Re[2]: Beating the dead horse: Alfa's non-return to the US, and...

[Richard Welty <rwelty@domain.elided>]

On Fri, 20 Sep 2002 07:07:18 -0400 Brian Shorey <bshorey@domain.elided> wrote:
> Audi faced one of the most difficult situations any automobile
> manufacturer has ever been able to recover from in this country.  The
> cars weren't unreliable, they didn't rust out early, they were CONFIRMED
> KILLERS!

in the minds of the public and the safety lobby. i've written long essays
about this in the past, and will refrain from doing so now, where it's off
topic. perhaps i'll send one to offtopic, to generate some traffic over
there.
 
> I believe (I could be wrong) that Jag was doing ok here prior to Ford
> buying them out, they've always had the reputation of being unreliable
> but prestigious enough to be worth the trouble.  Now Ford has fixed the
> reliability problems, and stuck a lot of Ford parts into the Jag,

the quality fixes began with Sir Peter Eagan, (i bet i spelled that last
name wrong), who introduced a very simple concept -- he started testing the
parts from Lucas and Smiths before installing them in the cars, and sent
back the ones that arrived broken. it had never occured to anyone at Jag to
do that before he got there. Ford may well have improved quality even more,
but it began when Jag was privatized and Eagan came in.

> Alfa pulled up stakes and walked away, and it's problems were a lot less
> severe.  When they come back, *if* they come back, it's the unwashed
> masses they hope to capture, not the miniscule number of purists.

Alfa didn't put money in the marketing budget to make good TV ads and put
them in prime time. Audi and Jag have both done that. very nice ads, create
brand awareness. it didn't hurt Jag to get Sting in their ads.

richard
--
Richard Welty                                         rwelty@domain.elided
Averill Park Networking                                         518-573-7592
              Unix, Linux, IP Network Engineering, Security
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