Nestle, McDonalds, Bic, VW, and Daimler Benz all suffer from the same problem: marketing people with too much time on their hands. As Forbes' Jack Trout points out, there's nothing more dangerous to a brand than a marketing staff that can't leave well enough alone. It can take a company years to recover from a branding blunder. Mr. Trout sums it up in two sentences  "A brand can only stand for one thing in the mind; the more things you try to make it stand for, the more the mind loses focus on what you are. Endless variations give marketing people something to do while they do long-term damage to a brand or a company."  Are you listening, Rick, Tom, Alan, Dieter, Wendelin and friends?

We've long argued that Cerberus Capital Management will do whatever it takes to stem Chrysler's cashflow cataclysm.  The Wall Street Journal reports that the Chrysler Group's new management team is giving their poorer-performing dealerships six months to improve sales or face closure. Chrysler has already banned 450 or so so-so dealers from their used car auctions in an attempt to force them to sell more new cars. The warning signals the next step in their campaign to cull underachievers from the automaker's bloated ranks. Like GM and Ford, Cerberus wants to "encourage" smaller dealerships to merge with larger ones. That said, Cerberus better walk softly with that big stick. Car dealers are protected by state franchise laws; dealer groups wield a mighty checkbook at the state level. 

The Shrevesport Times reports that Martha Ritter's hapless husband tried to take his wife shopping for a new Ford, only to discover that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows (not a singing group) had captured all her attention. "My husband had the nerve to try to take me out to buy me a new car," Ritter said. "I said I can't look at new cars, I have to read the book." According to people who've read the latest novel in the Potter opus (not a type of sea-going mammal), Mr. Weasley's flying 1962 Ford Anglia does not make an appearance in the final installment of the interminable internationally successful saga. Our sources insist that this lack of automobile-related chicanery has nothing to do with the fact that the car used in the movie was stolen from Cornwall on 26 October 2005, as the Harry Potter series is a work of fiction. 

Proctor & Gamble are keepin' it real by extending their Mr. Clean brand of car wash products into an actual car wash. The Enquirer reports that the Cincinnati-based conglomerate has opened the first of two Mr. Clean Performance Car Washes within miles of its corporate HQ. Mr. Clean (not an actual person) offers services ranging from a $9 stay-in-the-car express wash up to a $69 full-service interior and exterior clean. While the cynical amongst you might conclude that the move reflects P&G execs' desire for super-clean company whips, the $3.3m facility is [also] an attempt to capitalize on the car wash industry's growth. Industry boosters claim automated car washes are a $35b industry in the U.S., growing at about 10 percent a year. Yes, but– P&G's move into bricks and mortar represents a major change of focus– and risk– for a company known for its ultra-conservative brand management. 

As one of our regular commentators recently pointed out, Lexus owes much of its success to their dealer experience. The recently opened Newport Lexus in Newport Beach, California raised the luxury automaker's retail game to the next level. Designed and built by by Sauers Construction Inc., the $73m pleasure dome offers customers a putting green, game room, multiple lounges with giant-screen TVs, restroom stalls with smaller (though plasma TVs), wireless Internet, executive workroom, Wolfgang Puck cafe and Tommy Bahama boutique. Oh, and cars. The only thing Newport doesn't have is an attractive building. In fact, the Seattle Times coverage of the refurbished Lexus of Bellevue dealership confirms the trend: bland, monolithic surfaces adorning large pedestrian shapes. While Lexus' "L-Finesse" design language is moving their cars away from cod-Mercedes shapes, the Japanese automaker's dealership architecture remains heavily influenced by parking garages, government buildings and maximum security prisons.   

Earlier this year, GM admitted it was getting creamed on the coasts; the General promised to launch major marketing efforts to reclaim major metropolitan areas. Other than Chevy's recent tie-in with Rolling Stone magazine, we've seen little of what could be called bi-coastalistic marketing. Meanwhile, Toyota continues to target their new full-size Tundra pickup at the American heartland. Tomorrow, visitors to Minot's North Dakota State Fairgrounds will get a chance to put the Texas-built pickup through its paces as part of Toyoya's "Tundra, Prove it!" campaign. The high touch experience includes a limited slip diff demo, an "acceleration run" and a "braking zone" test with and without load. GM would be well-advised to watch its back.  

