Jay Leno…Business Mastermind
Jay Leno writing for Portfolio.com shares his advice for the declining U.S. auto industry. He says that:
Where we seem to lose it is in the low-bucks econocar. I used to be able to identify any American car from 25 yards. Now they all have this jellybean look. It’s a mystery to me, because the one thing we used to do better than anybody else was build cheap, extremely high-quality cars. We did it for decades, all the way back to the beginning of the industry. There was no better car for the money than the Model T. It was a basic car, but it used the finest materials available. There are still almost a million of them out there.
I agree with Leno, 100 years ago we were on top of our game. Since then workers have done everything in their power to unionize and suck the blood from their employers, who in turn are looking for the government to pay for their problems…and lest we forget, you and I pay the government’s tab. With that in mind Mr.Leno offers some more advice:
I believe that, all things being equal, Americans will buy American. It just has to be as good as the competition; it doesn’t have to be better. The classic example is Harley-Davidson. Throughout the ’70s, the motorcycle maker had huge quality-control problems. Then Harley-Davidson said, “Look, let’s take our time. Let’s build fewer bikes. Let’s build them properly, so they don’t leak oil and they’ll run forever.” Harley-Davidson won back the market share it had lost, and it continues to dominate today.
If we start to build some better automobiles, more people will buy them. Supply and demand at it’s finest. Much like King Lear, this tragedy has the comedian telling the truth.
