One More Time …

Several of you have told me that GM is “so yesterday” that I should stop trashing them—as in … Who cares?

Well they’re still damn big, and still employ a lot of us. So I pose this question: Who’s more incompetent, FEMA’s chief or GM’s? As I see it … Whatta contest!

As I (clearly) recall, GM boss Rick (“I know things you don’t”) Wagoner said … I KNOW THINGS YOU DON’T. Namely that buyers didn’t give a shit about gas prices … and would keep on buyin’ his high-margin SUVs.

Of course RW couldn’t have predicted New Orleans, but it seems as though the Japanese did!

Last week GM announced August car sales were down a whopping 13% (industry sales were up 3.8%) … even as they continued their “free cars” employee discount. Ford’s biggest SUV sales plunged … 40%! And, oh yeah, Japanese car market share hit a new record, 39%. (Nissan … +15%. Toyota … +14%. Honda … +23%.) So what, exactly, is it/was it that Wagoner knew that you and I didn’t?

Tom Peters posted this on September 6, 2005, in Strategies.
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