Choice is great...

... if you're the customer.

Yesterday, as you may have heard General Motors CEO Richard Wagoner Jr. announced that GM was on a slippery slope, and that is was going to have a huge problem by the end of 2005.

From BusinessWeek :

"We have to address some long-standing fundamental problems with the company."

He does -- and fast. It's becoming painfully obvious that Wagoner's four-year-old strategy of using rebates to grab market share and generate cash has failed. Company insiders say the 52-year-old CEO is getting heat from the board, and some mid-level managers are losing faith the top brass will make the bold moves needed to execute a quick turnaround. Without a dramatic rebound in sales -- an unlikely prospect anytime soon -- GM may be forced to shrink the company to a size that more closely matches its diminished market share.

Wagoner may have to go back to the United Auto Workers to get concessions to trim his workforce and lower health-care costs. He will also have to squarely face a dilemma that has haunted GM for years: Can it really continue to support eight competing divisions? "GM is simply too big," says Sean McAlinden, chief economist at the Center for Automotive Research. "They have to shrink."

Yes, once again size is not a strategy.. and it is not the big that eat the small, it is the fast that eat the slow...


Nissan - 2 Brands
Volkswagen - 2 Brands
Honda - 2 Brands
Hyundai - 2 Brands
Toyota - 3 Brands
Daimler Chrysler - 3 Brands

Ford - 8 Brands
GM - 12 Brands

Last year, I posted regarding the demise of Oldsmobile. Which brand(s) will be next...

This morning, I'm going to pop into our corporate library.. and brush up on Fast, Focused and Flexible...