`
`At Ford, 20 plants wil be idle for just a
`week this summer, not the traditional two.
`This is the Louisvile assembly plant.
`
`Is the sales
`call center
`obsolete?
`New theory: All
`must be e-savv
`David Barkho1z
`. i
`dbarkholzi1crain ;com
`As Internet leads, mobile phone
`calls and texts swamp dealerships,
`business development centers are
`starting to look counterproductive
`to some dealers.
`That's odd, given that the centers
`
`are separate staffs of salespeople
`who work leads on the phone and
`the Web. But some dealers say the
`centers can shield regular salespeo-
`ple from learing Internet sales
`techniques. And corrosive rivalries
`can form between the centers and
`regular sales staffs.
`Some dealers are dumping their
`business development centers, or
`BDCs, while others - who defend
`the centers as the best way to han-
`dle the rising tide of Internet leads
`- have worked out a truce between
`the two staffs.
`Chris Hil said dismantlng the
`business development center at Bil
`Joliet, IlL., was
`the only way to shake the regular
`sales staff from a "country club at-
`mosphere" that gave regular sales-
`people a pass on calling prospects
`and learning how to engage cus-
`tomers with smartphones.
`He said the seven specialists
`working the phones in the call cen-
`ter and responding promptly online
`to Internet leads were doing a good
`job of handling a growing list of
`prospects.
`
`Jacobs Auto Group in
`
`see CENTERS, Page 27
`
`.. '" J.. '- i-~ J V t~ 1)
`
`MAY 2 8 2013
`
`Entire contents If 2013 Crain Communications Inc. All riL
`
`reserved.
`
`$159/yEAR; $6/COPY
`
`~ PllilllVi'â
`'- ~
`Too busy for a shutdown
`
`Strong sales are killing a Detroit 3 summer ritual
`Plant closings and flexible labor contracts
`Nick Bunkley
`nbunkleyi1crain.com
`have broken the cycle of overproducing and
`The traditional summer auto plant shut-
`discounting. But the flp side is that automak-
`ers have to stretch their capacity quickly to
`down is quickly fading away.
`With tight inventories, rising sales and cus-
`keep up when the market is on an upswing.
`Ford Motor Co. is reducing its shutdown
`tomers flocking to big, profitable vehicles, the
`schedule for a second consecutive year, with
`Detroit 3 no longer can afford to halt plants for
`two weeks.
`20 of its 31 plants being idled for one week in-
`Higher demand for pickups, SlNs and
`stead of two. Chrysler Group is eliminating
`crossovers is largely behind the decisions to
`time off at three of 10 assembly plants, all six
`skip or shorten the downtime that historicaly
`transmission
`engine plants and five of six
`has coincided with the beginning of the new
`. plants; four Chrysler assembly plants wi shut
`model year.
`for one week.
`
`At General Motors, whose May 1 inventories
`were the largest of the three companies,
`sources say most plants wi keep their usual
`shutdown plans in early July. But a plant
`building large crossovers is expected to stay
`open, and a heavy-duty pickup plant will be
`idled for just one week. A GM spokesman de-
`clined to reveal specifics.
`The transplant auto makers have historicaly
`not scheduled significant summer downtime
`for model changeovers and have not an-
`nounced any major changes this year; most of
`their plants wil close for no more than a week
`
`see SHUTDOWNS, Page 27
`
`)
`
`I
`
`Not satisfied with OtiStat's steady pröfits,
`GM wants to create a global 4G powerhouse
`Dave Guilford
`dgu i Ifordi1cra i n.com
`ETROIT - General Motors' OnStar tele-
`matics unt has quietly become a profit
`margin superstar.
`Analysts peg OnStar's revenues at about
`margi of30 to 35 per-
`$1.5 bilion annualy, with a
`cent. That's about five times the 6.2 percent margin
`from GM's fist-quarer adjusted earings before
`interest and taxes in Nort America - where the
`vast majority of OnStar' s business is today.
`The question for GM now is: Can OnStar be
`more?
`CEO Dan Akerson and other top executives are
`itching to shake up OnStar's cozy safety-and-se-
`
`They see GM's deal with
`
`curity oriented, monthy subscription modeL.
`AT&T to provide 4G LTE
`connectivity - the fastest tye of wireless Inter-
`net connection now avaiable - though OnStar
`next year as the enabler. Akerson told stock ana-
`lysts this month that the 4G deal "opened up what
`I think are potentialy lucrative lines of business
`that don't exist" in OnStar today.
`"So when we look at what we can do with a 4G
`pipe into a car," Akerson said, "you can change
`the business model almost entirely."
`GM foresees expanded offerings such as custom
`apps, streaming entertainment and enhanced
`
`see ONSTAR, Page 26
`
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`Automotive News
`I N
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`
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`OWNER Ex. 2030, page 2