Professor Elam

Jerry Flint nails it again.  He makes the point that you canot cede a market to your competitor and expect to get it back.  And so the US has exited the luxury car market. Yep, Lincoln is fading with nothing in the pipeline, Cadillac is about it, but compared to BMW, Lexus, Audi, Mercedes, I suspect Caddys have more appeal as 40% discounted used cars with low mileage than as new entry  points.  And once the perception about your company shifts, it is darned hard to get it back in the case of Ford or to change it in the case of Wal Mart. 

So if Americans aren’t selling much in the over $50 K category, this speaks to why they aren’t selling as well in the under $50 K category, folks don’t have the brand loyalty they used to and are as likely to go home in a KIA as a Dodge, well what would that be anyway?   As the US makers continue to lose the car market, one has to wonder if GM and Ford won’t end up as light truck makers, farming out cars to overseas low cost makers like Tata and Chery.  You can outsource yourself right out of the business, eh?