Here’s How General Motors Should Repair Its Brand Image and How You Can Too
By: Christopher Bartley
Tags: Strategy, Business, Automotive, Marketing, Cars

Here’s How General Motors Should Repair Its Brand Image and How You Can Too

Learn how GM’s engineering created Buick’s brand identity crisis and how the Domino’s Pizza approach can help them turn it around Christopher Bartley Follow Sep 22, 2020 · 10 min read

Photo by Dietmar Becker on Unsplash

When I saw the latest 2020 Buick commercial, my head turned away in disappointment ever so slightly with barely pursed lips — like Miranda Priestly’s pout scene in The Devil Wear’s Prada. It was as if I refused to be worked up by such a letdown. “Not again,” I thought.

The commercial starts with the driver picking up his friend for dinner. Surprised as she sits in the SUV, she rhetorically inquires, “Nice! This is the new Buick?” To which the driver corrects her, “You mean the new Alexa.” The “Buick vs. Alexa” debate goes on for the next 30 seconds and then extends to the waiter and waitress when they reach their destination.

Why Buick Commercials Frustrate Me

The identity crisis that Buick has experienced and shamelessly marketed for decades hasn’t changed. In 2018 they launched a commercial titled “Mistaken Identity,” where various people mistake the identity of new Buick models. In 2014, they released a commercial titled “Hmm,” where the catchphrase “That’s not a Buick!” became popular.

“Clearly, so inconsequential are Buick’s cars that the Buick brand itself can now make light of the ease with which customers turn their backs. It’s as if the funeral planning is well underway before life support has even been removed.” — Timothy Cain, The Truth About Cars and Driving

However, Buick’s deflection campaigning isn’t a new marketing strategy. In 1988 a similar ad campaign entitled, “This is not your father’s Oldsmobile,” was launched, which not only insulted the demographic who did buy Oldsmobiles (i.e., old people) but unsuccessfully captured the younger audience they were targeting. Facing the same identity crisis as Buick, the Oldsmobile brand went out of business in 2004. Quite frankly, how effectively did they think the name Oldsmobile would play for young people? And why has this happened with more than one brand? Who owns Buick and Oldsmobile anyway? General Motors.

GM was an Auto Industry Leader

Alfred P. Sloan, Jr., president, chairman, and CEO of General Motors Corporation between the 1920s and 1950s, positioned the company as “a car for every purse and purpose.” GM had substantial market share leadership in the U.S. because of this powerful differentiation strategy. Their “every purse and purpose” portfolio made up their brand architecture:

Chevrolet: Entry-level Pontiac: Performance, Speed Buick: Conservative, yet Plush, Riding Comfort Oldsmobile: Sophisticated Engineering Cadillac: Ultimate Luxury

Additionally, Cadillac has a rich history of pioneering many “firsts” in the auto industry. They engineered power sunroofs, the electric engine starter, powered memory seats, and electric seat warmers, auto-interior temperature control, and more. With all of this innovation and success, what could GM have possibly done wrong to weaken their Buick and Oldsmobile brands? Well, GM did something that not only impacted their Buick and Oldsmobile line but every brand under their ownership. And it started with badge-engineering.

What is Badge-Engineering?

Badge engineering is also known as rebadging or platform engineering and typically associated with the auto industry. An automobile manufacturer applies a different model name (or a manufacturer’s name) to an existing car, consequently marketing the new name but old vehicle as a separate product. The primary reason for this is cost. It’s cheaper to rebadge a product than it is to create an entirely different model. Rebadging can happen within a company or between companies. For example, the first-generation Honda Odyssey was rebadged as an Isuzu Oasis because Isuzu needed a minivan. As a trade, the Isuzu Rodeo was rebadged as the Honda Passport because Honda needed an SUV. Another example is the Mitsubishi GTO/3000GT, which was sold as the Dodge Stealth in the U.S. market.

Badge Engineering for the auto industry is like White Labeling for the tech and consumer goods industries. It happens frequently. The problem with “auto white labeling,” however, is that people tend to have a stronger brand association with their cars than a box of cookies or a messenger application (which is arguable because the iMessage “blue bubble” brand association creates a strong promise). GM’s brand architecture started to unravel when they broke their differentiation brand promise of “every purse and purpose.”

