This is The Morning Shift, our one-stop daily roundup of all the auto news that's actually important — all in one place at 9:00 AM. Or, you could spend all day waiting for other sites to parse it out to you one story at a time. Isn't your time more important?
It's Labor Day, so in honor of almost everyone getting the day off we're doing a TMS in honor of my favorite Ferrari GT. That's right, we've only got three gears and at least one of them is about GM so it might as well be the 400i Automatic, which comes with a GM three-speed Turbo-Hydramatic transmission.
1st Gear: Chevy To Hit The 5 Million Mark
How are they doing it? Big growth in the Middle East, China, Russia, Mexico, and Brazil
It's also worth noting, via Tom Walsh, that GM is also leading (amongst the Big Three) in the leasing market.
In an analysis done for the Free Press, covering the years 2008-13, ALG said the average residual value of GM products gained 13% — moving from 41.8% to 47.3% — while longtime industry leaders Honda and Toyota saw residuals rise only 4% and 5%, respectively, over the same period.
Higher trade-in values means more attractive lease payments means return customers.
2nd Gear: Diesel, Diesel, Diesel
Interestingly, people in the industry seem to think that the biggest benefit would be the Big Three throwing their weight behind it. We'll see how the Cruze diesel does…
The article points out that while German automakers (fairly) feel that diesels are penalized in the U.S., makers of hybrids (fairly) think that their vehicles are penalized in Europe.
Once again: Globally-aligned car standards would be great.
3rd Gear: Who The Hell Is Buying The NISMO Juke?
But really? It's almost $23k.
Worth noting that the Z NISMO now accounts for 15-30% of sales, depending on the market.
Oh, and the 2014 GT-R NISMO is going to be awesome apparently according to the press release.
Reverse: First The Falcon, Then The Mustang
On September 2, 1959, at a news conference broadcast to viewers in 21 cities on closed-circuit television, Henry Ford II introduces his company's newest car—the 90-horsepower, 30 miles-per-gallon Falcon. The Falcon, dubbed "the small car with the big car feel," was an overnight success. It went on sale that October 8 and by October 9, dealers had snapped up every one of the 97,000 cars in the first production run.
[HISTORY]
Neutral: Any News I Missed? Slow morning, tell me what I missed.
Photo Credit: Getty Images, Nissan, GM
Chevy Is Going To Sell 5 Million Cars For The First Time Ever