DebRedZR1

Exactly............Sure some threads are a great source of entertainment with all the rumors and unsubstantiated claims.

Quinten33

Sadly, I think I’m the only teenager here

Nadovedan

Every major corporation is watching what is being said about the brand. They have tools that scour the internet with anything they decide to put in their search string.

ArmchairArchitect

In my opinion, they would be wise to, to an extent. Amongst all the nonsense there are some sensible ideas and voicing of preferences here. For example, keeping the car lightweight being a priority, what the consensus is around certain design elements/features, offering a manual option (at a higher price to offset extra costs), etc.

Obviously GM has their "focus groups" but that may not be the best cross-section of individuals, so best to get ideas/feedback from multiple sources...

Glenmcp

There are some posters that have a good amount of knowledge. The problem for me is looking through all of the nonsense to get to the posters that know what they are talking about. I do learn from them. My guess is that 20% or less really know what they are talking about. And, GM looks at a lot of social media sites. My guess is they find very little content to take action on.

RapidC84B

Yes they pay attention to the forums... but what they do with all of our collective BS is unknown. I will say the C5/6 forums had tons of seat and steering wheel complaints... for the C7 they clearly put a ton of effort into the seat, steering wheels, and interior in general. Nobody complains about the C7 interior anymore... they got it right this time. The early days of the C7 people complained about paint and fit/finish and they built a whole new paint shop. I'm sure it was based on warranty claims and real-world validation, but I'm sure they do glean info from here.

Foosh

Having spent a lot of time in the upper echelons of the corporate world, I am absolutely certain that this section of CF is being routinely monitored by GM. Yes, there is a very high percentage of nonsense to wade through, but there are kernels of wisdom that I'm sure they pay attention to. Any large corporation in the social media age would be idiotic to completely ignore a source of free feedback.

I do my dead level best to post on subjects that an executive would be interested in hearing or knowing about because I am one.

The HACK

Then GM has some ray of hope for the future of the Corvette brand, as the average age of Corvette buyers continue to age (now at the ripe age of 61...as an AVERAGE!), without some of these so-called teenagers to supplant your average Corvette buyers, pretty soon no one would be buying Corvettes (as most of the average buyers gets closer and closer to being too old to even drive).

Rejoice in the fact that the C8 is getting this level of immaturity in response, as it can only bode well for the future of the brand, IMO. Take another make and model that’s in the same market and price range, for example. The BMW M3. The M3 forums are FULL of high school level bickering and ***** waving. The average age of BMW M3 buyers are in their late 40s...the ideal demographic for this level of price (meat of their purchasing power and earning potential, young enough to buy 2-3 more generations of M3s...etc).

JerryC5

I suspect that GM does indeed look at the C8 section, if only to get general feedback and to ferret out sources of leaks.

I am always amazed at the posters who guess/estimate /project things about the C8, based on ABSOLUTELY NO FACTS.
Even more so, those who ask questions about the horsepower/trunk capacity/features etc., based on ABSOLUTELY NO INFORMATION from GM are also amazing.

Having an emotional response to the teasers about a new Vette is perfectly understandable, but interacting with those posters who operate their lives based on NO FACTS/NO INFORMATION is a waste of time.

Foosh

Actually, there have been quite a few intelligent analyses of likely pricing, based upon historic pricing practices. No, we don't have definitive pricing data on the C8, but we do have decades of data on Corvette pricing and sales vis a vis the competition. Those are very solid data, and any departure from that Corvette model would be both radical and risky. Thus one is able to make reasonable predictions about the most probable price bracket.

For example, we know that US sales of over $100K 2-seat sports cars have always been well under 10K units annually. We know a lot about what GM's targets for Corvette sales have always been. Those two sources of historical data alone are enough for a reasonable prediction.

Nonetheless, a reasonable forecast is just that, a forecast. An 80% chance of rain does not mean it's a certainty, but it's certainly based upon solid data.

Speednet

Yeah, I'm sure GM gets its jollies by planting idiotic comments about how bad a camouflaged car looks, or stupid comments about it being a Cadillac, or stupid comments about how there will definitely be a FE car made at the same time, or stupid comments about dual clutch transmissions being bad, or stupid comments about how they should make the CERV prototype the actual production car, or stupid comments about how you should buy a Porsche instead of a C8, or paranoid comments about GM planting stupid comments, or 1,000 other comments that make the Corvette community appear to be made up of either immature man-babies or elderly luddites.

