Buick Enclave 2008

In North America Buick sells 72 percent of its cars through dealerships shared with Pontiac and GMC. GM hopes to have all those dealers selling all three brands someday soon, so the last thing Buick needs is a rebadged GMC.

The first thing it needs is something with the style and elegance of the new Enclave to reestablish itself as an aspirational marque for buyers (well) under 65.

The Enclave is under its voluptuous skin. GM's Lambda platform provides seven or eight seats with a minivan-size third row, a 275-horsepower, 3.6-liter V-6, six-speed automatic transmission, and front or intelligent all-wheel drive in the GMC Acadia and Saturn Outlook.