Posts Tagged ‘Chevrolet’

Second Snow Day in a Row

Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009

Call it being extra conservative, but I’ve taken a second snow day in a row. I’m not sure about all of Monmouth County, but in the development where I live the main roads are still not drivable. Oh sure, our cul-de-sac is fine and I could drive circles around it all day. However, the main road of our development which the cul-de-sac feeds in to is abysmal. I don’t understand why the maintenance team would be sure that the cul-de-sacs are okay to drive on, but the main roads are not. Isn’t that some type of useless?

As if this wasn’t bad enough, last night’s deep freeze has rendered those snow covered roads to be ice covered. Great…

When you put all of this together with the fact that I’m now driving a Honda Civic instead of a Chevrolet Blazer, you can see why I’m more restrained about making the hour long trek across New Jersey from Tinton Falls to Trenton. Ain’t happening today.

And let’s be real – I definitely do not get paid enough to put my safety on the line to get to an office where my work is more “appreciated” than valued. Seriously. If I had a dollar for every time someone said thank you or that they appreciated my work, I’d double my salary! I don’t want to start down that path right now, though…

So I’ll be working from home again today while the folks in this development try to dislodge their heads from their asses and figure out how to make the main road drivable!

Donated My Truck to Kars-4-Kids

Monday, January 12th, 2009

Earlier this month I donated my 1999 Chevrolet Blazer to the Kars 4 Kids charity. You know this organization if you listen to NJ101.5 – they have the commercial where the guy and the kid both sing “1-8-7-7 Kars 4 Kids…” It sticks in your head (and apparently it works since they were the first group that I thought of when I wanted to donate my truck).

It was a very pleasant experience and the Kars 4 Kids people were very nice to speak with on the phone. If anyone has a car or a truck that they are looking to get rid of, then they should consider donating it to a charity like Kars 4 Kids. Not only do you get a tax deduction, but I also got a three-day, two-night stay at a hotel of my choice. Pretty sweet, huh? I’ll be putting that to good use this summer when I go down to Nashville.

Kars 4 Kids seems to be a Jewish-based organization that provides “for the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of distressed and at-risk Jewish youth.” There’s a whole page of stuff that this organization does to help young people. I admit that I had no idea that Kars 4 Kids was a front for this organization when I made the donation, but it doesn’t matter. As long as someone who is less privileged is getting some type of benefit from my old truck, then all is well!

How to Fix the Major Automakers’ Dilemma

Monday, November 10th, 2008

Cut prices. That’s it. It’s a very simply solution, actually. Cut the prices of your vehicles so they are affordable during the current economic recession and tightening credit atmosphere and you’ll sell more product. Selling more product equals more income. More income equals a greater chance that your companies will see net revenues instead of deficits.

Is this stuff really that hard? Couldn’t any high school student educated in basic economics come up with a solution to the “problem” that the major automakers are facing? Hey, we can even get more in-depth about a solution and tell the automakers to cut expenses – a novel idea! Or how about this one? The automakers should be making more products that the consumers want to buy. Eureka! We’ve figured it out!!!

Seriously, it is a disgrace that the big three automakers are facing the problems that they are today. These companies deserve what they’re getting – they didn’t produce fuel efficient cars in mass quantities when the consumers demanded them as far back as ten years ago and are currently doing nothing to sell the excess quantities of their product. There are a lot of people out there (like me) who would LOVE to buy a new car. In fact, you could say that someone like me is constantly in the market to buy a new car.

But most of the people in my situation are realists. We know that we can buy a good used car that is only one or two years old for 60% – 75% of the price of the same model if it was brand new. Why would anyone pay the premium to purchase the new car in this economy? With all of the executives driving the buses at these companies (pardon the pun) can it be that none of them realize that they need to cut prices in order to stimulate sales? I’m a big fan of Chevrolet (and I have no idea why since I’ve paid more to have my Blazer fixed than the thing could ever be worth). I’d love to buy a 2009 Chevy Impala. Yahoo! Autos suggests that the model I would like to buy starts at $28,000 and that the 5-year cost to own this car is $52,000.

Why would I ever buy that car in today’s grim economy? Is there no one at Chevrolet who is looking at this and saying, “Hmmm… We need to fix this problem.” Better yet – do the people at Chevrolet even see this as a problem? Here’s why they should.

I can go to Enterprise Rent-a-Car and get a certified pre-owned (used) 2008 Chevy Impala for $15,000. Read that again. I can get a one-year old Impala for about HALF of what a new one costs.

How can you fix the problem that today’s automakers are facing? Simple. Cut prices and move product. If this doesn’t happen, then you and I better get ready to pay a little bit more in taxes because you know another government bailout won’t be too far behind.


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