General Motors will idle U.S. truck plants for two weeks in July in an effort to trim dealers’ pickup truck inventories and ready factories for 2012 model-year production.
GM’s Flint assembly in Michigan will shut down for the weeks of July 4 and July 11, said Tom Wickham, a spokesman for the automaker. Production at the Fort Wayne assembly plant in Roanoke, Ind., also will stop during those weeks, said Orval Plumlee, president of United Auto Workers Local 2209.
The two plants make Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra light-duty pickups. GM’s truck inventory was 288,000 units at the end of May, up from 275,000 on April 30, said Don Johnson, GM’s vice president of U.S. sales, on June 1.
Mark Reuss, president of GM’s North American operations, said at a June 3 conference that the current short-term truck inventory was acceptable and wouldn’t prompt price discounting.
GM’s truck plants in Arlington, Texas, and Silao, Mexico will continue normal production during the Flint and Fort Wayne facilities shutdowns, said Chris Lee, a GM spokesman.
