Chevrolet is gearing up to produce the new eighth-generation Corvette on February 3, but there’s still some more bad news, according to recent reports. The effects of the six-week United Auto Workers (UAW) union strike late last year, GM is still playing catch up getting the new Corvette out to anxious buyers. After pushing back production for the 2020 model, there may not be as many Corvettes coming as we all hoped.
At least, that’s according to a video Louisville Chevy salesman Mike Davenport put out last week and also reported by Autoblog and CorvetteForum. “I got word about three weeks ago that we were going to lose about 15% of our allocations,” he said. Because of the working days the factory lost due to the strike, he discovered GM needed to cut its 2020 production by about 20 percent to make up for lost time. That’s down to lost production capacity and time spent tackling internal issues brought about by the strike.
Going off this information, Chevrolet just won’t have as many 2020 C8 Corvettes to go around. Davenport noted GM is prioritizing “sold” orders placed by individual customers. If you are one of those people who already put in your order with your dealer and paid for the car, it seems you will still get your Corvette on time. The ones who will lose their allocation, by contrast, are dealers charging well over MSRP for the cars, or those who are trying to stock up on inventory to sell off their lots when they arrive.
2021 Chevy Corvette production should still be on schedule
Production for the 2021 Chevy Corvette is still set to begin later this year, on September 1. By then, manufacturing at the Bowling Green, Kentucky plant should be rolling to the extent that it can allocate extra Corvettes to dealers who may lose out on the opportunity for 2020 models.
The first regular-production 2020 Chevy Corvette sold for a whopping $3 million at Barrett-Jackson last weekend. NASCAR team owner and collector Rick Hendrick bought VIN 001 at the Scottsdale auction, with proceeds going to charity DCF investments. The charity supports the expansion of public school quality and the recruitment, development and retention of educators.
Normal pricing for the 2020 Chevy Corvette Stingray starts at $59,995, though it’s widely expected that price will go up for 2021. Not to mention the inevitable dealer markups, naturally.
