ben in lj

did you read the whole notice? as we've known was a possibility for a year or two, porsche lost its appeal for the waiver of 2006 NA smart airbag requirements for the CGT. to comply, it would have cost millions. those millions would have been spread over a mere 125 cars coming to NA over and above the appx 625 that are coming now that 06s can't be sold here. LUCKILY they didn't do what i figured they would which is accelerate NA production via taking from euro allocation to build all 06 NA allocations as 05 models before 7/05. rather, i "think" they are doing us a favor actually by keeping NA allocation % the same relative to total worldwide production numbers.

1958 Convertible D

My car arrived today. Hope the damn rain stops so I can drive it soon!

DMin

Congrats on your new baby!

PogueMoHone

Can you explain how you fiqured this out from the press release that Chris sent you (and me) as well?

Woodster

Seeing (and hearing) a Carrera GT for the first time since Liepzig 2004,
I must say it is such an absolute thrill. The car looks and sounds
amazing!! A sideline note is that there was also a red 959 on the
transporter which is quite a cooincidence because "58 convertible D"
drove one on the Autobahn in 1989 to V-MAX! This car (CGT)
makes any other
car including "tubied ferraris and lambos sound "average"
The fit and finish are second to none and the porsche tech had
absolutely no problems negotiating the clutch/car when he drove it.
I hope to find out if my lightweight flywheel/racing clutch is trickier
than the CGT, because I believe it is .
Marty K.

ben in lj

i've been told 600 ish NA cars from more than one sales mgr. so my conclusion was only based in part on the PR.

ben in lj

congrats and enjoy!

PogueMoHone

The bottom line is we don't know the real numbers, if you follow the implied logic from the PR release, there should only be 500 cars in NA.

E.G.
3 year production;
1500 world wide (750 to NA)

No MY 06 to NA ,so that means 250 less, for a total of 500. Before any attempts to expedite MY05 production.

But the Press release blathers on about no reallocations to upset prospective owners, yet if the US gets 600 cars there was a re-allocation somewhere along the line. It had to be from the rest of the world (so the car's not selling there either) since they have reduced the # by 250.

Now you see what I mean about the press release not making sense, and Sales Managers at Dealerships rarely know what's going... and are partial to telling you what they think you'd like to hear.

So once again, can anybody make any sense of all this?

As an aside there already seems to be an awful lot of cars available..with how many more to come?

ben in lj

yep, colm i see your logic and it does make sense. given there will likely only be appx 1k cars produced by the end of year two, that implies there was a "temporary" 100 car reallocation to NA to meet the 600 number.

PogueMoHone

Let me see if I can try again:

Originally 1000 cars at $375K

Revised 1500 cars at $440K: production split between 750 NA and 750 ROW

Re-revised 1250 cars at $440K, because of NA airbag issue: 500NA and 750 ROW


For NA to have 625 cars there would have been a reallocation of some kind, that's my premise and I'm just looking for clarification.

The press release blathers about the unfairness of reallocation (when we really know that they couldn't sell the additional 250 cars elsewhere), and the potential reallocation I pointed above lends credibility to that theory. Again, the press release is confusing, amateurish and potentially misleading.

ben in lj

well i hope your read of 500 NA is correct (especially since i fully expect 4 vs. 2 yr warrantied NA cars to be bought by euro buyers at substantial savings via the weak dollar and overly saturated NA market), but i'd buy the 600 to 625 number based on "temporary" reallocation numbers. if NA was to get 600 to 625, then it'd still be getting it's pro-rata share of worldwide production - just 100 to 125 cars would be coming to NA less than a year earlier than originally planned.

PogueMoHone

But is that what the press release is saying?

ben in lj

what is what?

PogueMoHone

Here's the full text (available to me) of the release:

"Carrera GT – Reduction of production figures to 1,250 units

· The planned production ceiling for the Carrera GT shall be reduced from 1,500 to 1,250 units or a 17% decrease. The supply to North America was also adjusted accordingly.

· The reason for this measure is connected with the current legal position in the United States, the Carrera GT's main sales market. The new legislation on the smart airbag (valid from September 1, 2005) would require a level of investment in the remaining 250 Carrera GT models that runs into millions and is therefore not economically viable.

· Redistribution of the remaining Carrera GT models to other markets is not possible, since the distribution quota for these markets cannot be increased retrospectively. Porsche does not wish to disappoint its customers by not offering them the promised exclusivity of their cars in the individual markets.

· The Carrera GT is the most successful high-performance sports car ever made. So far, no other competitor has managed to achieve such a high sales volume."

Judge for yourselves what it says, and then translate it for me TIA

e6tme

Ha! It would be bad enough if it was just the dealers who were clueless, but what happens when the head of Sales and Marketing is oblivious?

This is a direct quote from Motor Trend, Aug. 05: (apologies if it is a repost)

"Though the market research said don't build the Carrera GT, we carried on designing it because we had to manage the brand, showing we were still sporting while we launched an SUV. The first research said [we could sell] 300 cars. At the press conference for the concept car, Wiedeking picked a number out of the air. He said 500. The press coverage grew, and we had 3000 solid prospects. No supercar like it has ever done more than 700 units, but we've sold 1250 now, and production will go to 1500 before ending in 2006." - Hans Riedel, Exec. VP, Sales and Marketing

So many things wrong with this statement, I don't know where to start...