Chevrolet’s Peper talks Camaro, Chevrolet’s future

Automotive News | July 22, 2008 - 2:22 pm EST

Ed Peper

DETROIT — As Chevrolet gets ready to launch the Traverse crossover and the Camaro sports car, the brand is at a pivotal point in industry history. The strong SUV and pickup brand must now shift attention to its car lineup. And while it has some winners already in stock — the Malibu for instance — it has more in the pipeline.

Ed Peper, General Motors vice president for Chevrolet, sat down with Automotive News Staff Reporter Jamie LaReau to discuss the brand’s direction and marketing messages for the next 18 months.

How can dealers help promote the Camaro?

They’ve already been promoting the product. It’s one of those vehicles where we’ve been out there for a couple of years promoting at various auto shows, plus all the public relations and media that we’ve received.

There are a lot of hand-raisers and interested parties out there. We’re getting in touch with those folks.

Can dealers start taking down payments for the car?

They will be able to take official orders coming up in the fall.

So they can take a deposit?

Absolutely. And we have a lot of interested hand-raisers that we’re communicating with, almost 600,000. There’s a lot of demand — a lot of it was helped by the Transformers movie.

Then it’s realistic that the car could sell more than 100,000 units annually?

We’re going to compete like crazy, but I’m not going to give a sales number.

In terms of engine development, might we see a turbocharged four-banger either in this car or other Chevrolets?

We’re planning to have a turbo four-cylinder in the Cruze (compact), and we may pursue it in other vehicles as well.

How important is it for Chevrolet to be a technology leader?

Very, very important. We’ve got to be able to combine the power and the fuel efficiency at the same time. We’re taking the lead for the fuel solution strategy at the company. We’re doing Project Driveway for Equinox; we’re going to have a Volt by November 2010. We have eight vehicles that get 30 mpg or better; we have more vehicles on the road that run on E85 ethanol than any other brand; we’ll have three hybrids in operations. So it’s really important. We’re a brand that obviously carries big volume for the company so we also have to carry the fuel solutions for the company.

At the end of June, in the small-car segment, GM had about a 13 percent share. How does Chevrolet compete against the Hondas, Toyotas and Nissans of the world, which dominate the small-car market?

We’re already competing. In fact, we’ve gained in car share this year as much as anybody in the marketplace.

But how do you take that up a notch?

By continuing to do what we’re doing. We added a third shift at Lordstown (Ohio) for Cobalt production, which will provide a lot more vehicles for us. The Cobalt has been one of the hottest-turning vehicles for us in Chevrolet history.

We have a Malibu, which is a better car than the Camry or Accord, and everybody knows it; we’re continuing to tell more consumers about it. We’ve got the No. 1-selling large car in the marketplace with the Impala, which far outsells the Avalon and the other entries. We’ve got a new Aveo5, which also gets a good share in the economy segment.

We’re going to continue to promote our cars more than we have. We’ve spent a lot of money this year promoting cars versus trucks, more than we have in a long time, and we’re going to continue to do that.

How are you going to get the market’s attention for the Traverse this fall?

I can’t talk about the content. I can tell you, though, that the pre-launch commercials will be even more disruptive than the Malibu pre-launch commercials were. Just disruptive with the target. It’s going to be a very unusual approach.

But you’re going to do more with less?

Yes, we are. But keep in mind: For us, we’ve been the dominant player in utilities in the U.S. with the Tahoe, Suburban, Equinox and TrailBlazer, so this is a division and group of dealers who know how to sell utilities really well.

What would you want to convey to Chevy dealers as we enter the second half of the year?

The launches that we have coming with the Aveo5 right now, Traverse and Camaro at the beginning of next year, and the new Equinox, which will come out in June of next year — we have more product coming, an absolute onslaught of product. We just have to stay focused on selling cars and small utilities in big numbers and continuing to sell trucks, which have been a mainstay of our business. They should be very excited about what we have coming. We’re building the best-quality vehicles in the marketplace, and they can look forward to more of that.