http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2018/04/movin-johan-de-nysschen-leaves-cadillac-immediately
As I said in the comments, good riddance, but too little too late... Caddy missed out on a boom and finally took the first step back to reason just as market conditions have turned sour (more expensive credit and climbing gas prices). Can't understand who was impressed with his work at Infiniti, the Q names are a disaster.
I hope the quote from him blaming culture on a lack of sales was the nail in the coffin. I'd call him a dummy but anyone that makes that forges a career to that level isn't overtly dumb
Didn't he get forced out of Infiniti after like two weeks?
Quote from: Rich on April 18, 2018, 01:03:31 PM
I hope the quote from him blaming culture on a lack of sales was the nail in the coffin. I'd call him a dummy but anyone that makes that forges a career to that level isn't overtly dumb
Dilbert Principle?
Quote from: Rich on April 18, 2018, 01:03:31 PM
I hope the quote from him blaming culture on a lack of sales was the nail in the coffin. I'd call him a dummy but anyone that makes that forges a career to that level isn't overtly dumb
Jesus did he really say that?
What did he say? I don't see a quote about that in the link.
Me too, details have not been forthcoming. I hope he didn't get forced out over some sexual harrasment shit. I want it to be performance based, because he has led Cadillac through the wilderness. He should retire and just buy an old E39 M5.
In 2017 Cadillac recorded the second-highest sales total in the brand's entire history. They fired him because he wouldn't play their games with the fleet sales, rebates, and carpet bombing dealership model. Sure, he didn't have any smash hits like the original Escalade or CTS, but he'd also only been there for what, 4 years? He definitely drove them upmarket on pricing if nothing else.
He definitely got them up in China, but by any metric the Ring-tuned Alpha-numeric experiment is an abject failure. All the Alpha sedans combined sell less than the old Sigma CTS did in a good year, at least in the US. And I don't think the platform was necessary to make inroads in China, given the success of Buick there. But we are here now.
Lutz is off and on, but he was on here IMO:
"Bold new marketing thrusts such as Book by Cadillac (pay a monthly fee, then order up any Cadillac model as needed) never got traction," Lutz writes. "Expensive advertising campaigns showing emaciated, scraggly-bearded, tight-jacketed metrosexuals posed in rain-drenched back alleys, urging the viewer to Dare Greatly—at what?—flopped miserably. Moving the brand headquarters to New York City, always a bit of a mystery to me, was of little reputational value, but served to distance the Cadillac marketing people from GM's powerful Detroit-based planning and product development groups."
Lutz compares de Nysschen and GM to a "bad marriage" that, for a number of smaller reasons, had to end.
"Perhaps [GM] trusted their experience, data and instincts more than they trusted a bunch of effete East Coast marketing genii. Outgunned by the bulletproof reputations of the Germans, the onslaught of competitor crossovers, the relative failure of the new Cadillac sedans, the lack of traction of marketing initiatives and the steadily-sinking profitability of the brand, circumstances conspired to lead everyone concerned to one conclusion—let's end it."
The full Lutz article:
https://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/car-technology/a19863777/why-johan-de-nysschen-failed-at-cadillac/ (https://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/car-technology/a19863777/why-johan-de-nysschen-failed-at-cadillac/)
Apparently, de Nysschen wanted more crossovers, and Caddy exclusive ones, but the GM brass over ruled him.
Tanking sales was based in part on de Nysschen's decision to pull out of the rental fleet segment to improve resale and image in the retail segment.
Quote from: MX793 on April 20, 2018, 07:15:56 AM
Apparently, de Nysschen wanted more crossovers, and Caddy exclusive ones, but the GM brass over ruled him.
Tanking sales was based in part on de Nysschen's decision to pull out of the rental fleet segment to improve resale and image in the retail segment.
So Sporty should be singing praise be his name.