Ford, GMC and the like, were building big ugly trucks and SUV’s, automobiles that are not preferred by Europeans etc. so it’s not surprising that Ford turned a profit in Europe, since they weren’t selling the cars that they were selling here in the US.

Again…BIG UGLY TRUCKS AND SUV’s.

And toyota didn’t have a truck till a few years ago with the Tacoma.

Drug dealers use many traditional marketing methods even if they don’t buy ads. They use brand names:
Orange Sunshine Owsley Acid
Purple Microdot
Mr. Natural Blotter
Purple Kush
Blueberry Reefer
plus various brands of Heroin like “Persian” and street brands.

(And BTW, GM bought 11 during the last Super Bowl, at 2.something million apiece, according to the currect issue of The Economist).

And this year they canceled all their Super Bowl ads.

If you make a mean steak, the sizzle will take care of itself.

Product is almost everything, but you still have to let people know how good it is. Nowadays, when the perception of the domestic automakers’ current products is distorted by bad consumer experiences from as long ago as 30 years, relying on word of mouth may not work fast enough.

It’s interesting, though, how Ford is handling their public image now. They didn’t take any TARP money and they’ve gotten a ton of good press over the EPA’s rating of the 2010 Fusion Hybrid at 41mpg, significantly higher than the Camry Hybrid, a fact that the press is picking up and propagating.

Unlike GM, which has never really been at risk of bankruptcy even during the Great Depression, Ford’s survival has been threatened before and the Ford family knows that. Henry Ford lost control of the first Ford car company, which is why he bought out his partners in FoMoCo as soon as he could afford it. Still, he wouldn’t admit that time had passed the Model T by as Chevrolet became the sales leader in the mid 1920s. He had to be dragged, literally kicking and screaming, by Edsel and other associates into developing the Model A. The company then shut down for 6 months switching over, which sort of hampered revenues. Then during WWII, after Edsel died, the old man took over and by then he was senile. The gov’t couldn’t afford to have a major defense contractor managed by a doddering demented old lunatic who was pretty crazy even before his dementia, so they gave Henry Ford II a quick discharge so he could take over control of the company. However, it took a threat by Eleanor Ford (Edsel’s widow) and Clara, Henry’s wife, that they’d sell their stock (Edsel owned 48%, Henry owned 49% and Clara owned the remaining 3% – so after Edsel’s death the Ford women owned 51%) if Henry didn’t yield control to his grandson. It was Hank the Deuce and his “whiz kids” who brought out the first truly modern postwar car, the 1949 Ford.

So I think the Ford family is aware of the risks in the car biz from sitting pat.

“July 3, 1835 Children employed in the silk mills in Paterson, New Jersey go on strike for the 11 hour day, 6 days a week.”

So…were you one of those little Dickensian tykes hitting the bricks with a wee little sign in your calloused and grubby mitts?

Oh that’s right…that’s Asking the Unanswerable Union Membership Question of you.

In 1988, I sailed 12 or 14 decks below the forward stack of the SS Independence, which was a US-flag cruise ship bopping around Hawaii.
I was also the Engine Delegate,(analogous to a shoreside shop steward), which meant i was spokesman for one of the two largest Black Gangs in the entire Seafarers Union.

At the time I was reading Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle”, you might be familiar with the work…Sinclair reported how the Slaughterhouses and meat-packing plants in 190x Milwaukee and Chicago would keep a large population of unemployed workers who knew the job around in order to drive down wages.

Well, in the course of addressing my guys’ beefs and other “yoon-yun bidness” I’d end up at the Hall in Honolulu, usually about 6 am on Saturday morning, and see the long line of schlubs waiting to get in the Hall to get a berth aboard SS Independence or her sistership SS Constitution.

Milwaukee 1908 WITHOUT union contract, Honolulu 1988 WITH union contract. Not much difference.

Crappy working conditions and minimum 12 hour days to make a living wage.

BTW, you ever been in a steamship’s engine room in the tropics?
Eight hours is plenty more than most would care for. The extra 4 for the overtime wasn’t really worth the additional $8.00 an hour I’d make.

And these ships were launched in 1952…how much is it worth for you to breathe a few lungfuls of asbestos every day?

But see…there’s that Union Hall, and there’s that long line outside it, so if I balked, the Union would readily provide some other schmuck to hand-fire the boilers,(a lost art…like blacksmithing), and I could go and live under a bridge somewhere and join the back of that line, right?

“Advertising and other marketing methods are absolutely vital to any business that sells at retail and plenty of other businesses as well.”

Really?

When was the last time you saw an ad for an illegal drug?

THEIR business model seems to work like a house on fire, without benefit of Super Bowl Ads.

(And BTW, GM bought 11 during the last Super Bowl, at 2.something million apiece, according to the currect issue of The Economist).

If you make a mean steak, the sizzle will take care of itself.

Thinking Person: I don’t read the newspaper. I believe their downfall was due to the fact that to save a buck they started to use cheap ink that gets all over your fingers, aside from the fact that I read for knowledge or relaxation not to be fed a line of bull by reading a line of bull. And p.s. the funnies aren’t funny anymore, although I might have lost my sense of humor.

Apparently you have no idea that there are government regulations now that deal with work hours/days/vacations/minimum pay requirements etc? I’d also like to know the “them” you’d be fighting against? Your comments always seem as if you’ve not read a newspaper or watched any news outlets in 50 years.

From:
http://www.econedlink.org/lessons/index.php?lesson=NN692

“At the turn of the 20th Century, automakers thought the best way to maximize profit was to build a car for the rich. But Henry Ford had a different vision. He wanted to produce a car that everyday people — like the workers in his factories — could afford. With lower prices, cars would be more affordable to the general public. He also figured that if he paid his factory workers a better wage, more of his workers would be able to afford the cars they helped make. Henry Ford would make a profit by selling MORE cars.”

July 3, 1835 Children employed in the silk mills in Paterson, New Jersey go on strike for the 11 hour day, 6 days a week.

Carpenter wanting demanding they work 10 hours a day, little brats going on strike demanding to work eleven hours a day 6 days a week.

Now do you see why we need unions with those out there that want us to work more than eight hours a day, five days a week. We must join forces and fight them!

I think the children are the worst because by July 1903 they were still demanding to work fifty-five hours a week! We must stop them before it is too late!

Employer-paid health benefits first became widespread during World War Two due to business competition for scarce workers, and not from any union activity. Wage and price controls kept businesses from competing for workers by offering higher pay, so they instead competed for workers with employer-paid health benefits and other gimmicks.

The labor scarcity was due to the movement of 10-12 million male workers into military service, and enormous government contracts for war manufacturing.

Unions were somewhat responsible for the retention of widespread employer-paid health benefit plans whene the war ended, with the degree of that not being clear, but unions were at least a non-trivial factor.

Unions were definitely NOT responsible for this feature becoming widespread in the first place.