Three Pitfalls that will Weaken a Brand

There is a difference between brand identity and brand image. Brand identity is based on internal values that drive the company. Brand image is what the consumer ultimately perceives and articulates about the company. When a business suffers from an identity crisis — meaning there’s a gap between values and operation or strategy — it will eventually manifest itself as an unattractive brand image to customers and stakeholders. Adjunct Professor of Columbia Business School and former Accenture Senior Partner, Leonard Sherman, suggests three management mistakes that will weaken a brand image:

Breaking a brand promise. Diluting brands meaning through dissonant product-line extensions. Diluting brand value through excessive product complexity.

Seth Godin defines a brand as a set of expectations, memories, stories, and relationships that cause you to choose one product or service over another repeatedly. In short, strong brands have a clear promise of what a company is about, what it will deliver, and how it will make you feel. It takes years of positioning and marketing. Thus, if a company breaks its promise by introducing a defective product or reneging on customer service, it risks creating what Sherman calls brand dissonance, damaging the brand for years or permanently.

GM’s Mistake was Using Badge Engineering

Like Facebook, Amazon, Google, and Apple’s recent Antitrust Subcommittee Hearings, GM faced antitrust concerns as their market share grew to more than 50% in the 1960s. GM was the industry-leading auto manufacturer, but its operations became bloated with unnecessary costs and other internal complications that created opportunities for competition to seize.

For example, when the 1970s gasoline crisis hit and Toyota, Honda, and Nissan created fuel-efficient, high-quality and affordable cars, GM attempted to respond with its own fuel-efficient vehicle to protect its market share. But the Chevy Vega became known as one of the worst cars of all time by Car and Driver magazine.

“It was so unreliable that it seemed the only time anyone saw a Vega on the road not puking out oily smoke was when it was being towed.” — Car and Driver Magazine

I think it’s important to note that the Vega was not created by any of GM’s independent divisions, but by a “corporate team.” In other words, GM circumvented their current brand architecture of Chevrolet, Pontiac, Buick, Oldsmobile, and Cadillac to create a car they adequately researched. So even though user research was extensively applied, it was rendered useless in the hands of corporate leadership that were not as close to the customers as their dedicated divisions were. It was like handing an aircraft flight manual to Doug Parker, the owner of American Airlines who has 30+ years in the industry, and expecting him to successfully taxi, takeoff, fly, and land a plane he technically owns. It was the prelude to GM’s promise-breaking behavior.

With a focus still primarily on costs and not customers, GM then started the rebadging strategy. It was, once again, led by the wrong person — the CEO whose specialty was finance, not engineering. I’m willing to bet that the innovative developments GM pioneered with Cadillac and their other makes did not come from corporate. Yet somehow, these strategic changes weren’t trusted with the same people who positioned GM as a leader. I could imagine the C-Level (“C” for clandestine) meeting going something like:

Executive 1: Oh, this problem is a bit too big for any of the five brands we currently operate. Executive 2: We need a high-level strategy that’ll benefit the entire company — not just one division. Executive 3: Let’s keep this one close to the chest and create an innovation silo that’ll develop a new model the world with which the world must reckon! Executive 1 (whispers): Yes, yes. And we’ll call it…the Vega!

Thus, GM began their badge engineering efforts and made every car across all five of their brand divisions the same, internally. The same chassis, engine, and other significant parts were engineered and replicated for Chevy, Pontiac, Buick, Oldsmobile, and Cadillac. And to feign the brand promise of differentiation, cosmetic styling was applied to reflect each brand’s personality. Not only did GM break the promise of “every purse and purpose,” it didn’t think people would notice or make a big deal out of it.

But it was noticed. Fortune Magazine featured GM on its cover in 1983. And they made it known that the promise no longer delivered:

Heading: With Auto Sales Rebounding, Will Success Spoil General Motors? Subheading: GM Look-alikes: Chevrolet, Oldsmobile, Buick Pontiac.

Sherman explains why this breaks their promise by summarizing, “The cars not only looked alike, but they also shared common performance characteristics, thereby destroying the historical rationale for tiered-brand pricing.” As a result, Cadillac eventually suffered the same fate too. In 2009, Oldsmobile and Pontiac went bankrupt. Cadillac’s brand image is still marred. And now, in 2020, Buick makes light of its brand identity crisis with facetious marketing campaigns that say, “Yeah, we know we have a problem, but what can you do?”

