In many car-design studios around the world, global competition is the order of the day — designers in Barcelona fight it out with those in San Diego and Stuttgart and Tokyo for the right to pen a new car. Not so at Dodge, even though
the new Caliber is a world car with big European ambitions. Greg Howell, senior product designer, says there’s little need to go abroad for inspiration: “When you go into the styling studios it’s like the U.N. anyway,” he says.
Like most auto design departments, Chrysler fields most of its art talent from four schools — the Royal College of Art in the U.K., the Center for Creative Studies in Detroit, the Cleveland Institute of Art, and Art Center College in Pasadena. Other places like Detroit’s Wayne State U. are represented, but the change to sophisticated and expensive design software like Alias and CATIA has made the rich schools richer.
And when it comes to moving their designs from paper and clay into production, stylists still haven’t reached the nirvana of a totally paperless design studio. You still need to print it out and look at it on paper, Powell says. And, he adds, you still “cut clay as soon as you can.”
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Escalades have rap stars to shill them, and pickup trucks have country-music stars. But it’s easy being green in a
Ford Escape Hybrid — or so Ford wants shoppers to believe with new ad spots starring Kermit the Frog. The ads, set to air during the second quarter of Super Bowl XL on Feb. 5, are 30-second spots in which Kermit runs into the Escape Hybrid while out exploring. What exactly happens in the ad, Ford isn’t saying — but we’re betting that somehow, Kermit will use his catchphrase about being green. And we haven’t heard any mention about what Miss Piggy will be doing during those 30 seconds. We’re guessing Old Country Buffet.
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While Tiger Woods strokes away at another Buick Invitational title, he’ll be having his clubs carried around the grounds at La Jolla in a new bag designed by Woods and Buick, apparently on a break from working on the production version of the Velite. The blue-and-silver golf bag is plastered with Tiger’s name and the Buick logo. Nike made the bag, which Tiger is likely legally obligated to use at every tournament for the foreseeable future. “Tiger’s new golf bag parallels the premium attributes of our new Buick products, particularly the new Lucerne luxury sedan,” said Buick Golf Manager Larry Peck in an expertly worded release. “Both have the style, grace, quality, and elegance you’d expect only from Buick.”
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In addition to stealing thousands of hours of time that could have been spent writing book reports on any Stephen King book, the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is now charged with more prosecutable crimes. The city of Los Angeles, the AP reports, is taking the makers of the game to court, charging that there’s porno inside. Rockstar Games and Take Two Interactive will have to defend their game against the city’s attorney, who charges that the game is marketed and rated as a “mature” game, not the adults-only tag it should have earned. Attorney Rocky Delgadillo says there’s an embedded mini-game in GTA: SA that has characters in explicit sex acts — as opposed to the main game where they simply kill, deal drugs, and pimp out other characters. The AP estimates the game booked about $600 million in retail sales, $10 million of that in California.
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So, GM and Ford are all like, "Dude, this sucks!" And
President Bush was like all, "Don't look at me man, I'm like totally out of cash, unless you need a prescription drug plan or a levee or somethin'. Whyont you ask your moms for some scrilla or get some skills and build ya a better ride." And Bill Ford was all like, "Man, I don't need your wack-ass money!" Word.
Ford's Way Forward apparently doesn't include its most productive automotive plant, but at last count still does include the septuagenarian Ranger compact truck. We'll take Illogical Moves for $200.
It's Super Bowl time-and the Motor City is as ready as it's ever going to be to put on the Big Show. We are a little worried about what the
"Detroit Salute" will look like on TV, but with
Cadillac in the groove and Ford Field on prime time, maybe we can all forget about multi-billion dollars losses and instead focus on whose costume malfunctions instead. (We're hoping it's John Madden's.)
Toyota's coming to NASCAR. We could make all sorts of rednecks-going-in-a-circle jokes, but since we can't translate them into katakana, we'll just sit on them for a while.
Zetsche says it's time for Mercedes' notoriously infighting management team to get over themselves.
"No more bullshit," he told TCC last week in a conference call. We kind of think he was talking about the sesame bagels we brought to the meeting when he specifically asked for everything bagels, but he won't answer our IMs.
TCC reported it first - and Ford confirmed last week that
Steve Lyons is leaving the company and headed to Arizona to sell cars. Given the company's current state, we think we both got it right.
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Marty Padgett January 31st, 2006
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