Originally posted by KharmaDog
Well, a main consumer criticisim about GM products is their quality. It looks bad when they end up closing the best regarded plant when it comes to quality when the consumers have stated their opinon on the issue.
It's like saying, " well we know we we're going down the sh*tter. And we know that our product is far from the best. So we've decided to make our product with less people and of those people, none of the ones who were doing a great job in the first place. This sound business strategy will only serve to increase the consumers' confidence in our product."
It reminds me a bit of the Leyland problems in the UK nearly 30 years ago - except we had major Union trouble also and BL had been nationalised but the quality thing is similar
British Leyland Motor Corporation
The British Leyland Motor Corporation ("BLMC"
, was a vehicle manufacturing company formed in Britain in 1968. Ultimately it would become nationalized as British Leyland then known just as BL.
History
BLMC, later to become just "BL" was created from the merger of British Motor Holdings and Leyland Motor Corporation, to combine most of the remaining British car manufacturing companies. These two companies were the results of mergers themselves. The corporation included car, bus and truck manufacturers and more diverse enterprises including construction equipment, refrigerators, metal casting companies, road surface manufacturers; in all nearly 100 different companies.
The company became an infamous monument to the industrial turmoil that plagued Britain in the 1970s. At its peak, BL owned nearly 40 different manufacturing plants across the country. Rivalry between the individual marques which had previously been competitors prior to the merger resulted in a product range which was incoherent and full of duplication. This, combined with serious industrial relations problems (principally, the company's relations with hard-line Socialist Trade Unions of the time), and ineffectual management meant that BL became an unmanageable and financially crippled behemoth whose bankruptcy in 1975 was inevitable.
Many of the brands were divested over time and continue to exist to this day, although the British Leyland name came to an end in 1982. From Austin to Morris the most direct heir of the company was the MG Rover Group which collapsed in April 2005.