GM offers dealers incentives

General Motors Corp. is giving dealers cash awards in a bid to halt a 9.4 percent drop in U.S. sales this year, a program outlined in an internal GM memo.

Retailers will get $250 for each sale made from Aug. 23 through the end of the month, the memo from Jim Bunnell, general manager of GM's Buick, Pontiac and GMC divisions, said. Dealers can use the money to boost discounts offered directly to consumers through most of September, GM sales and marketing chief Mark LaNeve confirmed Tuesday.

GM raised incentives on large trucks this month after sales dropped 22 percent in July. The Detroit-based automaker said last week it slowed production at six North American truck plants because of the slump.

"This seems to say the sales are shaping up worse than they thought they were going to be at this point in the month," said George Magliano, research director for Global Insight Inc. in New York. More at Detroit News