Dinner with Ed Peper

I'll be honest with you: all this time I've been calling Chevrolet General Manager Ed "Peeper" Ed "Pepper" as in the Dr. Well I stand corrected. What I did find out about Ed today was that he is a generally engaging fellow and that he's really hot on the Malibu. In fact, if he could have it his way, he'd name this blog All Malibu, All the Time. It's understandable that Ed believes that he has a very competitive product on his hands. We didn't get to drive the Malibu, but there was one on hand to sit in. The interior plastics were a step up and what shiny bits were left were masked with this particular model's contrasting colors.

But enough about Malibu, sorry Ed, let's talk about Chevrolet in general. Firstly, there is a big push with hybrids, hydrogen and E85: not so much diesel. Ed believes that given the "beaucoup engine choices" that GM is providing there isn't such a push for light duty diesel. The party line seems to be that it would require tremendous resources to get a diesel ready for the states and the return on that investment is uncertain. What troubles me is that is the same line that GM used against hybrids years ago and later came to reverse their thinking. Perhaps GM hopes to gain similar diesel efficiency through homogeneous charge compression ignition? I don't know but I am a bit worried especially with diesels coming from VW, Nissan and Honda.

However, Chevrolet does have some aces coming. There is the aforementioned Malibu, the two-mode hybrid full size SUVs and the Enclave/Acadia/Outlook based Traverse. The Traverse will enter a segment that is blazing hot and will undoubtedly rack up big sales for Chevrolet dealers. Peper was quizzed repeatedly on the badge engineering aspect of these crossovers, but his boiled down response is GM sells more units with the separate brands than if they only had two. I along with others have to wonder if these short term sales gains create long term brand confusion. What frustrates me is that the Enclave is so wonderfully conceived and unique and the Outlook/Acadia are so similar. It strikes me as a rush job, not so much from the mechanical side but from the design side. We'll have to see how much the Traverse differentiates itself. What we do know is that the Traverse will be the value leader of the bunch.

Peper was surprisingly more upbeat on a micro car for the US market. I brought up the subject of the Beat/Groove/Trax and he said that Chevrolet might consider something along the lines of the Beat/Groove. Making no promises Peper said that he could see viability for a sub-Aveo entry if GM could "make it safe" and I might add make it profitably.

In discussing features like Bluetooth integration, Ed seemed to be of two minds. In private conversation he said that GM is definitely working on Bluetooth. However, at the dinner table he wondered how much gadgetry Chevrolet buyers really wanted. Peper asked, "Does the guy driving his family want a navigation screen, Bluetooth, IPod and everything else?" My immediate answer would be yes, but Ed has seen a lot more focus groups than I have. I do think that given current handsfree legislation GM would be wise to get Bluetooth available on every car in the near future, but we'll have to see how that plays out. My counter to Ed was that extra features like Bluetooth could be tipping points for buyers, but that was greeted with a big head shake. I brought up the example of the Nissan Versa throwing in heretofore high end options like keyless ignition and Bluetooth, but it was no sale. I still stand by my argument that the more unique relatively low cost features you can add to your car, the more competitive you'll be. I think it's worth the effort.

In the end I was impressed with Ed's willingness to come meet with us bloggers. I don't know if the opportunity was given to other managers but the fact that he was there and listening counted for a lot. I didn't agree with every answer, but I was glad to have the opportunity to ask the questions.