Buick City
Encyclopedia
Automobile
An automobile, autocar, motor car or car is a wheeled motor vehicle used for transporting passengers, which also carries its own engine or motor...
manufacturing complex in the northwest of Flint, Michigan
Flint, Michigan
Flint is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and is located along the Flint River, northwest of Detroit. The U.S. Census Bureau reports the 2010 population to be placed at 102,434, making Flint the seventh largest city in Michigan. It is the county seat of Genesee County which lies in the...
. Elements of the 235 acre (951,000 m²) complex dated from 1904, but it became known as Buick City in 1985. The Buick Site is still producing components for GM facilities and outside buyers. Operations ceased on the week ending November 20, 2010. The site will be vacated by GM employees and site responsibilities will be transferred to Motors Liquidation Corp as of December 6, 2010. The final cars built at Buick City were the Pontiac Bonneville
Pontiac Bonneville
The Pontiac Bonneville was an automobile built by the Pontiac division of General Motors from 1957 to 2005. It was introduced as a limited production performance convertible during the 1957 model year...
and the Buick LeSabre
Buick LeSabre
1959LeSabre and all other 1959 Buicks not only got new names, but all-new styling as well, adopting the new GM B- and C-body used on all of the corporation's full-sized cars...
.
The plant originated with Buick
Buick
Buick is a premium brand of General Motors . Buick models are sold in the United States, Canada, Mexico, China, Taiwan, and Israel, with China being its largest market. Buick holds the distinction as the oldest active American make...
before the formation of General Motors
General Motors
General Motors Company , commonly known as GM, formerly incorporated as General Motors Corporation, is an American multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and the world's second-largest automaker in 2010...
. Other elements were built by early manufacturers and suppliers like Fisher Body
Fisher Body
Fisher Body is an automobile coachbuilder founded by the Fisher brothers in 1908 in Detroit, Michigan; it is now an operating division of General Motors Company...
. The Buick City concept represented a successful attempt by General Motors to experiment with just-in-time manufacturing methods in response to Japanese manufacturers. The experiment included successes: The 1989 Buick LeSabre built in Buick City was ranked the top car in the J.D. Power and Associates
J.D. Power and Associates
J.D. Power and Associates is a global marketing information services firm founded in 1968 by James David Power III. The firm conducts surveys of customer satisfaction, product quality, and buyer behavior for industries ranging from cars to marketing and advertising firms. The firm is best known for...
rankings for that year; it was the first American built car to show up on the list. In 1999, the year the plant was closed, Buick City won the Platinum Award. As of 2006, it was the only General Motors plant given this award. The failure of auto manufacturing in Flint was lamented in Michael Moore
Michael Moore
Michael Francis Moore is an American filmmaker, author, social critic and activist. He is the director and producer of Fahrenheit 9/11, which is the highest-grossing documentary of all time. His films Bowling for Columbine and Sicko also place in the top ten highest-grossing documentaries...
's documentary film
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
, Roger & Me
Roger & Me
Roger & Me is a 1989 American documentary film directed by Michael Moore. Moore portrays the regional negative economic impact of General Motors CEO Roger Smith's summary action of closing several auto plants in Flint, Michigan, costing 30,000 people their jobs at the time and economically...
.