Dealer Order Procedures

[Stefano]

Hi Jim,
Great to have you aboard. I want to thank you and Barb for all the past and present help which you have provided through Pontiac Historical Services.

Did you and the Central Office help batch the small or even single dealer COPO orders to help get them processed?

[Jim Mattison]

It is my pleasure to try and recall some of the many things that we did at Chevrolet many years ago. Had I only known that some of the vehicles we produced were going to become so collectible, I'd have done a much better job of saving all my old records and notes. I'd have also bought-up and put away many of my old company cars.

When we began the 1969 COPO 427 Camaro and Chevelle project, all of the vehicles were scheduled to go through Yenko Chevrolet. Don Yenko was a very bright businessman and he recognized that he potentially controlled that entire market.

As dealers found out about these cars, pressure was put on the sales department to make them available to everyone. We finally devised a program that would allow the dealers who were truely into the performance market, the ability to order these COPO cars so long as they met our ground rules. Orders were accepted so long as the dealer would take a total of (10) ten cars, over a 60 day period. However, toward the end of the program we were accepting single orders.

As far as the batch building of these vehicles, that was scheduled by the folks at the assembly plant. I remember that the biggest problem that we had scheduling these cars was the availability of rear axle assemblies from our supplier.

Jim Mattison

[BEAUMONTBILL]

JIM,
Could you tell me if there were copo orders for other makes of gm vehicles other then chevrolet. I would imagine that fleet orders were needed for all gm models and it would be surprising that no other make took advantage of this program as a way to get high performance vehicles built. i have never heard the term copo used with anything other then chevrolet and was just wondering why. Thanks for your time.

[Jim Mattison]

The term COPO was unique to Chevrolet Division, although I am sure that the other divisions had a department to handle "special orders" also!

Jim Mattison

[Stefano]

Jim,
I was discussing the COPO cars with a Former Super Car Dealer and he remembers having many more orders than he recieved,in the order banks. He stated that GM canceled his second complete batch of orders.

He remembers that the cancelations had something to do with the rear end heat treated ring and pinion or gears, which were having a problem meeting specifications.

The Dealership was not very upset about the cancelation of the orders because the 427 COPOs had been flagged by the insurance companies and were becoming difficult to retail by mid model year.

Do you remember anything about the cancelation of such orders? Could this be a reason why the engine plant numbers for the L72s were so much higher than the actual production? Could this also be one of the reasons why some of GM's own internal paperwork projected greater COPO production totals than what actually seems to have been produced?

[Jim Mattison]

Steve,

In all honesty, I don't remember any COPO 427 Camaro or Chevelle dealer orders being cancelled, other than a batch of about 100 Yenko orders. I remember that my group was scrambling to get every order that we had built. Many dealers were crying for these cars! If orders were being cancelled, it had to be being done by the zones or regions.

My recollection is that the insurance companies had caught on to the Yenko cars (mainly from the magazine coverage that they had gotten), making it difficult for Yenko customers to get insurance. However, for the rest of the dealers, unless an insurance company was suspicious, there was nothing in the vin number that would suggest that the engine was anything other than a standard V-8.

Jim Mattison