BrandlandUSA™

DETROIT – No brand is safe now and General Motors (NYSE: GM)  is indeed in a mess. All the brands are damaged. It should not be this way. All of them lost sight of what their mission was in GM. You cannot have multiple platforms which cost you money and then give every car to [...]

[Read more →]

DALLAS – Will Saturn become a retailer? Very interesting way for the brand to survive. An investor group that includes private equity firm Black Oak Partners, LLC, working together with a number of Saturn retailers, announced today that it has approached General Motors about buying and operating the principal assets of Saturn Distribution Corporation as [...]

[Read more →]

We found the rather spectacular website Artificial Owl with some hauntingly beautiful photos of Detroit’s empty Union Station. The site is all about photos of abandoned places. I cannot help but think of the parallels between Detroit’s waste of this great building, and the waste that is the American automobile industry. It is telling that [...]

[Read more →]

IRVINE, Calif. – BMW is the coolest car brand in America. Or so says Kelley Blue Book, which has just released current winners of their 2009 Brand Image Awards. And Cadillac? Boy do Americans like the interiors. The Brand Image Awards are presented to the top brands in 10 categories, and are based on consumer [...]

[Read more →]

A quick thought. We miss diversified car companies. We miss diversified retailers. We miss when our car companies did amusing things. We liked Ford when it made Fordson Tractors, Tri-Motors and Philco Televisions. We liked General Motors when it made Electro-Motive engines and Frigidaire appliances. We liked Chrysler when it made Chrysler sailboats (long live [...]

[Read more →]

We have been thinking not only of what happened to Saab, but then what to do about Saab. We haven’t gotten far, we admit. And then we found this great response in the alternative weekly The Hook in Charlottesville, Virginia. It was a response to Courtney Stuart’s article on the future of the Saab, Hummer [...]

[Read more →]

We read a great post on General Motors, and their brand and intellectual property portfolio. The Truth about Cars website interviewed Paul Earle of Chicago-based River West Brands, a company that revives defunct brand names to get his take. Earle’s answer is not killing off brands, but trying to manage each bit of intellectual property [...]

[Read more →]

DETROIT – Recent press reports indicate that Saturn might completely disappear as part of a new General Motors, and Pontiac might be a sub-brand sold at other dealers. Who knows what will happen to Saab, but whatever will happen, Saab, Hummer and Saturn are all for sale, perhaps free if you just pick up the [...]

[Read more →]

Michigan Needs a GM Auto Tour A week or so ago, we happened upon a Business Week story about General Motors auctioning off some of its car collection. Some of these items were either flubs or concept cars, and not actually produced. All are fascinating, including a Harley Earl Buick. When we first read it, [...]

[Read more →]

The folks at General Motors are apparently giving Pontiac short attention during press events this week. Bad omen for a great American brand, says Byron Hurd on the site SpeedSportLife.com. Writes Hurd: In fact, due to Pontiac’s location near the loading area, their floor space was practically eliminated during GM’s press conference so they could [...]

[Read more →]