Well, Buick, what you shouldn’t do is partner with another brand (e.g., Alexa) to attempt to change your brand image. It won’t work. Do what Domino’s Pizza did:

Remove the bandaid Take ownership seriously Differentiate effectively

The Domino’s Pizza Change Initiative

When I was younger, Domino’s Pizza was considered a below-average pizza joint. At the time, Pizza Hut ruled the nation. But decades later, Domino’s started initiating some exciting changes. In 2010 they took ownership of their “lackluster product,” revamped their recipe, and boldly marketed the transformation with an “Oh Yes We Did” campaign. They implemented a Carryout Insurance program where a customer can replace their pizza if it gets rained on, dropped, or ruined. And more recently, they launched a Paving for Pizza initiative, where they give grants to cities to fill their community’s potholes for a safer pizza ride. They also designed a website dedicated to the paving project where customers can take pictures and share their stories. There’s even an interactive “pizza cam” that shows what’s going on inside a pizza box when road conditions are mild, moderate, critical, or catastrophic (4).

Because of these innovative initiatives, they’re now the top pizza franchise in sales, even though they have 2,000 less domestic units than Pizza Hut. Domino’s once suffered from a brand image crisis, too. However, when they started to address their recipe failure and then innovated in ways that made their marketing less gimmicky, they changed their perception in the pizza market. They most certainly changed mine.

1. Remove the Bandaid

I find it interesting when partnerships occur cross-industry, such as Porsche and the OnePlus phone company partnering to create the OnePlus 7T Pro McLaren edition or Buick partnering with Alexa to appeal to a younger audience. However, cross-industry partnerships are not permanent. At the very least, a contract will eventually be reviewed and reconsidered for renewal (or sometimes prematurely broken — see Toys R Us and Amazon). I should note that Buick is not a total failure. It’s just not successful in the U.S. In China, Buick is a cool and inspirational brand. It goes to show how different markets can perceive the same brand differently.

But if Buick wants to capture the younger market in the U.S., it isn’t going to do that by partnering with Amazon’s virtual assistant AI technology to add a feature to a new model. In UX design, we understand that features are not the ultimate way to make users happy. Buick would need to rebuild its brand persona and experience from the inside out. Or, at the very least, bring back the Avenir sub-brand and leverage that brand equity.

Removing the bandaid means exposing the festered wound by pulling off the white label and addressing why most young people don’t see Buick as cool or trendy. However, here’s the kicker: Buick’s original brand promise was a conservative, plush ride, not an untraditional performance vehicle. That was Pontiac’s brand (and still in some cases now, Chevy)! Buick needs to become aware (by ripping off the bandaid) and then accept what it’s been perceived as for decades — the father’s car. And if it wants to change that perception, then it has to be a drastic makeover. However, international markets are quite happy with Buick as-is.

2. Take Ownership of Mistake Seriously

Domino’s took serious ownership of their failed recipe, while Buick made pseudo-parodies of themselves with “That’s not a Buick!” commercials. If a brand refuses to take itself seriously by owning up to its mistakes, the target audience will reciprocate the brand’s insincerity.

By communicating its shortcomings publicly, something special happens. A genuine marketing campaign will create enough room for the audience to ask, “So what are you going to do about it?” And this allows the brand to reestablish or create a new brand promise when people interact with the brand in the future.

Brands are public entities. So publicly declaring and accepting those mistakes creates an open-ended dialogue between them and their audience (the conversation taking place in the viewer or reader’s mind or personal space). It gives the brand the power to declare not only its failure but also its solution to make things better. However, creating marketing campaigns that already feed into what an audience thinks about a brand establishes a close-ended conversation. The audience has the final say. And it’ll often go something like my shaking head of disappointment I mentioned at the beginning of this story.

3. Differentiate Effectively

“Differentiating effectively” may sound cliché, but it’s also the reason GM’s brand image started to implode. And if they’re not careful, their electric vehicles (EV) might suffer the same fate. Strategy 101 says if you can’t dominate in cost and volume, then attempt to win by differentiation. Domino’s chose to create a winning strategic move by implementing Discontinuous Innovation.

Giving grants to cities for potholes and pizza insurance positioned Domino’s as a company that took their pizza product seriously. They valued their pies so much that they wanted roads to be well-paved so that customers got a perfect pizza (at least this is the brand story they’ve conveyed — and it’s genius). That’s how much they prided themselves in their new recipe and revamped business operations. They differentiated from other pizza companies by focusing on “last mile” strategies that brought perfect pizzas to hungry customers. And if they weren’t happy, customers were “insured” until they were.

Other car manufacturers have indeed turned their brand image around by developing an entirely new brand division or restyling their current models from the ground up. But often, insight and innovation come across more profoundly when a business in an unrelated industry applies strategies and creativity that can be leveraged in your playing field. Besides, it took the science of internal combustion and a tricycle to make a car.