General Motors announced today that it has aligned the sales, service and marketing of its brands into four distinct channels. They include the Chevrolet Channel; Buick-Pontiac-GMC (BPG) Channel; the Premium Channel that encompasses Cadillac; Saab and HUMMER; and what's called the Channel Support Group (CSG). Other media outlets like Automotive News insist Saturn is one of the channels, so we assume it will fall under the CSG, though it will still be lead by its current General Manager, Jill Lajdziak. One big score for the General was hiring on Mark McNabb, who comes to GM from his former position at Nissan where he was corporate vice-pres of Infiniti and the senior vice-pres of sales and marketing for Nissan North America. McNabb has been crowned the North American Vice President of the newly minted Premium Channel and will oversee sales, service and marketing for Cadillac, Saab and HUMMER. Otherwise, it seems GM has just switched around who reports to who and who is responsible for what when it comes to sales, service and marketing, hopefully in the interest of building a better automaker, but time will tell us that soon enough.
[Source: GM, Automotive News - sub. req'd]
PRESS RELEASE
GM Aligns Marketing Leadership With Four Brand Channels
DETROIT – General Motors announced today that its U.S. marketing and field operations will be more strongly aligned into four retail channels: Chevrolet; Premium (Cadillac, Hummer, Saab); Buick-Pontiac-GMC; and Saturn. Each channel will be focused on continuing to deliver world-class products for their customer and build value for GM and their respective dealers.
GM announced the appointment of four new leadership positions to direct activities within this organization, effective June 1:
Ed Peper, 46, is appointed North America Vice President, Chevrolet Channel.
Susan Docherty, 45, is appointed North America Vice President, Buick-Pontiac-GMC Channel (BPG).
Mark McNabb, 47, is appointed North America Vice President, Premium Channel.
Jim Bunnell, 52, is appointed Executive Director, Channel Support Group (CSG).
Jill Lajdziak, 51, will continue to lead Saturn as General Manager, and assume sales responsibility for that channel.
Bill Powell, 61, will continue his role as GM North America vice-president, industry and dealer affairs.
Doug Herberger, 56, also continues his role as GM North America vice-president, Service Parts Operations, and global process leader for after-sales.
Docherty, McNabb, Peper and Bunnell, will report to Mark LaNeve, North American vice-president vehicle sales service and marketing, in their new assignments, as will Lajdziak, Powell, and Herberger in their current assignments.
"These changes have been designed to improve all of our brands, and achieve strongly profitable channels at both a wholesale and retail level," said Troy Clarke, GM North America president. "We are further streamlining the organization to reduce complexity, align resources to improve the consumer experience and improve bottom line business results. We expect that the channels will work closely with GM's global product development teams to ensure the products meet consumer needs. This is the next step in our continuing strategy to increase the effectiveness of GM North America's operating model."
"The past few years have yielded demonstrated success with award winning products such as the Chevy Silverado and Malibu, Buick Enclave, GMC Acadia, Saturn Aura, and Cadillac Escalade and CTS." said Mark LaNeve, GM North America vice president, vehicle sales service and marketing. "Customers' opinions of our products and brands have improved. We raised quality to world-class levels and announced our 100,000 mile powertrain warranty, the most comprehensive transferable warranty in the business.
"We also began focusing on a retail channel approach in 2002 with Buick-Pontiac-GMC. We are transitioning our portfolio to highly differentiated vehicles for each of our brands that truly meet targeted customer needs. This has resulted in stronger, more focused models in each channel portfolio, " LaNeve added.
"A great example of this is the Buick Enclave which, within the BPG Channel, replaced the Rendezvous, Rainier, Terraza and Montana SV6. The Enclave outsells all four combined and Enclave is a true Buick in every sense of the word.
Today, the BPG channel covers a wide section of the market with distinct products like the Buick Enclave crossover, Pontiac G8 rear-wheel-drive sedan, and Professional Grade GMC trucks. Today's announcements will build on that positive momentum by better aligning the organization to our channels . We are offering more valuable products for customers and producing better results for the business."
Mark McNabb joins GM beginning April 21st from Nissan Motor Co., where he was corporate vice-president Infiniti and senior vice-president sales and marketing of Nissan North America. Jim Taylor, Cadillac divisional manager, Martin Walsh, Hummer divisional manager, and Steve Shannon, Saab divisional manager will report to him.
"Mark McNabb is a world-class executive with extensive experience. His background with Mercedes and Infiniti, in addition to Nissan, make him uniquely suited for this new position as the vice president of the premium brands," LaNeve said. "He is a great addition to our North American team."
Ed Peper, a 23 year GM veteran, has served as Chevrolet General Manager since April, 2005. He has had numerous assignments in GM's field operations and central office, including general manager of GM's Northeast Region and vice president of sales for Saab Cars USA.
"Under Ed's leadership, Chevrolet led the U.S. industry in total sales two of the past three years, on the strength of great new products like the Chevy Malibu," said LaNeve.
