Autoblog

Back in October, we told you about Kentucky State Representative C.B. Embry and his bill to name the Chevrolet Corvette the Official Sports Car of Kentucky. The bill is a costless measure intended for honoring General Motors because their Corvette plant is a vital feature of the Bluegrass State's economy. Such a measure would normally speed through, ideally only taking up a few minutes of the legislative process, but it seems to have encountered a snag. There are simply too many more pressing issues at hand. For that reason the chairman of the House Committee on State Government has placed the Corvette bill at the end of the line. The backend of that queue also consists of a few other "feel good" pieces. They address such matters as naming cornhole (think bean bag toss) the official state game, burgoo the official state dish and KFC the official state picnic food.

[Source: Detroit News]

Assembly workers at Toyota's Georgetown, Kentucky plant make about $25 per hour, they build the best-selling non-truck in North America, and a lot of workers still aren't happy.

UAW members that are hurt on the job get paid 100% of their wage until they're well again, but at a Toyota plant, you may get placed in a less physically demanding role, but at a lower pay rate. This is just one example of why workers are meeting every Wednesday at a local Holiday Inn creating a game-plan to introduce the UAW into Toyota's biggest plant in North America. Another driving force for unionization is a leaked document that outlines Toyota's goal of controlling its labor costs by capping wages. Toyota officials say that being able to adjust pay at its own discretion allows it to provide stable employment for its workers when other manufacturers are leaving the region and the country all together.

The Georgetown plant has been around for 25 years without unionization, mostly because Toyota has treated its employees very well and paid wages that were competitive with what UAW members made. With Toyota's big profits and immense growth, some employees at Georgetown feel all they have to look forward to are more temp workers and "flexible pay". We know there are a lot of Autoblog readers who would be thrilled to make $25 per hour (including many Autoblog writers), but for the 7,200 workers in Georgetown, the siren call of the UAW may be getting harder and harder to tune out.

[Source: Freep]

click above image for a photo your of the National Corvette Museum

April 26-28, 2007, hundreds of Corvette owners flocked to the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green Kentucky. The occasion was the C5-C6 Bash, a festival celebrating the latest two versions of the American sports car that started it all. Corvette-ifosi were also there to witness the unveiling of the 2008 Corvette and register their approval or approbation. When not ogling the new car or any of the hundreds of other souped up Corvettes that made the journey, Bash-goers could wander the halls and pay homage to Zora Arkus-Duntov's remains, which are kept behind glass in a wall in the museum. And that's only the beginning.

Click through the jump to read the story and do yourself a favor by viewing the high-res gallery, which as good a guided tour as your're going to get without visiting the National Corvette Museum yourself.

Toyota Motor Corp. is apparently looking into adding a new model to the assembly line at its Georgetown, Kentucky facility. That's the plant we've recently covered regarding union issues. Georgetown is currently building nothing but Camrys right now, so adding a new crossover to the mix "would help ease the plant's dependence on Camry sedans." Sure, like five million Camrys indicates they need a change. They have already added Camry Hybrid production, but it's never a bad idea to diversify to allow for market fluctuations.

The plant update would likely cost around $400 million, but wouldn't add overall production capacity or swell the work force. If and when another model is added, it is likely to be a new crossover, which would require Toyota to shift some Camry production to other facilities. They would also have to be able to build this new crossover in other Toyota plants to meet global demand. With a potential $400 million on the line, it's not surprising to hear that the Kentucky legislature is working on an incentive package for the expansion.

[Source: Automotive News, sub. req'd]

The Detroit News is reporting that the United Auto Workers union is hosting a town hall meeting for workers at Toyota's manufacturing plant in Kentucky this Saturday. Not an organization known to mince words, the UAW has labeled the meeting's topic as "The Human cost of Toyota's Success". A press release issued about the meeting states that workers will talk about on-the-job injuries, the use of temps, and concerns about conditions at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky. In attendance will be UAW Vice President Terry Thurman.

As far as we know, the UAW has not managed to establish a credible presence at any automotive assembly plant in the U.S. owned by a foreign automaker. The union would certainly have us believe that the town hall meeting will be attended by a number of disgruntled Toyota employees ready to take action against their employer in a more organized way. Indeed, Thurman states "Our union is firmly and fully committed to helping these workers gain justice."

Problem is, we've never heard of these gross injustices being perpetrated against workers employed by foreign automakers. Perhaps that's because these workers have never had an organized voice before, but it could also be because their jobs are no worse or better than those under the umbrella of the UAW at domestic automakers. Truly, we really don't know which is the case and are very interested in what the workers at Toyota's assembly plant in Kentucky have to say.

[Source: The Detroit News]

While Toyota expects to see overall growth in the US market next year, the company is cutting production estimates for its new San Antonio full-size truck plant. Originally expected to start at its full capacity of 200,000 units per year, the automaker now expects to build 150,000 Tundra pickups there in 2007. To blame is a shrinking full-size truck market, led by high fuel prices and a decrease in housing starts (we've seen data that strongly correlates the housing market to pickup truck sales). Stealing sales away from the established leaders won't be easy, either, especially not with GM's new Silverado and Sierra hitting showrooms ahead of the redesigned Tundra.

Toyota has doubled its order for Camrys from Subaru's Indiana plant, however, and now expects 200,000 units/year to come online in October of 2007. Combined with the output of Toyota's Kentucky plant, this gives it a North American production capacity somewhere north of 500,000 units/year. The automaker has already stated that it expects to sell 450,000 Camrys here next year; just how many are they thinking of pushing in '08 and beyond?

[Source: Marketwatch]

Toyota has launched a new advertising campaign aimed at educating Americans about the company’s involvement in and importance to the U.S. economy. The billboards highlight such facts as 386,000 jobs have been created in this country by Toyota and the company’s invested $13 billion in the U.S. since it arrived over 35 years ago. The ads have been placed along highways in two dozen markets where Toyota operates factories or has supplier operations.

Reactions to the ads are obviously varied depending on who you ask. The general consumer these days who cares more about “Bang for the Buck” than “Buy American” is comfortable with the Japanese automaker’s increasing presence in the U.S. economy. Members of the UAW and other organized unions, however, whose domestic employers have been losing marketshare to Toyota at a rapid rate are not pleased. The linked NewsDay article points out that the UAW in particular has been weakened by the presence of Toyota’s and other foreign automakers’ nonunion operations.

[Source: NewsDay]

Note - No pics of the actual billboards were available, so we had some fun in Photoshop above.