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General Motors Co. celebrated improving sales Tuesday. But the company said another sector of the economy – construction – would have to recover before sales of pickup trucks made in Allen County really come back.
GM employs about 2,400 workers at its Allen County assembly plant and about 1,100 at its Defiance, Ohio, foundry.
The foundry makes parts for most of GM’s product lines, so Tuesday’s news that overall sales were up 4 percent last month over October 2008 was good for workers.
But sales of the trucks made in Allen County were more mixed. GM sold 0.2 percent more Chevrolet Silverados in October than in October 2008, while sales of GMC Sierras were up 5.7 percent over the same period.
Sales of both models were off more than 35 percent for the first eight months of 2009 compared with the first eight months of 2008.
GM spokesman John McDonald said Tuesday that the financial industry went into crisis – and the recession went into high gear – in mid-September 2008. The fact that sales are again on their way up is a sign that the economy is beginning to recover, he said.
In September, GM announced it will hire 700 additional workers – many from a plant that closed in Michigan – to staff a third shift at the Allen County assembly plant starting in April. McDonald said those plans are unchanged. Officials also plan to spend $46 million retooling the plant so it can make heavy-duty Sierras and Silverados.
But GM thinks home construction will have to start to recover before truck sales will. That’s because many people who buy trucks work in the construction sector, McDonald said.
“We see truck sales as a leading economic indicator,” McDonald said.
