Quote:
Originally Posted by SilverTurtle
I'm going to take this a step farther and say that during that time in GM's life, they had grown to be larger than life, much like Toyota has achieved now... but when you are getting to a point where the demand is so high for your products, something has to suffer... and in GM's case, as well as Toyota's case, quality was the weak link in the chain.
success and arrogance usually travel hand in hand... one of the few things that Honda has done right is to know that they have almost perfected the art of front wheel drive and only on VERY rare occasion have they produced a rear wheel drive vehicle... even their Ridgeline is a front wheel drive based vehicle, and it is doing battle in a market that is DOMINATED by rear wheel drive machines... but that's their niche, and they know they do it well, so why mess with success?
Toyota will always be there to fight another day... but quality issues like the ones they are having now will push loyal consumers away at a rate that will surprise their top brass... dont believe me? ask Ford what it was like to realize that they couldn't survive selling Mustangs and F-150s.
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I agree 100%. That's why I respect Honda so much. They know what they're good at, and they focus on perfecting that. They don't try to please everybody. Most of their products are not what I'm looking for, but they are still very good products. Toyota just cares about being the biggest, not the best. They used quality to get to the top, and now that they're there they just don't care much anymore. Its a sad but pretty much unavoidable fate in corporate culture. Combine stockholders who just care about stock price and dividends with power hungry and proud executives, and bad things happen.