GM Stopped making USA - Delco Spark Plugs ???.

Champion - Spark Plugs im sure are made in the USA I might try them also. Brian - Las Vegas , NV

AC-Delco doesn't make anything anymore. When GM spun off it's part divisions into Delphi, GM kept the AC-Delco brand name for it's aftermarket parts. Now GM puts whatever they feel like in those boxes.

Many of the AC-Delco oil filters you see are now made by Champion Labs (provider of the fine STP and WalMart SuperTech brands as well). Delphi was still making some of them, but I think Delphi has targeted filter for shutting down.

The bottom line is that the box saying AC-Delco means nothing in terms of who actually made the parts inside.

John

Another good reason to use the higher priced "Genuine GM Parts"

Feel free, but that would be a mistake. Champion plugs are pure junk. NGK has long been an excellent plug. If you're losing sleep over products not being made in the US, you're in for a very long sleepless life.

Years ago, while keeping two stroke oil burning motorcycles running, I found the opposite to be true. NGK would foul for who know what reason, while you could install the oldest Champion in your bike and it would run. Also, Harley Davidson uses Champion plugs with their name, and seem to have nearly zero spark plug issues. Those Nippondenso plugs seem to be good too.

What the hell is wrong with GM ???. GM needs to get back to its ROOTS and make things in the Good ol fashioned USA like they did in the good ol days.

Brian - In Very HOT Las Vegas, NV

So does Ford, Chrysler, Whirlpool, Black & Decker, and every other appliance, tool, and auto maker. It won't happen. Only way to assure you buy only goods manufactured in your country is to move to China. What is even worse, we demand that these companies buy cheap overseas. We vote with our dollars and keep buying cheaper and cheaper merchandise.

Pogo said it best, "We have seen the enemy . . . . . . .

It's just that the song we hear so often is; "Don't buy Japanese cars, because of "foreign parts" "

but when GM outsources, suddenly it's OK because of "GM Quality"

Let's Bring this back up in the Group What do you all think about GM has stopped making their own replacement parts. Lets Discuss.

Not much to discuss. None of us like to see jobs going out of the US, but as long as we want cheap, that is what we will get.

People complain about Wal Mart importing so much, yet we go to the Wal Mart store and buy it every day. If GM stopped using imported parts we'd complain more about the price of cars.

GM, like most companies, subcontracts a lot of material. I doubt there are any 100% integrated businesses. Why try to make something yourself if you can buy it cheaper, better, faster from a company that specializes in that type of part. I've worked for manufacturing companies for 45 years. Every one of them bought certain items from other sources.

It is an old subject. The reason GM spun it's parts making businesses out into Delphi was so that GM could source parts anywhere. The whole point was to get out of the business of making parts which are readily available on the market.

The union labor dynamic is part of the situation as well. For years the UAW has negotiated for top labor rates at the integrated manufacturer level while wages at the unaffiliated parts makers have long been lower. Thus even in an all-us-made scenario it is cheaper for GM to buy spark plugs from Champion than it is to make them itself. Now add in newer (to the US) non-union suppliers and their costs are lower still. Moving further on, parts made in China, Mexico, etc. are lower cost yet. So, there is no economic reason for GM to make things itself nor to have them made in the US. The end customer has proven that they by and large could care less where something is made.

Oddly enough, there will probably continue to be spark plugs factories in the US, but they are likely to have names like Denso or NGK on the front door and employ non-union labor.

Remember the story about killing the goose which laid the golden eggs? In the auto industry the US unions have pretty much done so. Of course poor management decisions haven't helped either!

John

John Horner wrote in news:YtJKg.2334$%75.967 @trnddc05:

There's a Delphi plant near here that makes electrical components for GM cars. The wages are ridiculous. $30-$40 hour plus an expensive benefits package. So Delphi's in bankruptcy. They have to scale back operations. After paying these huge salaries, it's cheaper for them to scale way back then be in full operational status. It seems so "either...or". There are either people making $40/hour doing assembly work or the co's paying $8 hour. Should be some happy medium. $20/hour would still be a comfortable living here in the midwest and would allow the business to stay solvent.

Those are the kind of wages many of the non-union so called transplant factories are paying.

John

Without overtime, a guy making $30 an hour is making $60k a year. Significantly higher than the average US salary, but is it really that bad? Compare that to the guys running the corporations who make as much 100 times that much (or even more in some cases). In the end, what will make GM (or Delphi) more competitive - firing 1000 $60k a year guys or firing 10 $600k a year guys? I am living through upper management firing workers in a desperate effort to make the numbers for one more quarter so they can get their fat bonuses and cash in there stock options. It isn't pretty. Until the stockholders of corporations wake up and take control of the corporations back from the good old boys who award each other huge salaries, I don't expect things to improve. Until GM out sources the CEO job to India, or pays Japanese style compensation to executives, I don't expect to see much improvement at GM (or Delphi).

Ed

In and of itself, no. If it is a low skilled job then yes, it is not a good thing compared to other business in the workd that we must compete against. Should we pay supermarket baggers that much? Skilled machinists? Doctors?

Fire the 10 $600k guys and the few $1000k guys too. There certainly is an imbalance in top management wages, sports figures, and celebrities. We accept it and continue to drink a Bud and watch the big game so it will continue.

Often, the stockholders are part of the problem. We want big gains now, evenif it costs the life of the company down the road. Too much of the "live for today" thinking.

I have thought this in the past too, Ed.

But, BEING a stockholder, I have to say I dont do it for nothing. If my money will bring me 5-6 percent in a secure loan, why should I put it into GM or any other company and expect nothing?

I must have either growth or dividends or both.

I have seen a lot of companies fart off their profits in expensive world gambits, executive bonuses, etc, without concern for the actual OWNERS of the company who are the stockholders.

Sure, I can wait a while for profit, but I am not a nonprofit enterprise. And I have not, and would not, invest in GM.

The key is balance. Sure we all want stock prices up but it has to be done at a sensible rate of growth. What we have been seeing, is a flash-in-the pan style where the upper management shows big stock increases and saves money buy getting rid of 10,000 employees, thus justifying big bonuses, then when it goes to crap they bail out with big settlements on their contracts. The stockholder suffers for a few year until the next hot-shot comes in and does his magic. Next guy sells off the unprofitable division that are on the skids due to the big layoffs, makes the corporation profitable again and gets his big bonus and leaves. . After a few cycles, the stockholders have nothing left.

Sure you can get 5% in a sound investment and want more from you stocks. Do you want 15% every year for five years and have it go belly up, or do you want 9% stead for decades from prudent investments by management for solid growth of the corporation? Should a corporation dump the R & D department this year to show a big profit, or do they keep in going for new products for sustained growth; albeit at a slower place?

The company I work for is 20 years old. I've been there 18 years. In the beginning, we struggled and got by, but continued to invest in new equipment rather than fancy showy stuff. Today, we are solid financially, long term employees get great benefits and rewards that would not be possible if re-investment was not done along the way. The key employees demand and work for profitability, just as a stockholder in a corporation would because it is our future, our profit sharing, our income at stake.