Foosh

I don't see that many comments about DCTs being bad. They can be awesome. However, I do see comments that manual lovers would prefer a true manual, as would I.

MitchAlsup

It is so difficult to know if the comment is stupid before you read it.

ToddC7

The ONLY thing GM will be concerned with is initial sales and sustained sales. Internally, of course, they'll worry about margins, factory capacity, etc.

If sales don't meet their SET expectations, then they'll evaluate what went wrong (or right if they exceeded).

It's possible that members here are perfectly correct (or not) in what they are saying (i.e. sales will slump if no manual, rear-end is butt ugly, etc. and more etcs.), but that will make zero difference to the folks at GM.

I mean, can you imagine at a board meeting some of the engineers saying "But... BUT user 'boobslayer69' on the vette forum SAID WE NEED A MANUAL!!!"

RapidC84B

I would listen to anything boobslayer69 has to say.

range96

GM spends a lot of money on customer surveys from new car buyers. Why would they not use the internet as a marketing tool on a car not released yet?

Skid Row Joe

A good many of those posting don't own a C7 Corvette. Still more, will never buy a new C8, much less a used one in the next 6-year C-cycle. I look at it this way; if you don't own at least a C7, your comments are not
worth any consideration by GM. It's just unsubstantiated noise, by non-C7 car owners, with no skin in the game with no record of recent Corvette C7 ownership. A lot of talk, no substance.....

AORoads

"The ONLY thing GM will be concerned with is initial sales and sustained sales. Internally, of course, they'll worry about margins, factory capacity, etc"

"It's possible that members here are perfectly correct (or not) in what they are saying (i.e. sales will slump if no manual, rear-end is butt ugly, etc. and more etcs.), but that will make zero difference to the folks at GM." ToddC7

I notice the contradiction between what is in the first para of Todd's otherwise good post, and the second quoted paragraph.

IF the comments about the C8 butt, or the lack of manual trans AFFECT sales, initial or down the road, you bet GM will be concerned! And have all kinds of meetings to decide what to do. How about that Camaro front end change from bad to better?

Does GM watch CF? If you took 2 or 3 staff people who know what to look for, and merely copy/pasted the comments that are of note and worth, there'd be a pretty long compendium of useful or interesting comments to read at GM. You can argue, "staff who know what to look for" or "of note and worth" but that's like questioning, is it helpful to have a focus group which may or may not, surveys which may or may not, etc. It all depends on track record of the persons, and their knowledge and ability---proven over a period of time. And, an added "test group" could be a bunch of unknown respondents on a forum called CF who have no knowledge that they're being watched and read, a significant portion of which own Corvettes, own GM products, own other similar vehicles from competitors and speak/write intelligently about them, etc.

If I ran a company, and there was talk about my company or products on a forum, you bet I'd find "the right people" to keep their eyes on, and a list of the better, best and most-descriptive topics that affect MY company, MY product and eventually, MY profit. Or I'd hire an outside company of winners to do it for me. In today's world, whether it's a complaint or compliment, wish or want, you can't just isolate yourself to what YOU believe excluding all others. jmo

Michael A

By this logic, they should only build cars that appealed to C7 buyers of the past. I don't normally use this emoji, but it applies here.

By the way, this is public forum, so anyone can post. If someone doesn't like that, then they can start their own forum, and require a current vehicle registration certificate be submitted. Good luck!

ToddC7

I don't see the contradiction Your 'summary' of my 2nd paragraph isn't correct... i.e. the "IF...". You'll note that you converted the meaning my 2nd paragraph to mean "IF... *affects sales*" which I did not write or imply (or hope I didn't). Comments made now do not affect sales.

What I was saying is that it's possible, as in a coincidence, that members here may say something that corresponds to some reasons why sales might go below or above expectations. But sales don't follow something because someone here said they would

And just because you ignore a forum doesn't mean that you are isolating yourself. Designers didn't just get born yesterday ... they studied art and similar for years if not decades before getting to style the next Corvette. I very highly doubt these designers are reading this forum and seeing the "omg the rear end is FUGLY" comments and care one iota about it.

Similarly, the decision to go DCT was probably almost entirely down to costs and hitting the sweet spot of performance vs. utility vs. fun. If costs were no object, of course we'd be seeing a manual, auto, DCT and a lot of other offerings. Again, they certainly aren't going to care what we write in the forums... they already know they are going to alienate a certain % of potential buyers if they don't offer a manual.

But they've probably calculated that months if not years ago...