Going, going, gone.

One from the archives. A classic Aussie milk bar photographed by me in Broken Hill, NSW, in 2001. Turn the clock back forty years and there was a milk bar in almost every suburb and town in Australia. Now they are very much on the endangered list, killed by the shops in service stations, 7/11 convenience stores and changing lifestyles.
The other staple of Australian country towns in the years following WW2, the Greek cafe, is now almost extinct.

This one is also from the archives. A Holden Commodore wagon. The fact that it is the only photograph of a Holden I have tells you a lot about Holden, GM's Australian brand. This week GM announced that it was the end of the road for Holden, often referred to as "Australia's car". Holden will be gone by the end of the year and GM made vehicles will no longer be sold in Australia. GM have promised ongoing parts and service support for ten years but with the dealer network gone this may prove problematical.

The announcement should not have come as surprise. Holden stopped local production in 2017 and since then it has been a slow lingering death for the brand although the rot had set in many years before. Holden joins the long list of once thriving brands which GM, through incompetence, have managed to kill.

The news of Holden's demise has been met with an outpouring of mostly sentimental tosh and ill informed comment from politicians, academics, journalists and the members of the general public, particularly on social media.

Most of the Holden dealers had seen the writing on the wall many months ago and there were already many closed Holden dealerships across Australia before this week's announcement. Ironically many are taking on Chinese brands particularly LDV (Leyland Daf Vehicles)- and MG.
The GM assembly plant in Thailand which was producing RH drive vehicles has been purchased by Great Wall, the Chinese brand, and they have announced that they will be stepping up their exports to RH drive markets.

I have to confess that I squirm every time I see a new Chinese MG on the local roads and there are quite a few of them already.

How did it come to this?