YouSaid · the spoken record

Alfred Sloan

lines on the record

53

first

2020-04-26

most recent

2020-04-26

sittings or episodes

1

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podcast

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1. “Awareness of the importance of the used car market. There were no statistics on the different cars market penetration. No one kept track of registrations. Production schedules were set with no real relationship to final demand. Our products had no planned relation to one another or to the market. The concept of a line of products to meet the full challenge of the market had not been thought of. We had to start from that beginning. My impressions of all this, after more than 65 years in and around the automobile industry, 45 of them with General Motors are the basis for this book.”

   2020-04-26 · Founders · #122 Alfred Sloan (General Motors) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

2. “Involved with thousands of others in the destiny of this industry, they conducted the prosaic operations of running a business without being aware of the revolution they were making. The field was open to all. Technical knowledge flows from a common storehouse of scientific progress. The techniques of production are an open book. The market is worldwide and there are no favorites except those chosen by the customers. When we started on this great adventure in the early nineteen hundreds, the whole automotive industry was searching for ways and means to find itself. In those early days we lacked the techniques that today are taken for granted. Things just seem to happen to us and to the industry. The number of sales by dealers was unknown. The number of cars held by dealers was unknown. Trends in consumer demands were unknown. There was no”

   2020-04-26 · Founders · #122 Alfred Sloan (General Motors) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

3. “We knew that the product had great potential, but I could hardly say that any of us realized the extent to which the automobile would transform the world, reshape the entire economy, call new industries into being, and alter the pace and style of everyday life. It was my personal satisfaction to be associated as a supplier or a competitor with a large number of the able citizens who created and contributed to the development of this industry. The names of a few of them by their association with cars and companies stand for New American legend. Ford, mister Buick, Mr Chevrolet, Mr Olds, Mr Chrysler.”

   2020-04-26 · Founders · #122 Alfred Sloan (General Motors) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source