The North American auto show season has kicked off in Los Angeles, and it looks as if continued prudence will be the theme, as the players head through major (and minor) North American markets en route to the season finale in New York, come Easter 2010.

The first show of the season is also exciting, since we haven’t seen the players all together on the same pitch since the previous spring. It gives us a time to catch up on what’s been going on, as well as look forward to what’s coming up over the next few months. We can network with peers and shed more beams of light on certain situations where none of us have the complete picture; we can talk not just to one company’s executives but to many within a space of a couple hours, sometimes together, without juggling schedules and making appointments; and we can see and feel vehicles we’re going to be driving in the coming weeks, months and even years.

That’s the importance to us journalistical types, and it certainly helps us move the information along to the readers, who also happen to be consumers (whether they are looking to buy right now or just gathering information for two or three years down the road).

For consumers, auto shows are invaluable for their shopping potential. All shows are staffed by local retailers, so you can not only get quality information but you can also compare like vehicles within short walking distance. With today’s auto malls, this isn’t as onerous a task as it used to be when you literally had to walk a mile of dealerships for comparison shopping.

For retailers, it provides the opportunity to comparison “sell” vehicles – you can get around and look and feel vehicles that are direct rivals of the product you’re trying to sell, as well as see how those products are being marketed to the consumer. What are the pitch models saying? How are the vehicles displayed (especially marquee models that often have intricate displays to not just show off the vehicle, but convey an image)?

Entertainment, information, excitement, take-aways … they’re all part of the auto show experience. And one’s coming to your town or region over the next four or five months. Get out there and see what the industry is up to, as it gets out of one of the most difficult times in its history.

September is a great month if you’re into sports – Canadian football is winding up its season, American football is starting its campaign, and hockey and basketball teams are going to camp.

On the auto side, we begin the drive toward the championships in all pavement motorsports seasons, and we start the auto show season – this year in Frankfurt.

Auto show season is always a great time to check out not just all the new models under one roof, but to also get a glimpse as to what may be coming down the road in the next five or so years.

Last year in particular was exceptionally hard on not just companies putting together their show line-ups, but also show-goers who didn’t get to see a full roster on the field (some companies stayed away from some high-profile shows – Nissan, Porsche and Suzuki in particular took a pass on the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, claiming they simply didn’t have anything new for the floor – leaving plenty of carpet space for Chinese manufacturers to take centre stage, instead of remaining confined to the back-halls and pedestrian alleyways.

That in itself was a healthy insight into how other countries view the importance of the North American automotive market, and allowed North Americans to perhaps view a potentially new marketplace of smaller, more fuel efficient cars.

It started off in Los Angeles with GM cancelling a press program to highlight the new Buick LaCrosse, and Chrysler planning to stay out of the show entirely (until the local dealers association secured product for a very subdued display).

By the time we got to the end of the season in April in New York, Chrysler and General Motors were into restructuring and it seemed as if fall shows in Frankfurt and Tokyo were going to be relegated to regional status.

But huge and, perhaps more importantly, sensible strides have insured that the traditional kick-offs to the auto show season will set the stage in Europe and the Orient, as we gear up for our home games. We start off with a preview of what to expect in Frankfurt, followed by a full show report and then on to Tokyo and Los Angeles, as we work our way eastwards to Detroit and Toronto.

“Here’s to the new year. May she be a damn sight better than the old one.”
- Col. Sherman T. Potter, 4077th MASH

Another auto show season has come to a close and although it wasn’t a terribly bright one, in terms of all the uncertainty in the industry, it also wasn’t all doom and gloom.

It didn’t start off too promising, with Chrysler passing on the Los Angeles show in November 2008. Were it not for the dealers’ association cobbling a car line-up together to participate in the show, Chrysler would have been absent. However, it was still depressing to see the company’s half-lit corner of the display hall alongside the bright Audi display with what seemed like excessively highlighted bright white cars.

General Motors had invited a strong media contingent down to the Media Preview days but then cancelled all its planned activities for the event the week leading up to the show, in light of information that was starting to stream out of the woes in Detroit.

Several off shore manufacturers pulled out of the North American show in Detroit, and we were all the poorer for it. In protest, Porsche has not entered the Detroit show for a couple years, and Suzuki’s decision to not participate was more to do with penny pinching than any form of protest or indication of sagging fortunes. Nissan’s decision on absenteeism was a curious one, though, since only months before its CEO had held the media attention with a bold forecasting speech about the industry at the opening of the LA show.

Maybe it was Carlos Ghosn’s foreboding of an automotive world that could not sustain the electric and hybrid vehicle requirements being suggested by governments that led to his company’s decision to take a miss on Detroit, especially in light of the multitude alternative fuel introductions and forecastings in Detroit. Or maybe, it was just that the company didn’t really have anything new and ready to roll out on press day, when the attention of the world was so keenly focused on the goings-on in Detroit.

How curious then that at New York the company decided to introduce its new Nissan 370Z roadster in a private ceremony on the eve of the Press Preview. Maybe it was due to the industry’s still being in hyperactive economical mode that made Nissan think twice about introducing a powerful, full-seeking model when all about them were thinking hybrids, plug-ins and E85.

Still, that didn’t stop BMW from unveiling an M version of its new X6 crossover, Porsche from pulling the wraps off a GT3 version of its 911 Carrera, Chrysler from rolling out a new Jeep Grand Cherokee, and GM from showing off its Canadian built GMC Terrain crossover.

And what of Ford in all this? The company that is widely believed to be in the best shape of the Detroit Three was awkwardly silent in its corner of the Jacob Javitz centre by the Hudson River. It had made a big splash in Detroit with several introductions in its Lincoln, Mercury and Ford line-ups, but it still had a little something up its sleeve in New York and it was playing from a position of strength, whereas its Detroit compatriots were trying to get out from under ever thickening storm clouds.

Maybe all this is just highlighting what I always tell outsiders trying to make sense of everything going on in the industry – “it’s a wild and wacky automotive world, isn’t it?”