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Automakers tussle over owners of 'orphan' makes

When General Motors put down several of its brands in recent years, it also let loose thousands of brand-loyal customers who will eventually need another car.
R.L. Polk Associates estimates there are more than 18 million cars from 16 discontinued makes on the road today. Those "orphan owners" have sales-hungry competitors seeing dollar signs. GM is offering Saturn owners $1,000 cash toward a Chevy Cruze, Cadillac CTS or a GMC Acadia. Ford is giving its Mercury lease customers a chance to get out of their contracts with no early-termination penalty and offering to waive six remaining payments if they drive off in a Ford or Lincoln.
Edmunds.com research shows the efforts are paying off somewhat for GM, with 39 percent of Pontiac owners, 37 percent of Hummer owners and 31 percent of Saturn owners taking delivery of another GM-branded vehicle. But that leaves as much as 69 percent of owners going elsewhere. Ford, Honda and Toyota seem to be attracting many former GM owners.

Hummer EV to be sold at only about half of GMC dealerships

The new 1,000-horsepower Hummer EV will be sold under the GMC brand, but you won't find it in every GMC showroom. Currently, just about half of GMC's dealers have agreed to take on the electric truck, Buick GMC VP Duncan Aldred told investors on a conference call last week. According to Muscle Cars and Trucks, there are a number of reasons for the irregular availability. For one, there's the cost of upgrading dealerships to sell and service a fully electric vehicle. Stores would need to be upgraded with charging stations, and service centers would require new tools and training to work on an EV. Then there's the customer experience. At $112,595, the initial Hummer EV Edition 1 caters to a different clientele than the traditional GMC truck. The planned EV3X trim level that arrives in late 2022 and EV2X arriving in spring 2023 will start at just below $100,000 and $90,000, respectively. Some sellers believe that customers paying six figures for a vehicle will expect certain niceties that will necessitate showroom upgrades as well. Complimentary doughnuts, at least. Furthermore, not all GMC dealerships are located in areas with customers willing to shell out that much cabbage for a new vehicle, especially an EV. An $80,000 base trim will be available in 2024, so perhaps more dealers will be willing to take on the truck by then. Finally, there's the Hummer EV's no-haggle pricing. Aldred was adamant on the call that customers see the same price on the internet as they do on the paperwork. It's part of the premium dealership experience that GMC wants to provide for its well-heeled clientele. Still, GMC appears to have no problem moving all the Hummer EVs it can build. Even with its lofty price tag, all Edition 1 trucks were sold out 10 minutes after GMC's announcement. Related Video:

2022 GMC Hummer EV Edition 1 Prototype Drive Review | Let the supertruck wars begin

MILFORD, Mich. — Hummer is high on the list of vehicles we never thought would return. The gas-guzzling brutes met their demise more than a decade ago as the industry pivoted briefly to smaller cars and General Motors shed brands during its historic restructuring. Fast-forward to 2022, and HummerÂ’s revival is at hand thanks to yet another industry shift, this time to electric propulsion. ItÂ’s expensive, itÂ’s still huge and the numbers are eye-popping to the tune of 1,000 horsepower. America loves a comeback — but it loves trucks more. We briefly tested the 2022 GMC Hummer EV Edition 1 truck at the GM Proving Grounds 40 miles northwest of Detroit. Weeks from now, Hummers will start rolling off the line at GMÂ’s EV site, dubbed Factory Zero, in the Motor City. While the Hummer SUV will undoubtedly prove its worth, GM is leading with the pickup, ambitiously calling it a supertruck and eagerly touting its metrics and mojo-generating features, like CrabWalk, against the Rivian R1T, Ford F-150 Lightning, Tesla Cybertruck, as well as gas-powered off-roaders like the Ford F-150 Raptor and Ram 1500 TRX, plus various Jeep and Land Rover SUVs. (Here's our latest supertruck spec comparo). All of them have impressed us (save the Cybertruck, which only Jay Leno and a few others have driven), but the Hummer is formidable in its own right. For one thing, itÂ’s a Hummer. The negative connotations of the old Hummers melt away when thereÂ’s a 24-module Ultium battery pack powering three motors for a range of 350-plus miles on a single charge. The old model was divisive, but a lot of people paid a lot of money for them simply because they looked very cool. HummerÂ’s familiar grille makes it bold return on our tester that looms high on its 35-inch Goodyear Wrangler Territory MT tires. It certainly looks the part of a supertruck. The cabin is roomy and airy, with the removable sky panels letting in the bright fall morning. Hummer EV chief engineer Al Oppenheiser is our co-pilot for our test, and after a quick walk-through, weÂ’re off.  The first order of business is simply mashing the throttle. The Edition 1 serves up about 1,200 pound-feet of torque, and you can make use of all of that and the four-figure horsepower to hit 60 mph in about 3 seconds. We accelerate hard, blasting over some soft ground before things get a little squirrelly and can confirm the claimed time feels legit.