gthal

Taking out weight and adding power is FAR from all it takes to make a great track car. Maxima ...

C2C3C4C6

Maybe this ME should be a Cadillac, cost well north of $100k and let the C7 continue on with continued refinements and a re-style in a couple of years. I just started a thread wherein I warn that the C8 could end up killing the Vette.

jcsperson

Why would Chevy continue to build a car whose sales are declining?

JustinStrife

Ignorant poster. The Camaro and Corvette are not in the same market place nor have they ever been.

RACE U

The C7 is more expensive than the C6, especially in dollars out of my pocket (versus sticker price). All of these guys thinking the mid engine will be affordable........I only have 1 question.........who manufactures a car, any car, with a me for less than $100k? If the new c7 is much h more expensive, gm will need ALOT of new buyers in higher income brackets. And will gm sell enough of these cars to be financially viable? What's that volume.......30,000 units annually? Is that(or whatever the number is) achievable?

How have the cars with similar designs sold?

gthal

In response to your question, Porsche Cayman... ME and less than $100K. Even the GT4 version was less than $100K.

JustinStrife

http://carsalesbase.com/us-car-sales...orsche-cayman/

3,179 units sold in 2018 in the U.S. As I've said before, there is zero proof that there is a market for an ME sports car for the amount of sales that the FE Corvette has commanded over decades here. Not one person has been able to counter this argument and I have been waiting.

gthal

I wasn't arguing anything... he asked someone to name a single ME car under $100K... so I did

pietro c7

JoesC5

Total 718(Boxster/Cayman) sales were 5,276 in the US during 2018. But still a ultra low number.

No one has shown me that a mid-engine Corvette will be priced only $2.37 more than a front engine Corvette and no one has shown me that they can sell 33,000 of them a year. Year after year.

pietro c7

RACE U

GM counting on sales of other GM vehicles from the hype, excitement, and auto enthusiasts discussions about Corvette.

Some of this "value" is very hard to measure.

jcsperson

And hard to show shareholders on the bottom line.

JustinStrife

You have absolutely zero proof of that. The burden of proof falls on the mid engine supporters that Corvette won't lose a significant market by switching. You better hope you're right or you'll have effectively killed off America's Sports car.

Supermassive

This is just a really poorly thought out response as have been every single post about the new Corvette having possible issues selling at a reasonable price because it is mid engine. Its a Corvette, it will have a Corvette nameplate on it, and it will look good and perform better. It will sell just fine, it is an established brand, people will buy it just because it says Corvette on it and its the newest version.

With the DCT, no one will be able throw shade at it anymore, there will be no excuses to not purchase one, if I had Ferrari and Lambo money I would be all over the mid engine Corvette for an affordable toy to modify and track with no worry about possible depreciation hits to my exotics, while still having the Corvette that would likely stand toe to toe with them in performance.

The people stuck on the front engine platform are deluded plain and simple, the Corvette is a sports car not a damn sedan. Just because it has been rather soft around the edges in the past to accomodate the "old guard" there is no future catering to them anymore. Take a look at the things older folks have kept afloat that are suffering now, Harley Davidson and cruisers in general, Golf, etc. are suffering because they aren't able to excite newer buyers or enthusiasts. Harley has gone all in on electric motorcycles to salvage something from its business amd golf is doing anything and everything it can to get people on courses.
The Corvette is amazing amd has been amazing for decades, its just that the image this car has is that of a silver haired man drivong down the road with the top down, one chrome wheels, doing 5 under the speed limit. Anyone who disputes this is obviously out of touch with reality and except for those in that age demographic this does nothing to drum up new sales with younger buyers.

The mid engine, high tech C8 can change this, older folks will likely still be the primary buyers due to how most older people have amassed disposable money for the purchase of toys, versus the typical young person, but it will stand out as a truly "next generation" car which interests young people who have a tech obsession.

So no I don't worry about the C8 javing poor sales, because I can see how it can succeed and I doubt that GM has dumber people than myself running things.

o2baZR1

i'm surprised i'm not reading much about cargo space. seems like every car i know with the trunk in the front has about enough room for a 12-pack. i know it's not the most important feature, but i do think it matters quite a bit to a lot of customers, potential or actual. it's amazing how much stuff you can cram in the back of a coupe. i really like that. i think if the space available is what i'm used to seeing in most such layouts, it's gonna be a tough pill to swallow for quite a few people. even when i got my '13 427, there were times when it mattered way more than i thought it might when i was first considering getting it. just a long-weekend away with the old lady had to include some extra thinking about how to budget what we were going to take along. the decrease in space wouldn't be a deal-breaker for me, but it might for some folks.

JoesC5

Here I am, at "old fart" age 70, while driving over 160 MPH.




Here I am full of "**** & vinegar" at age 11 driving 5 under the speed limit.



I have even driven over the speed limit on occasion in my "old " 64.




