Strikes Threatening GM Just as ’93 Models Are Due : Autos: UAW says a walkout at a key Ohio stamping plant could begin next week. It could delay deliveries of new Saturns, other cars.
General Motors Corp. faces at least three potential strikes in the Midwest, including one in Ohio that could delay production of 1993 models of its showcase Saturn cars.
The United Auto Workers served GM with a “five-day letter” Thursday over disputes at Local 1714, which represents 2,300 stamping plant workers in Lordstown, Ohio. The letter is a warning to the company that the local may strike in five business days.
A walkout at the Ohio plant could begin next Thursday.
The workers make metal parts for the Pontiac Sunbird and Chevrolet Cavalier, which are assembled at the Lordstown complex.
The plant also supplies stamped parts to Saturn Corp.--GM’s import-fighting small-car subsidiary in Spring Hill, Tenn.--as well as other GM plants that spokeswoman Linda Cook refused to name.
For Saturn, which operates on extremely tight schedules and keeps on hand only the parts it needs, a disruption in parts flow now could be disastrous.
“If they go out, it would be a bare minimum number of days before that whole operation would just shut down,” said Joseph Phillippi, an auto industry analyst with Lehman Bros. Inc. in New York.
Saturn dealers, who are virtually sold out of 1992 models, have gone so far as to lend demonstrator cars to customers to test drive in hopes of writing orders for 1993 models. A delay in deliveries could send buyers elsewhere.
Another UAW-GM labor dispute in Lansing, Mich., could cripple production of the popular Pontiac Grand Am.
UAW Local 602 at the Lansing body plant, which makes the outer shell for the Grand Am, voted in favor of a strike last week. Talks continue over issues that neither side would reveal. The international UAW has not issued a five-day letter in that dispute.
And union employees at GM’s Inland Fisher Guide plant in Anderson, Ind., vote today on whether to authorize a strike over work being sent to outside contractors. The plant makes lighting products and bumpers.
“Outsourcing” is at the heart of scores of grievances pending at UAW locals throughout GM.
Phillippi said the UAW must be aware that its actions in Lordstown and Lansing affect plants where strikes could severely hurt GM.
“One is Grand Am, which is doing well, and that affects operating profits,” he said. “The other is Saturn, where they desperately need high levels of volume to keep the franchise prospering.”
Saturn and Grand Am sold a combined 261,096 units through Aug. 10, almost 14.6% of all GM cars sold this year.
The world’s largest auto maker is only beginning to make money on cars and trucks again after an industry record loss of $4.5 billion last year.
UAW spokesman Reg McGhee declined to comment on UAW-GM relations, and a GM labor official declined to be interviewed.
Company and union relations have been strained since last December, when GM announced plans to close 21 plants and cut 54,000 U.S. hourly jobs by 1995 in a restructuring of money-losing North American operations.
GM in February identified 14 of the 21 plants targeted for closing. Chairman Robert C. Stempel said last week that more would be named before the end of the year.
The UAW could also lose more GM work in a new global purchasing scheme in which all supplier contracts are being rebid. GM now buys 70% of its $50 billion in annual parts purchases from in-house suppliers, which employ about 80,000 UAW workers.
