Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-07-31
AUTOMOBILE TRADE
SITUATION CLEARS
Industry Put House in Order
Immediately After Recent
Market Crash.
BY DAVID J. WILKIE,
Associated Press STAFF Writer.

DETROIT, July 3l.-Whatever else
may be said about the position of the
automobile industry in relation to the
general business depression. it must be
recorded that the industry lost no time
in putting its house in order when the
slump came. While in many other lines
of business there was some hesitancy to
make drastic readjustments, because of
the belief the depression would be only
temporary and of short duration, the
leaders of the automobile industry took
immediate and drastic steps to curtatl
production and to distribute a heavy
accumulation of overproduction.
When the slump came last Fall the
automobile industry found itself with a
surplus of more than 100000 units. This
was really stock on hand and the pros
pect of moving 1t was none too good.
Moreover 1t had to be moved or become
total loss in many cases, because al
ready many factories had new models
well under way-too far under way to
suspend production on them.
Production Reduced.
Production was reduced below actual
consumer demand, and ignoring the OPP
timiStic statements made in some quar-
ters- that early Spring would find BUSH
ness we'll back on normal leveE-or at
least on the upgrade--the automobile
induStry's chiefs disposed of the surplus
and went ahead with the production of
their new models. The production, of
course, was on sharply restricted
basis. Then came the time for the for
NAL presentation of the new cars. A
complete suspension of manufacturing
activity was decided upon by several
companies. This suspension lasted for
two weeks and 1t served to finally clean
up that part of the surplus production
that had not already been disposed Of
Few of the industry's leaders look for
an immediate improvement in business
conditions. Most of them look for a
continuance of restricted output and
curtailed demand at least for the re-
Inainder of the current year. The in
dustry, however, is in position to take
immediate advantage of any improve
ment in the demand for new cars.
Automobile executives are not natu-
rally peSsimlstic nor easily discouraged;
IN the contrary, they are inclined rather
to hold that transportation is one of the
first essentials to the economic life OF
the Nation and as such bound to feel
the first move toward improved busi-
ness conditions. In the current depreS-
SION however, there have been no at
tempts by the industry's leaders to Gre
ate an artificial condition of prosperity
by rushing into print with unduly opti-
mistic statements. Very few of the mo-
tor industry's chiefs want t. be quoted
at ALL one declined on the ground that
he did not want to lie about condi-
tions," nor did he want to be a pessi-
mist. Another went further and pre-
dicted that business conditions would
show little. if any, improvement before
next Spring.
Operations Schedules.
Although those chiefs or the industry
whose function is mainly production
efficiency and the speeding up of opera
tons on the assembly lines have found
little opportunity to exercise their skill
during the last six or eight months, there
has been one comforting result of the
drastic steps the industry was forced to
take when it was caught with huge
surplus. This Is the fact that there has
been no permanent discontinuance of
operations by any manufacturer. There
has. been dealer mortality" as the
trade describes failures but, barring
something at present unforeseen, the re-
turn to normal business conditions will
find all of the cars popular a year ago
still in production.