GM Plans to Add Minority Dealerships

General Motors Corp. plans a 40% boost in the number of minority-owned dealerships over the next three years, the auto maker announced today.

The company plans an additional 76 minority-owned dealerships by December, 1993, said GM President Lloyd Reuss and Tony March, chairman of the 11-member GM Minority Dealer Advisory Council.

GM has 192 black, Hispanic and Asian dealers, making up 2% of its about 9,600 dealers.

“Increased minority participation in our dealerships is vital to achieving GM’s prime objective of the 1990s--satisfying car and truck owners better than any other manufacturer,” Reuss said.

GM has conducted a minority dealer-training program since 1972. But March, one of GM’s leading black dealers, said the new agreement went an important step further.

“There is no doubt in my mind about the commitment of Lloyd Reuss and (GM Chairman) Bob Stempel,” said March, a Buick dealer from Hartford, Conn. “We are talking about a commitment from the largest corporation in the world.”

GM intends to increase the number of minority dealers in cities with relatively large minority populations, according to a GM statement. Those cities include Detroit, where four black-owned GM dealerships folded this year, leaving no black-owned GM franchises in the metropolitan area.

At Ford and Chrysler, minorities make up 5.7% and 2.5%, respectively, of dealer ranks.