RIP Cadillac XLR

General Motors confirmed the end of production of the Cadillac XLR manufactured by the American automaker at the Bowling Green Assembly Plant. All the 40 employees responsible for the production of this particular model will be laid off as soon as this spring, Sharon Basel, communications manager for General Motors, said according to Bowling Green Daily news. What's interesting is that the plant currently employs 154 workers who will be fired by March 1 due to General Motors' restructuring plans. The production facility is currently closed until February 23, the aforementioned source wrote.

Basically, General Motors decided to discontinue the XLR in a move supposed to conserve cash and eliminate models that would only increase costs without helping the manufacturer to increase its local market share. In this context, the XLR, which faced declining sales ever since last summer, was chosen to be killed by spring.

“No one’s really happy about (the XLR loss). Everyone in the plant wants to do what we can to build great vehicles. No one’s feeling good about it. Obviously, it’s difficult when a plant loses a product. We want to continue to grow our volume as much as we can. So it’s been difficult,” said Paul Graham, plant manager.

Sales of the XLR were down 28 percent in 2008 compared to the previous year, according to figures published by the same source, with approximately 1,250 models sold in the whole year. A Cadillac XLR costs between $87,000 and $106,000.

“Models like the XLR often have limited product life cycles. Difficult decisions have to be made to ensure that we can continue to develop, engineer and produce the most critical products in our portfolio. It’s very specialized in terms of who would buy a vehicle at that price point. We’re seeing the market downturn impacting all segments and some more severely than others,”Sharon Basel stated.