Susan Docherty had been the Western Region's General Manager since March 1, 2006. She was General Manager of Hummer and had worked at GM's Cadillac Division, responsible for launching the Escalade family of vehicles. She spent a good portion of her career in marketing leadership assignments covering Europe and Asia.
"Susan has a strong list of accomplishments supporting a variety of GM regions and brands." LaNeve said. "Her leadership will help the BPG channel continue to gain strength and customers".
Jim Bunnell, who had been general manager of BPG, will lead the Channel Support Group (CSG) collaborating with the channels on business strategies to provide common processes and systems to the channels. He had previously been General Manager of GM's North Central Region.
"Jim really led the way by being the first to run a retail channel in the U.S.," LaNeve Said, "He will use that experience to support the further development of all the channels."
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Mal Fuller @ Apr 16th 2008 5:08PM
GM had to hire someone for this. Alfred P. Sloan died years ago.
CH @ Apr 16th 2008 5:09PM
John, the press release clearly states:
"General Motors announced today that its U.S. marketing and field operations will be more strongly aligned into four retail channels: Chevrolet; Premium (Cadillac, Hummer, Saab); Buick-Pontiac-GMC; and Saturn."
TriShield @ Apr 16th 2008 5:28PM
Not really new, GM has been doing combining franchises like this for the past 15 years if not longer.
The Cadillac-HUMMER-Saab stores have a nice corporate building design as do Saturn stores. One went up nearly 10 years ago in Sioux Falls SD when I lived there. One is under construction now in Scottsdale, AZ.
Henry Brown Buick-GMC-Pontiac here in the Phoenix area is one of the first dealerships in the country to use the corporate building design in the country.
oby @ Apr 16th 2008 5:50PM
Classic example of shuffling around the deck chairs on the RMS Titanic! There will be lots of new signage on GM dealers everywhere proclaiming the new GM but the reality is the huge gash below the waterline. SOS
caddy dave @ Apr 16th 2008 9:36PM
The only thing leaking on this blog is the limited number of brain cells from the gash they created when they did your labotomy.
Mallory @ Apr 16th 2008 5:57PM
You know, they always throw out stuff like "_____ has a strong list of accomplishments supporting a variety of _____" or "His background with _____ make (sic) him uniquely suited for this new position as the vice president of_______" but they never can give you real world specifics where this or that person did something extraordinary that any other Joe couldn't have done. Why?
I guess the fact that they can't even master the English language to the point of putting out a basic press release (see above) is telling enough.
stratojet @ Apr 16th 2008 8:04PM
I have met Susan Docherty. She is a real corporate person and will say and do whatever it takes to get ahead. Like a lot of other so-called executives at GM. Now, if this bunch of executives are so good, then why is it that the market share does not follow? At this point, they need more than good corporate citizens. Maybe this guy from Nissan can bring something new and sing another anthem for a change.
dallennium @ Apr 16th 2008 6:01PM
I think it would have been better for GM to have 3 Groups world wide.
Group 1 Chevrolet, Cadillac, Hummer, (including Daewoo)
Group 2 Pontiac, Buick, GMC
Group 3 Opel, (Vauxhall), (Saturn), Saab, Holden
The groups would share platforms but then refine the individual brands drive trains, HP etc. The goal would be to take these 3 groups, divide and conquer.
elprogramer @ Apr 16th 2008 6:20PM
People want their fancy Saabs, Cadillacs, and Hummers to be unique. There was enough furor over the "upgraded Caprice" days, we're not going back to it.
bernie @ Apr 16th 2008 7:41PM
Mark McNabb left Nissan 6 weeks ago. I'm not sure that's hiring him away.
Maybe he can spread the rotten morale that I hear existed in sales and marketing at Nissan to GM. I've never seen the man smile.
iQuack @ Apr 16th 2008 8:43PM
Anything GM does to consolidate dealers so fewer of them sell more car lines will make it easier to drop redundant vehicles.
GM still has too many brands and too many models per brand. This is unnecessarily costly both in manufacturing and marketing.
Does the world really need a Saturn Aura, Chevy Malibu, and Pontiac G6? Do truck buyers really need both Chevy and GMC variations of the same vehicles?
GM needs to be ruthless in simplifying its car lines IMO. And Saab doesn't need to be killed because it's been dead for years, so GM should finally bury the corpse.
dan spalinger @ Apr 17th 2008 8:44AM
Good luck with McNabb GM!! He alienated thousands of Nissan owners by gutting the Nissan racing program in the whopping less than 1 year he was in his last position...he has a history of coming in, burning bridges and jumping ship for somewhere else...
Borger @ Apr 17th 2008 11:54AM
Hmmmm, I wonder if GM moved Saturn into the Buick-Pontiac-GMC group, because one of the former brands is about to die? Interesting!
TICK-TOCK!
Alpha @ Apr 17th 2008 4:24PM
Smart move, especially with the premium brands!