• Santa Claus will be coming the the UAW 2250 Union Hall on Sunday, Dec. 13 from 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm to meet our future members. There will be cookies, milk and juice so bring your children and grandchildren and don’t forget your cameras!
• This Saturday, Dec. 12, the keys to the Habitat house in Wentzville will be handed over to the Tesson family. The dedication ceremony will be at 3:00 pm and everyone is invited. The house is located at 710 Cheryl Ann Drive in Wentzville. Through the hard work of all the volunteers and your generous donations, this family will now have a place to call home!
• Adopt-A-Child gifts can be dropped off at the cafeteria conference room.
• November sales kept the momentum going as the industry looks poised to set a new record. Here’s how the van and midsize pickup categories fared:
| 2015 | 2014 | Change | Share | |
| Ford Transit | 9584 | 4851 | +97.6% | 36.2% |
| GM | 6810 | 5194 | 31.1% | 19.9% |
| Ford Econoline | 3297 | 4072 | -3.6% | 14.9% |
| Ram ProMaster | 2754 | 3290 | -16.3% | 10.4% |
| Mercedes Sprinter | 2255 | 2532 | -10.9% | 8.5% |
| Nissan NV | 1105 | 1141 | -3.2% | 4.2% |
| Toyota Tacoma | 13,465 | 13018 | +3.4% | 49.8% |
| Chevy Colorado | 6230 | 2366 | +163% | 23.0% |
| Nissan Frontier | 5099 | 6332 | -19.5% | 18.9% |
| GMC Canyon | 2236 | 854 | +162% | 8.3% |
Despite a nice bounce in sales, field supplies for the van remained virtually unchanged, dropping only 167 units. As measured in days, the supply stands at 43, down from 46 days at the end of October. Chevy passenger vans, already extremely low, accounted for nearly all of the decline and now stand at just 7 days supply. Colorado supplies rose 834 units and stayed at 44 days supply. Canyon supplies rose around 1100 units and are now at 83 days, up from 80.
• The 12 days of Christmas raffle has begun. Now through Tuesday, Dec. 22 there will be daily drawings (1st shift, 2nd break in the cafeteria) for prizes such as baskets, jackets, blankets and a lottery tree. Tickets are available from any Women’s Committee member and are $5 apiece, 3 for $10 and 22 for $20. Proceeds go to fund committee activities in 2016. The first winner, of a picnic basket, was Don Prater.
• General Motors and the U.S. Army Tank Automotive Research, Development & Engineering Center (TARDEC) are modifying a Chevrolet Colorado midsize pickup truck to run on a commercial hydrogen fuel cell propulsion system and will expose the truck to the extremes of daily military use for 12 months. “Hydrogen fuel cell technology is important to GM’s advanced propulsion portfolio, and this enables us to put our technology to the test in a vehicle that will face punishing military duty cycles,” said Charlie Freese, executive director of GM’s Global Fuel Cell Engineering activities. Fuel cell propulsion has very high low-end torque capability useful in off-road environments. It also offers exportable electric power and quiet operation, attractive characteristics to both commercial and military use. "The potential capabilities hydrogen fuel cell vehicles can bring to the Warfighter are extraordinary, and our engineers and scientists are excited about the opportunity to exercise the limits of this demonstrator," said TARDEC Director Paul Rogers. "FCVs are very quiet vehicles, which scouts, special operators and other specialties place a premium,” he said. “What's more, fuel cells generate water as a by-product, something extremely valuable in austere environments."
• From Automotive News: Two years ago, General Motors' Mark Reuss relaxed on a lounge seat at the Los Angeles Auto Show, a few yards away from the new Chevrolet Colorado pickup that he'd unveiled hours earlier. Reuss chuckled when asked about GM's gamble on smaller pickups, a category Ford and Ram had left for dead. Could he recall a time when one of the Detroit 3's pickup strategies had diverged so sharply from rivals'? "No. It's wild," Reuss said, beaming. "This is going to be exciting to watch." Now, one year after the Colorado and sibling GMC Canyon hit U.S. showrooms, Reuss has 95,000 more reasons to smile. That's how many of the pickups GM was estimated to have sold this year through October, surpassing experts' full-year sales estimates in just 10 months. (IHS Automotive had pegged 81,000 for all of 2015.) They're getting snapped up nearly as fast as they arrive, with virtually no incentives. And customers tilt younger, more highly educated and more urban than Chevy's other pickup buyers.
Tom Brune
UAW Communications Coordinator
Wentzville Assembly
636-327-2119
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