Notice the supercharged 606 HP Callaway Grand Sport convertible next to my 64. It belongs to an "old fart" grandmother in her 60's and I know she was right on my Z06's butt at 145 driving out to Colorado. Her "old fart" husband, in his 70's, also drove 160+ in his C6 ZR1 at Talladega.

An "old fart" 82 year old grandmother drove her C5 coupe at 171 MPH, and that was on a 2 lane highway in Idaho, not a super smooth Super Speedway race track.


Oh, and the only speeding ticket I've received in the past 53 years was not in one of my Corvettes, but in my "old farts" Mercedes sedan.

You sure like to throw the insults at the senior citizen Corvette owners but you don't know **** about what you are talking about.

Foosh

It all depends upon price. Just because a car's nameplate says Corvette doesn't mean it will sell at any price. The $130K+ ZR1 is on pace to sell only 2K units in it's intro year when excitement about it was highest.

Please don't tell me that point was poorly thought out, and it's been the essence of the thoughtful concerns about sales and the future of the Corvette in an ME world. I happen to believe the ME will be offered in a range of $70K-ish to $150K-ish, and in that case I think it will do just fine.

There have been many thoughtful concerns about sales, which have been used to rebut those who seem to firmly believe it will start well north of $100K. It's future will be very much in doubt as an expensive "niche, halo car," which won't sell in sufficient volumes to survive long-term.

If C7 sales numbers are a reasonable barometer, which I believe them to be, 70% of sales were below $80K. The vast majority of folks aren't going to cross that barrier for a 2-seat sports car.

Halo cars like the Ford GT and Viper only appear on the scene for short runs and then disappear, perhaps making another brief appearance every decade or so..

Supermassive

Sigh,

The point is that the stereotype exists for anyone not "in" on the Corvette. I don't care about stereotypes which is why I bought a C7, but there are A LOT of people with the same perception that I outlined. You are also an outlier, the exception to the rule per se. When I would meet up with Corvette owner's groups in Phoenix, the stereotype was overwhelming, the few younger C7 owners that I did meet tended to shy away from the established Corvette meetups and instead went to meets and drives that featured imports due to the younger demographic.

Also if I never see chrome stick on additions on a Corvette again...it will be too soon.

*edit*
I am not insulting anyone, I am merely stating factual information from the perspective of people who aren't already in the Corvette fan club. You may have a few examples of older owners driving fast, but you can't say that you have never seen the ones I am talking about. I personally attended as many Corvette meets as I could because I began to love the Corvette as a brand, because of my C7 and hearing about all the cool cars that I missed out on due to my age, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't more in my element with the import scene.

Shouting that you don't fit the stereotype, and that it is an insult to Corvette owners that I would bring up the fact that this exists is kinda proving my point. Corvette owners are the most blind to what everyone else sees, because they can't relate. You have been a Corvette fan longer than I have been alive, I have been a fan for about 5 years give or take a couple months, before that I was heavy into imports, I've owned and modified more than few cars that in the import world are the "bees knees" like a Gen 3 and Gen 4 Supra, 3000GT VR4, 300ZX Turbo, and my most recent being a '13 Scion FR-S. When I bought my Corvette and brought it to a local FRS owners group meet that I helped establish, the first thing I heard was "who brought the old man's car?", of course everyone respects the car for what it can do, but the stereotype exists...just like how we bash BMW owner's and their "optional" turn signals.

This is a problem for GM, image is actually one of, if not the most important thing in today's materialistic society and to just blindly pull wool over your eyes and go full codger on me because you think I am personally attacking your lifestyle by bringing up the generalization you so vehemently protest, just goes to show that you really don't understand today's car market. If GM cannot make the Corvette the "cool" icon it was when you were young, for a new generation, it will eventually fail as a brand. The C7 was a great leap forward for Corvette. By embracing a more European design aesthetic and pumping it full of high tech gadgets it became interesting to younger people, the same people who think a Tesla is "cool"...a freaking Model X is a minivan and it is considered cool, that is a prime example of marketing an image. Its how Apple continues to sell the same phone every year to people with such incremental changes that its hilarious.

So I am sorry if I touched a nerve, but CorvetteForum is pretty crappy place to hang out in on its own, if you aren't visiting other owner's forums such as Ferrari, or Porsche, or Viper, or literally any performance car community, you have a very narrow perception of what everyone else thinks and honestly its all those people that GM should be trying to woo and not Jimmy the 35 year Corvette faithful purchaser, who may voice concerns but will likely buy regardless.

Darion

In my eyes its really only about two scenarios, the ME has a higher starting price leaving room for a FE below it, think Porsche 718 and 911. On the other hand the ME is the new Corvette and it starts at a more accessible price as have all Corvettes generations to this point, that is part of the heritage. BTW, I'm not saying start at 60k but more like Foosh said 70k. If GM starts getting cute moving the base price up to the 100k point they will have a great first year or two then, not 30k units great, then volume will decline and the chatter will start about axing the whole thing.

PC