Kudos for the Cruze in Detroit

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Bob Boniface with Chevrolet Volt

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Vice President of Daewood Design Taewan Kim with Chevrolet Cruze

By Don Shilling

The Cruze’s designer gave the car a sporty feel, despite its size.

DETROIT — The next car to be built in Lordstown was welcomed warmly when it cruised into Detroit on Sunday.

“The Chevy Cruze should be a success,” said Ronald Kuhn, an industry insider who saw the car at a General Motors press conference at the North American International Auto Show.

GM unveiled the car to the automotive press in October at the Paris Auto Show, but Sunday’s event was the first time auto insiders in North America could climb inside the car that will replace the Chevrolet Cobalt in April 2010.

“They got the proportions right,” said Kuhn, vice president of Motor City Market, an Internet marketing company.

He predicted the Cruze will duplicate the success of the Chevrolet Malibu, which was named Car of the Year at last year’s car show in Detroit.

Kelsey Mays, editor of Cars.com, said he is impressed with the sporty look of the car and the effort GM has made to place the Cruze above an entry-level sedan. He cited the roominess of the back seat and the use of upscale trim in the interior.

The only drawback of the model as it stands now is that the back seat doesn’t fold down, he said. That could be a deal killer for many buyers who look for that feature to add to cargo space, he said.

Ed Peper, Chevrolet general manager, said GM aims for the Cruze to have the most room and the best gas mileage of any compact car.

“We think it will create a whole new segment and be very disruptive,” he said.

Chuck Russell, vehicle line director for the Cruze, said GM is shooting for 40 mpg on the highway and 30 mpg in the city for its manual transmission models. He said automatic versions will be slightly less, but exact mileage numbers won’t be known until more testing is done.

The Cruze features a 1.4-liter turbocharged engine.

The Cruze will be in European showrooms this spring, but it will have a different powertrain, so European and North American mileage numbers will be different, Russell said. The European car will be built in Russia.

Taewan Kim, who was in charge of designing the Cruze, said his goal was to give the car a sporty look, even though it isn’t a luxury or sports car.

“A family car doesn’t have to be boring,” said Kim, who is vice president of Daewoo Design in South Korea.

The Cruze is being billed as GM’s first global car. It was designed by Asian and European teams and will be sold in more than 100 countries.

Kim said he wanted to give the car an aggressive and athletic appearance despite its small size. Among the features are a pronounced wheel well, headlights that taper back along the side of the car and a raised tip on the trunk lid that acts as a natural spoiler.

One of the biggest styling cues is the line along the side of the car. Kim said the line is more noticeable because the side of the car underneath the window is depressed inward, while the side of the bottom of the door is beveled outward.

Kim said he wanted to take the “plastic feel” out of the interior of the car as much as possible and still keep the cost of the car down. The interior features a woven, mesh material on the edges of the seats, and the same material is used on the sides of the instrument panel and on the panel in front of the passenger.

Subtle details include an arc-shaped design in front of both the passenger and driver to give the car a dual-cockpit feel, Kim said. Also, the gauges will be colored “ice blue,” and the sides of the gauges will be translucent so the blue will shine through and give the car ambient lighting, he said.

Sean McAlinden, vice president of research for the Center for Automotive Research in Michigan, said the Cruze will have to be priced like a Honda Civic if GM is going to start making money on small cars. He said he expects GM to aim for a price of between $21,000 and $22,000.

Automotive News said the average transaction price in August for the Cobalt was $16,500, while the Civic’s was $19,200.

Mays from Cars.com said he thinks GM can price the Cruze higher than it has the Cobalt because of its styling and more upscale content, such as navigation system.

Mays noted that GM said Sunday that it was going to introduce a microcar, called the Chevrolet Spark, to the North American market in 2011. That car could replace the Chevrolet Aveo as a sub-$10,000 minicar, and the Aveo could have content added so it becomes a higher-level compact car, Mays said. That would create an opportunity for the Cruze to be sold as a premium small car, he said.

Russell said no decisions on pricing have been made.

Peper said GM still plans for the Cruze to be a mass-market car.

“I think it’s going to be a super high-volume car for us,” he said.

Russell said upgrades at the Lordstown complex are ongoing to prepare for the Cruze. GM has said it will spend hundreds of millions of dollars to get the assembly and fabricating plants ready for the new car.

shilling@vindy.com