This week’s theme is all about commercial vehicles. The commercial grade sector is often a tranquil market with very few product upgrades happening on a yearly, sometimes decade, long basis. Though, in the past few years, the competition has started to heat up in the commercial cop car, full-size van, compact van and heavy-duty pickup segments.

The Week in Car News:

• Cadillac distances from GM to avoid bankruptcy stigma [link]
• All-new 2011 Kia Optima [link]
• New Malibu renderings [link]

Clip of the Week

2010 Lexus Hybrid Commercial: ‘Milestones’

Tweetmeme:

Joel relives the chatter on tweeter involving Jim Sikes’ 2008 runaway Prius.

Talking Points

Commercial vehicles sales are a big part of America’s automotive industry. Commercial fleet sales make up about 30% of yearly industry sales and there are about 11 million commercial vehicles on the road today. As the retail industry has grown ultra competitive over the past 40 years, the commercial fleet segment has stayed relatively quiet up until today. Now, with new foreign a domestic arrivals, the new competitive battlefront is in this segment.

We go over four key vehicle markets in the commercial segment, specifically:

Cop Cars:

• Ford Police Interceptor/ Chevrolet Caprice PPV/ Carbon E7/ Dodge Charger

Full-size Vans:

• Nissan NV-Series/ Iveco Daily/ Vauxhall Movano/ Mercedes Sprinter/ Ford Transit

Compact Vans:

• Ford Transit Connect/ Nissan NV200/ Fiat Diablo

Heavy-duty Trucks:

• GMC Sierra HD/ Ford Super Duty

Listen, Comment and Enjoy!

For additional information visit AutoBird and Accelerate Minneapolis

Images By: Andrew Walensa