In my article, GM’s Renaissance: Pontiac Should and Will Die, I argued that a niche Pontiac was not a good idea for GM, mainly because it will largely overlap with the high-end versions of its other brands. But now that GM has decided to cease operations on its high-performance vehicles, the automaker can now focus its performance image mostly on Pontiac.
For instance, since the SS versions of Chevy (not including the SS Camaro) will no longer be produced, the brand will no longer be intruding on Pontiac’s turf. As a result, you won’t find anything like a Pontiac G8 GT (with its combination of power, sportiness, size and value) from any other GM brand other than from Pontiac. This will, in turn, make Pontiac truly distinct from the other brands.
It may be that GM’s intention to close down its performance operations was to save money (or it could just be part of its master plan), but the automaker can use this unfortunate circumstance to rebuild Pontiac into the performance brand it promised us in its restructuring plan.
Such a move by GM will give us more of a reason to believe that it has the potential to remake Pontiac into the distinct and exciting brand that it once was.
To the Anonymous that posted on February 28, 2009 9:15 PM,
I’d like to see Pontiac become a style leader again, but if the brand manages to reinvent itself, becoming a style leader and trend setter is going to be very difficult this day and age.
I can’t remember the last a Pontiac created a trend. In fact, it is almost impossible to imagine something like that.
The thing to remember with Pontiac, and mostly forgotten, is that they were ALSO the full-&-midsize STYLE Leader starting in the 60's — No One else came close to the Visual Excitement of their cars… they Created Trends!