Black Beauty
1950 Packard Convertible
By 1950 a combination of some bad management decisions, and probably some cash flow issues attributed to it, had put the once great Packard on death's door with only six years of life left. James Nance, the then CEO of Packard, decided to move out of their 2 story manufacturing plant and into a smaller, one story plant which not only created the normal move headaches associated with doing that, but the now somewhat jammed quarters led to quality issues in their manufacturing. And instead of addressing those issues where they occurred, they simply transferred "the fix" of those issues onto the dealer network. None of that bode well with the dealers, and many of the loyal dealers of many years decided to drop the franchise. And, surely, that would have an impact on sales.
Also, Packard was late to market with a fresh, after war look that their chief competitors, Lincoln and Cadillac had already done a few years earlier. And after the war, the buying public was ready and eager for change after no cars throughout the war years, and with little change from the models of 5 years prior. The 1950 shown above was really nothing more than a freshened up look of Packard's prewar models. Two years earlier Cadillac had already embraced the aviation look made popular back then by adding "P-38 tailfins" to their line. Lincoln did a complete redesign of their cars in 1949, and many had "gunsight" taillights, a new look for them, and probably created to emulate the machine gun gunsights found on WWII bombers. (although IMO, the prior year '48 Lincoln was a beautiful, classic, and much nicer design)
Although Packard had produced a beautifully smooth and powerful inline 8 cylinder motor for decades, and quite possibly one of the auto industry's best motors, it was not until 1955 that they met with the trend of providing V8 motors in their cars. Both Cadillac and Lincoln had already offered their V8 versions for decades prior. And Cadillac offered theirs as the newer, more advanced over head valve versions. Once more, Packard was late to market.
The final straw probably came when Packard, already somewhat financially strapped, purchased the even more financially strapped Studebaker Corporation. Nance's goal was to create a super power machine not unlike General Motors at the time. Negotiations were in place for Packard to buy the Nash/Hudson entity, and maybe because of ego issues of the leaders that acquisition never materialized. Nance figured Studebaker would then compete on the low end against Ford and Chevrolet, whereas Nash and Hudson would be his mid tier competitor against Buick and Oldsmobile, and Packard would remain at the top to continue to compete with the likes of Cadillac and Lincoln. Unfortunately for Packard, that never happened, and whether it would have made a difference in Packard's fate is arguably debatable. The end for Packard came in June of 1956, the final year of the last real Packard produced.
Black Beauty
1950 Packard Convertible
By 1950 a combination of some bad management decisions, and probably some cash flow issues attributed to it, had put the once great Packard on death's door with only six years of life left. James Nance, the then CEO of Packard, decided to move out of their 2 story manufacturing plant and into a smaller, one story plant which not only created the normal move headaches associated with doing that, but the now somewhat jammed quarters led to quality issues in their manufacturing. And instead of addressing those issues where they occurred, they simply transferred "the fix" of those issues onto the dealer network. None of that bode well with the dealers, and many of the loyal dealers of many years decided to drop the franchise. And, surely, that would have an impact on sales.
Also, Packard was late to market with a fresh, after war look that their chief competitors, Lincoln and Cadillac had already done a few years earlier. And after the war, the buying public was ready and eager for change after no cars throughout the war years, and with little change from the models of 5 years prior. The 1950 shown above was really nothing more than a freshened up look of Packard's prewar models. Two years earlier Cadillac had already embraced the aviation look made popular back then by adding "P-38 tailfins" to their line. Lincoln did a complete redesign of their cars in 1949, and many had "gunsight" taillights, a new look for them, and probably created to emulate the machine gun gunsights found on WWII bombers. (although IMO, the prior year '48 Lincoln was a beautiful, classic, and much nicer design)
Although Packard had produced a beautifully smooth and powerful inline 8 cylinder motor for decades, and quite possibly one of the auto industry's best motors, it was not until 1955 that they met with the trend of providing V8 motors in their cars. Both Cadillac and Lincoln had already offered their V8 versions for decades prior. And Cadillac offered theirs as the newer, more advanced over head valve versions. Once more, Packard was late to market.
The final straw probably came when Packard, already somewhat financially strapped, purchased the even more financially strapped Studebaker Corporation. Nance's goal was to create a super power machine not unlike General Motors at the time. Negotiations were in place for Packard to buy the Nash/Hudson entity, and maybe because of ego issues of the leaders that acquisition never materialized. Nance figured Studebaker would then compete on the low end against Ford and Chevrolet, whereas Nash and Hudson would be his mid tier competitor against Buick and Oldsmobile, and Packard would remain at the top to continue to compete with the likes of Cadillac and Lincoln. Unfortunately for Packard, that never happened, and whether it would have made a difference in Packard's fate is arguably debatable. The end for Packard came in June of 1956, the final year of the last real Packard produced.