Everyone Seems To Hate Stellantis Right Now

The modern car industry requires an incredible amount of coordination, not just internally but from suppliers, workers, governments, and dealers. Just one car is touched by thousands of people on its journey from an idea to a product you can buy. While all the aforementioned groups work together in order to create a product, they don’t always see eye-to-eye. We should all credit Stellantis for doing the impossible and uniting these forces for a common cause: Kvetching about Stellantis.

I’m starting out today’s Morning Dump with a little hyperbole, but only a little. United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain made a speech in which he talked about a potential strike and drank from a mug labeled “Boss’s Tears,” ended by marveling that all these disparate groups agreed that Stellantis is a mess.

You know who else agrees the company isn’t perfect? Stellantis. Let’s travel to Italy to hear the Stellantis side of it.

All of this is hard, and the uncertainty of what different governments are going to do doesn’t help. German automakers feel this most acutely, and the warning from China that these tariffs aren’t going to help cooperation might make for more sleepless nights in Wolfsburg.

UAW: We Might Strike Stellantis

I’ve embedded this video from Stellantis above because it opens with a slickly produced campaign film for the UAW that looks almost good enough to be an SEC football hype video. It ends with Shawn Fain at Solidarity House in Detroit clowning Stellantis while drinking from this mug:

The message of Fain is that “we have to save [Stellantis] from itself.”

All of this goes to the perceived threat, from the UAW, that Stellantis is going to back down from its plan to build the Dodge Durango at the Jefferson North plant and instead shift production to Windsor Assembly in Ontario, Canada. One of the commitments that Stellantis made during last year’s contract negotiations, according to Fain, was the right to strike over product plans. Specifically, Fain says that Stellantis agreed to $19 billion as the amount of product and investment, with specific plants and products listed in the contract.

According to Fain, Stellantis is trying to push its product plan with deals outside of the current contract, thus causing a need to renegotiate (Basically, Fain is saying that if the agreed upon production plan (i.e. build Durango here in 2026) gets delayed a couple of years, by the time that production would start the contract would be up). What’s Stellantis say?

From the Detroit Free Press:

The company has confirmed no such thing. However, Shawn Fain continues to allege that the company has violated the contract, but to date has provided no data or information to back up his claims. Instead, he continues to willfully damage the reputation of the company with his public attacks which is helpful to no one including his members,” according to the statement provided by [Stellantis] spokeswoman Jodi Tinson. “We would all be better served if these issues were addressed across the table with productive, respectful and forward-looking dialogue. A strike does not benefit anyone — our customers, our dealers, the community and, most importantly, our employees.”

Fain ended by saying that the problem “Isn’t market conditions when it’s your CEO draining the value of the company for short-term gain,” adding that “Carlos Tavares is the problem, and it isn’t just us saying it… Stellantis is being sued by their own shareholders, they’re being sued by their suppliers, they’re facing a national strike action from the UAW, and even the national dealer network is sounding the alarm.”

That last bit is a reference to dealers calling the current condition at Stellantis “a disaster” and pointing the finger at Tavares. Fain ends by pointing out that “It’s not every day that we, the auto workers, are on the same side as the dealers, the same side as the suppliers, and the same side as the shareholders, but today is that day.”

He’s not wrong there. Suppliers are indeed suing Stellantis. Dealers are mad. Shareholders filed a lawsuit last month taking aim at the company for poor performance. The vibes are bad.

Stellantis: Ok, We Are Not Doing A Great Job Advertising Maserati

I had the chance to drive the new Maserati MC20 around Pebble Beach last month and, though it was a brief drive, I thought it was a great product. I need to spend a little more time with it, but my first impression is that this is an attractive and unique alternative to just buying a 911.

This is not a thought shared by consumers, it seems, as there’s been a huge decline in global sales at the brand. In total, shipments dropped to just 6,500 in the first half of the year, down 58% from the more than 15,000 units moved in the first half of 2023.

What’s the deal? The folks over at Motor1 Italy went to an event and got an explanation from Tavares himself:

“With Maserati, we have the right cars and we have the right technologies. We can offer thermal or 100% electric luxury sports cars. If sales are sluggish right now, it is a matter of marketing. We have also improved a lot on the quality front, but now we need to work on marketing. We lack prospects and leads, we need to reach potential customers and deliver the right message for the right positioning.”

I agree with his analysis. I want Maserati to continue to exist and I often like some of the brand’s cars, but I’m not sure what a Maserati buyer is or why someone would make the choice to become a Maserati fan.

Carlos Tavares: The Auto Industry Is In A Survival Mode

At that same event, Carlos Tavares, pictured above, tried to explain to reporters why everything is so hard these days:

“The automotive industry is in a kind of survival mode: we are beyond fear. We cannot complain, we cannot hesitate, we have to concentrate our efforts to stay alive. To stay alive we need to achieve cost parity between electric cars and thermal cars, but another chapter opens here. We operate in a geographical region animated by chaos and it is difficult to make predictions. Governments have decided to reduce purchase incentives and this is holding back the market.”

Again, I don’t entirely disagree with the analysis here, and I love the translation, especially the “animated by chaos” bit. It’s true! Chaos animates everything around us and governments have made it hard to know what happens next, especially with suddenly vanishing incentives that are then coupled with higher trade barriers.

[Ed Note: “Thermal cars” is almost certainly the product of translating from Italian, as I’ve never heard of ICEs called “thermal cars” here in the U.S. -DT]. 

I do not envy anyone who has to decide what to do in these situations.  That all being said, I don’t think constantly making your partners mad is necessarily the best way forward. In addition to some shareholders, a lot of workers, dealers, and suppliers, the company always seems to be in a tiff with local governments.

Tavares is entirely correct that all major automakers are in a fight for survival, but I disagree with his apparent belief that this means you have to literally fight with everyone. Annihilation is a strategy that sometimes works, though given the choice I think cooperation is the more successful bet.

China: It Would Be A Shame If We Made It Hard To Import Your BMWs

I’ve explored the back-and-forth between Germany, the rest of Europe, and China before, so I’ll spare you the extensive rehash. Let’s just say that China and Germany have a longstanding relationship that both seem to agree is important.

The large tariffs against Chinese imports by the EU are causing a rift in that relationship and a warning from China.

Per Reuters:

China’s commerce minister said the European Union’s imposition of tariffs on electric vehicles (EV) will “seriously interfere” with trade and investment cooperation and hurt both China and Germany.

In talks on Tuesday with German Vice Chancellor and Economic Minister Robert Habeck, Wang Wentao said he hoped to reach a solution in line with World Trade Organisation rules as soon as possible, and avoid the escalation of China-EU economic and trade frictions, according to a statement released by China’s Ministry of Commerce early on Wednesday.

Germany has the biggest proportional share of votes in the EU so it often can get its way which, in this case, seems to be a softening of anti-Chinese tariffs.

What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD

That’s right it’s “Firestarter” from The Prodigy the way it’s meant to be heard: as an instrumental track on the game Wipeout for Playstation.

The Big Question

Is the Fed gonna cut interest rates 25 or 50 basis points? We’ll talk about it tomorrow so place your guess below.