Well it just seems like yesterday during the 2000 downturn in the US Economy that GM was laying off folks, cutting costs and promising to come back strong and improve earnings and market position remember? In 2000 GMs world wide capacity was to be cut by 400,000 units and about 10,000 workers. GM in 2000 was down 1/5 in sales in Europe and was be hurt by the regional demands being different and inability or unwillingness to target each individual sector with customized needs to the consumers in those regions. One size fits all does not work when the consumers have been told by Online Providers that you can have your Car and hold the pickle, hold the lettuce, special orders do not up set us. And then receive their car like a Dell computer in three weeks. Rather than admitting this both Ford and GM told shareholders it is a currency issue with the Euro at $.83 against the dollar in 2000, yet if you are paying labor in Euro and buying components from Europe, what difference does it make. It really is an issue of a good run in the economy and trying to hold on without listening to the customer. That was in 2000. Now we are in 2006 and again GM was to slow adapt to the changing market as consumers pinched and pitted against $4.00 per gallon gasoline prices want cars, which get better mileage. So will we will see a repeat of the 1970s with the SUVs in the auto industry if we do not wise up and pay attention. It is not a matter of retooling, we already have the smaller car bodies and models available; we just need to make more of them. We need to make them more efficient a little more sexy in style and then Ford and GM can compete against Honda and Toyota as the take more than 18% market share from US Automakers in under 14 months. It will take much more advertising to keep demand up for the SUVs, as gas prices stay high and/or continue to climb. |
