Re: Why no Packard in a "Packard"?

Posted by 58L8134 On 2012/4/4 7:35:18

Hi

Simply, within the Curtiss-Wright Joint Management agreement, the Utica engine plant was one of the spoils among others that C-W extracted for the $35M in '57 operating capital that S-P received to keep them going. S-P was in dire financial condition all the way from early '56 right through the forth quarter of '58 when the Lark began to sell. They couldn't afford to even bring the Packard engine tooling to South Bend for production or much of anything else for that matter. To say the corporation survived by the skin of their teeth would be to make understatement.

Possibly a Detroit Packard engine might have helped sales though most buyers recognized the '57 Clippers as part and parcel Studebakers, engine notwithstanding, something they had previously dismissed as unacceptable as when considering a new car. The price premium over the Studebaker President was hard to justify. They also had the badge-engineered Hudson "Hash" as an example of what would become of their resale value in the used car market.

At the time, the news magazine business pages reported S-P's financial troubles on a weekly basis. No one wanted to be stuck with an orphan when the company went out of business as all rumors seem to indicate. That avoidance of such cars made the rumors a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Steve