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Marchionne wants to nearly double Jeep sales by 2018

Jeep just keeps breaking its own sales records. A couple of weeks ago, the off-road brand announced its worldwide sales exceeded one million units for the first time, marking its third consecutive global record and the fifth straight year of sales increases here in the US. But FCA isn't about to stop there. TheDetroitBureau.com reports that chief executive Sergio Marchionne, speaking to the media at the Detroit Auto Show, has announced a new sales target for the Jeep division: By 2018, he wants to see Jeep sell 1.9 million units in a single year, nearly doubling its all-time record. The expansion will surely encompass new products, with the all-new Renegade just warming up, a next-generation Wrangler on the way and a reborn Grand Wagoneer in the pipeline, as well. But the focus of FCA's preparations to reach the new target is on production capacity. While it's not clear whether the Toledo, OH plant where half of all the Jeeps sold around the world are currently built will continue to host the next Wrangler, FCA is expanding production overseas. The Renegade is already being built alongside the Fiat 500X in Italy, where another 1,000 workers are being re-hired and where another factory is set to start producing Jeeps, as well. A Renegade-based variant for the South American market will soon be built in Brazil, and by the end of this year, Jeep aims to start local production in China.

Stellantis' production in Italy cut by up to 220,000 vehicles

MILAN — A global crunch in semiconductor supply could cost Stellantis up to 220,000 vehicles this year in terms of lost output in Italy, the FIM CISL union said, adding this would mark the fifth year in a row of declining production in the country. FIM CISL said in its periodic report on the group's production in Italy that Stellantis produced 351,890 vehicles in the first half of this year, almost 14% less than in the same period last year, with the key Melfi plant and the Sevel van-making facility being the most affected sites. Using data for the first half of the year and potential full-year production based on orders booked, the union estimates Stellantis could lose between 200,000-220,000 vehicles in 2022, said Ferdinando Uliano, the head of the FIM CISL union. "It's as if one of the group's large plants stopped for a year," he said, adding the chip supply situation was not improving this year and would also affect production in 2023. Uliano said factors including the war in Ukraine and the disruption to Russian gas supplies to Europe would only worsen the part supply situation for the automotive industry. A spokesman for Stellantis declined to comment on data and forecasts provided by FIM CISL, but repeated the carmaker had been taking decisions regarding the management of its operations on a day-by-day, plant-by-plant basis since the start of the COVID pandemic. Plants/Manufacturing Fiat Jeep

Jeep dealers worried Grand Wagoneer could be too much, too late

On January 10, 2011, an Automotive News article quoted Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne saying, "It's time we gave the market an upper-scale Grand Wagoneer." Like Babe Ruth pointing a finger at the far stands, Marchionne next predicted our date with historical destiny: "You'll see it in January 2013." Had that happened, the Grand Wagoneer would been a grand slam. Seven years later, with various economic factors in flux and still with no Grand Wagoneer in sight, it seems some Fiat Chrysler dealers are worried the luxury three-row Jeep could appear after the SUV game is over or, at the very least, much harder to play. What got in the way of the Grand Wagoneer? Shifting plans for and the need to pour money into Alfa Romeo. The debate about what kind of vehicle the Wagoneer should be — a unibody Range Rover rival, or a body-on-frame Chevrolet Suburban foe. After that, what should the thing look like? And then there's Fiat Chrysler's North American manufacturing capacity, which can't shoehorn space for Grand Wagoneer production at the same time as it needs lines running for two Ram 1500 model years. That last point is what could push Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer arrival to 2021. Outside the company, at least one Bank of America Merill Lynch analyst believes that economic forces such as a shrinking car market, more competition, higher interest rates on more expensive cars, lower used car prices, and higher gas prices will soon bring an end to the "Goldilocks" phase of crossover mania. He isn't alone, with an IHS analyst saying the same thing three years ago, another IHS analyst diving deeper into the declining numbers two years ago, and three other analysts breaking down depressed used car prices. Fuel prices are anyone's guess, but those other pressures could squeeze retailers trying to sell high-end metal. No one expects the Grand Wagoneer to fail, yet dealers don't expect the vehicle to practically sell itself. One dealer told AN, "We could have killed with [the Grand Wagoneer] if it had been available when they first told us about it, but it's a much tougher sell with interest rates and gas prices going up." Another dealer, perhaps more sanguine, said, "The Grand Wagoneer will still sell because it's a Jeep. But it would have been nice to have them already." "Nice" is an understatement. One dealership was so excited about getting the new big Jeep that it wrote a blog post in 2015 announcing the Grand Wagoneer's arrival in 2018.