- Cadillac Luxury Car - The Escalade - IFCAR
General Motors' signature luxury brand, the Cadillac, is named for Antoine Laumet de La Mothe, sieur de Cadillac. La Mothe came to modern-day Michigan in 1701 and named his landing spot "Ville d'Etroit," or "city on the straits" where Lake St. Clair, Lake Erie, and the Detroit River meet.
Today, Detroit is the heart of American car manufacturing with Cadillac the top luxury domestic car brand in the U.S., claiming nearly one percent market share of all autos sold in the United States in 2009. Cadillac history stretches back to 1902, and the Cadillac company profile shows a company with strong roots in defining American car style, and the brand endures in the 21st century as the Escalade and Cadillac STS continue the legacy.
Cadillac History
Henry Leland founded the Cadillac Automobile Company in 1902 in Detroit. The first model in Cadillac history was completed in October 1902 and debuted at the New York Automobile Show in January 1903, where sales manager William E. Metzger took more than 2,200 orders, halting purchases as demand overwhelmed manufacturing capacity.
In 1904 Cadillac was the first automobile corporation to earn the Dewar Trophy for standardization of automobile parts. Four years later General Motors bought the Cadillac Automobile Company from Henry Leland for an unprecedented $4.5 million. Leland went on to found the Lincoln Motor Company, one of Cadillac's biggest competitors.
The Cadillacs as Luxury Cars
Cadillac developed a variety of luxury lines over time and the Cadillacs, including the Brougham, Fleetwood, Eldorado, Eldorado Brougham, DeVille/Coupe de Ville, Calais, Seville, Sixty Special, Allante, BLS, Catera, Cimarron, Eldorado Biarritz, Eldorado Seville, Fleetwood Eldorado, and Cadillac XLR continued to symbolize luxury in the car market in the U.S.
In 1999 Cadillac debuted the Escalade SUV, one of the company's best-selling products. The Cadillacs currently sold include the Escalade, the CTS-V, CTS, DTS, SRX and Cadillac STS.
Cadillac Company Profile and General Motors
In 2009 Cadillac sales fell 47 percent and the company lost half a point in market share as a result of a strategic decision to reduce leasing. In addition, since 2008 the Cadillac company profile includes a rotation of short-lived CEOs. In October 2008 Jim Taylor left Cadillac to become the CEO of the Hummer division, and his replacement, Mark McNabb, left the position in May 2009 to become CEO of Maserati.
General Motors sold more than 2.98 million cars in the United States in 2008; of those, 217,000 were from the Cadillac brand.
Melanie Zoltan - Melanie Zoltan is a former college professor and administrator who has written for About.com, PCWorld, Brain Child, Thomson Gale, and ...
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