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Owen, Great post and as always such an interesting subject.
The 1932 900 Light Eight was an outstanding bargain and interesting move downmarket but was also introduced at the worst possible time as 1932 was the worst economically in the Great Depression. FDR was just elected and the New Deal had not yet begun. Without the GM men the 120 possibly would have been as dismal a marketing failure as the Light Eight and much is owed to them for bringing Packard back from the fate of Pierce -Arrow and so many other luxury makes during the Depression.
I agree that the Six was unnecessary and was driven primarily by the GM men who hated the "senior" line and steered the company down market to compete with the middle price car makers. As mentioned George Christopher was probably the person most responsible for this.
The beautiful Clipper styling had such great promise but I think it was a mistake to mount the body on the short 120" wheelbase and sell a six cylinder and small eight version. After WW2 if the company had begun production of the Super Eight and Custom and offered a convertible it could have sold as many cars as it was capable of producing in those first postwar years. I also don't think the '48 makeover was necessary either as the Clipper styling still had legs (notice the similarity with a 1950's Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud) and could have been retained until at least 1950. I wonder how a Clipper Custom with a powerful new Packard V-8 and Ultramatic would have sold in 1951 even? Oh well all just speculation and water under the proverbial bridge and more importantly I just heard the snow plough go by and I have to go clear the driveway of 2' of snow

I enjoyed every word of your response until I got to the word "snow". We'll typically get 4 or 5 snow storms here in northern NJ, maybe one will be 10 or 14 inches, the rest pretty trivial. The only context I want to think of snow in is if I should take a cruise down to Antarctica this winter. Maybe the Amazon or Caribbean is a better idea!

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Not to take this thread off topic as it is so very interesting hearing the various opinions but It is bitterly cold here today with windchill about -40C (or F as it is the same at -40). The snowfall was about only 12" but had drifted in my driveway to a depth of 2 feet in places. An Antarctic cruise would be interesting. I have always been facinated with that continent, the wildlife and the men who explored it especially Ernest Shacketon but I digress......thank you.

Owen & Clipper47: Here are some production figures for 1927 and 1928.

1927 total production 29,821 cars. 4.486 Eights built and
25,335 Sixes.

1928 total production 49,550 cars. 7,800 Eights built and 41,750 Sixes built.

It would be really interesting to see how much profit Packard made from each of the two models lines in both years.

Also it would be interesting to see which made more profit per unit for Packard the Eight or Six.


John F. Shireman

John, Interesting figures and as you mentioned it would be an interesting exercise to see which car contributed the most profit per unit. Typically with modern cars the more bells and whistles the more profit so I suspect there was more per unit profit on the more expensive line. A 1980's Chevrolet Nova and a Cadillac Cimarron (remember that gem?) were basically the same car but the profit on the Caddie was very much higher.
Nineteen twenty-eight was a boom year for the economy with the stock market going wild on margin buying (sound familiar)as was 1929 until Black Friday, October 25 so high end cars were selling like hotcakes and the 626 Eight was a big seller for Packard. A record year that stood until 1936 I think. I wonder why Packard discontinued the Six in late 1928 if it was a big money maker? The Standard Eight offered more prestige for about the same money I guess. I don't imagine Packard made cars for the VERY wealthy just for the fun of it. If the big Custom Eights had not been profitable they would have been dropped as soon as the Great Depression began in earnest in the early 30's. I suspect that profit margins on the larger more expensive models was greater than on the smaller less ostentatious ones. Of course when I made mention that Packard made a mistake in offering the Six,I was referring to the 1937 version not the Six of the 1920's which was in no way shape or form anything but a high price car for the wealthy and I don't mean a John D. Rockefeller wealthy.

Ckipper47, I empathise with you. I'm up in Minnesota visiting family for Christmas and it is C-O-L-D

I always like to think of it as "Titanic economics". The White Star line made most of their profit from the Steerage passengers, not the First Class passengers. It's all about the volume.

Randy, Thermometer was at -25F this morning so yes it is COLD! Are you in southern Minnesota or up north?

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As did our Detroit three (you know, the companies that force Americans to buy thirsty SUVs that break down every month), when the Luxury thing is going well you make LOTS of profit on each unit, the cost to make a Cadillac vs a Chevy ins't nearly as big as the retail price difference of each. But when people aren't buying luxury in big numbers you had better have what they want to buy.

One detail I have observed in the companies that survived the depression/war/1950s shakeout is that they were the companies that were hostile to labor and preditory in their business models.
One "what if" I like to ponder is a join-up that could have happened during the wild days of the 1920s between Nash and Packard (who actually held talks about this). Charles Nash would have needed to run things, his business acumen and legendary frugality (OK, he was CHEAP!) allowed Nash to survive the depression and actually post a profit in 1932, a mean feat. He did it through tight control of expenses. Had they been able to combine, and perhaps bring a low price high volume product into the mix they could have survived, maybe.
The last great join-ups were formulated in the 1920s.

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A Packard- Nash in the 20's might have worked since as you say Nash both Charlie ( a man after my own heart was Charlie ) and the company emphasized frugality so the product line could have run from the lowly 600 all the way to custom bodied 12's and the 120 would not have been necessary.