younger buyers to Buick. However, before introduction the name was changed for the Canadian market to Allure. Rumor has it the change was precipitated by the discovery the word "Lacrosse" in means masturbation in French speaking Québecois slang.

 

Thats interesting. I dont know if its a good thing or a bad thing that GM has decided to weed out slow sellers quickly.

Makes it hard to see how Buick/Pontiac is gonna work with little to no overlap, unless they are planning on decreasing the dissonance between the two brands character...

 

This also leads me to believe that the next GTO will be Aussie-built (at least for a while).

 

Design it right and I don't think it would be a slow seller. They didn't look bad in say black with proper wheels, but they never stood out enough IMO.
I think Buick needs a proper cohesive theme going across the whole model lineup. Seems like one model is not so related to the next if you ask me.

 

Lucerne also outsells the LaCrosse at a higher price point.

 

Having seen it in the metal, its an ugly car IMHO. It's like Buick tried to copy Jaguar's design cues and got it horribly wrong. It just doesn't look like a car to take Buick forward. Not like the handsome Velite concept or the soon to be release Enclave... so why not drop it?

Sorry for the negativity but Buick got it so wrong with Lacrosse... the 3.8L engine in the base model sends the wrong message to Lexus owners looking to jump to a Buick (sarcasm intended).

 

So how many models are we looking for Buick to have by 2010? Three? Some sort of FWD ES300 competitor (to fill the void should the current Lucerene go RWD), a RWD Zeta sedan, and the Enclave?

 

Is the "Lecrosse" the model Buick sells in France?

 

Seems like, short of a Halo car like Velite I would say thats all it needs.

 

I would agree. That should allow Pontiac to have some distinct product with few overlaps.

 

I may have missed it. What's the other coupe?

 

This car committed the cardinal sin of not looking "newer" than the cars it replaced. It's not really ugly, it's just a very generic 1990s-sort of aero design. I guess Buick buyers are not as conservative as GM thought, because by most accounts it's a better car than the Regal.

 

the problem with the car is the name..nothing else..think about it..
call it a buick Regal..or Century..but they alienated people with a Lacrosse???
no name recognition nothing..

I bet if Buick threw the Regal name on the Lacross you would see a sales jump...seriously..itsthe name and that alone..

 

that description is spot on.

 

Lutz 1st made his mark in changing the names of almost everything he could. I'm not sure if it kept the Century name & I think the Regal name should be used on something else. But if it was named the LeSabre, it would probally have better acceptance since Buick's customers don't like change.

But then that would go against Buick's intention to bring in a slightly younger buyer.



Bit of Trivia: the "Regal" name, along with Impala, Monte Carlo, & Grand Prix, have the same Old-Guard-General Motors "exclusive agreement" with Oshawa that Ste. Therese had with Camaro & Firebird