The Truth About Cars has been telling the truth about cars since 2002. Ford was the first mainstream manufacturer to realize the potency of our brand, snapping-up www.thetruthabouttrucks.com to sell their highest margin vehicles. Now Audi's at it, launching a whole "TRUTH IN ENGINEERING" shtick to accompany their new driver experience program. According to our German admirers' website, the truth is fast ("The truth leaves others behind") and it's headed your way ("Discover the Truth in a city near you"). We're nervously expectant on this new tagline; will it replace Ingolstadt's previous, catchy boast: Vorsprung durch Technik (Leadership Through Engineering)? Oh, and by the way, what the Hell does TRUTH IN ENGINEERING actually mean? 

King of Prussia Mall, outside Philly. At the "Chevy Court," most people clock the static displays, follow Dionne Warwick's advice and walk on by. The Chevy Store– easily mistaken for a NASCAR shop– contains a last gen Vue and Silverado, a Cobalt SS and a Z06. Shoppers can buy car models, t-shirts, hats and other bow tie-branded chazerai. The full time assistant's AWOL. I ask the temp if the truck on display is a GMT-800 or -900. He shrugs his shoulders; he's a "Ford guy." I take an online survey. Afterwards, I win a Chevy key ring via a free scratch card. Apparently, 200 people per day wander into the store. I ask Mr. Ford if they generate any vehicle sales. One customer was set to buy a 'Vette, saw the Z06 and decided to upgrade. A lady ogles a pickup truck. She's driving a Honda Odyssey. Her teenage son is due to inherit his father's Civic. Dad's next vehicle? "Probably another Honda." I can only imagine what this Chevy store costs, plus the public display area, plus the signage. 

New Zealand's modern art loving pistonheads are on tenterhooks, eagerly awaiting Wednesday's unveiling of BMW's "art cars" at the Auckland Museum. The traveling exhibit includes Bimmers modified by uber-pimpers Andy Warhol, Roy Liechtenstein, Frank Stella and Ken Done. (7er.com has the full collection here.) IMHO, BMW hasn't produced a really compelling art car since Esther Mahlangu's BMW 525i. I make this observation in the hopes that TTAC's culturally aware audience can suggest some contemporary artists who should have a bash at painting one of Chris Bangle's cubist-influenced cars. For my part. I'd like to see a Z4 tagged by Jazz83.

A commentator (whose comment was removed for violating our no-flame posting policy) took violent exception to the Tribeca review’s three paragraph dalliance upon its, uh, "questionable" exterior design; specifically the model’s new front end. Vindication comes via a study by CNW Marketing Research of Brandon, Oregon, which concludes that 70 percent of drivers judge their vehicles primarily by the headlights and grilles. OK, they only interviewed 40 subjects. Still, CanWest scribe Peter Ketner offers an excellent piece of parsing, riffing on the study’s conclusion that pistonheads have a tough time remembering human faces. So now you know. 

When the U.S. and South Korea signed a new trade agreement last week, the dems bitched on behalf of The Big 2.8: "Last year, South Korea exported more than 700,000 cars into the U.S.,” their statement proclaimed. “While the United States exported fewer than 5,000." Setting aside the question of what American-made cars could generate 650k South Korean sales, chosenilbu.com reveals that the existing importers are playing silly buggers. Korea’s Fair Trade Commission has ordered Mercedes to stop price fixing. “The importer allegedly had a firm ‘three-strikes’ guideline for dealers that broke its rules more than twice. The offending dealers were stripped of their sales rights and required to pay penalties of W30 million [US$1=W928].” BMW and Audi may be next.

Reuters reports that Bentley sold 5600 vehicles for the first half of 2007. That's not half bad, considering the company sold 1017 vehicles in all of 2003. As The Continental GT and Continental Flying Spur account for nearly all the sales, VW's handling of the Bentley brand can now be officially labeled bloody brilliant. As VW flounders and Audi fights tooth and nail just to hear BMW say "We don't consider Audi a competitor," Bentley has hit (if not created) the low six figure sweet spot, just above Mercedes and BMW. The Conti's priced high enough to keep out the luxury car riff-raff, but low enough so that it doesn't scare away all the CEOs and Managing Partners (as would a Rolls-Royce or Maybach.) Where does Bentley go from here? That's a question that the Bentley brand, which sold the same car for the 20 years before VW bought it, will have real trouble answering.