One of the problems that Cadillac had in the late 1990 was that it’s products were old and tired. Corporate design and the accountants had successfully destroyed the brand and they were trading on past glory to sell cars, rather than distinctive models and a firm grip on the luxury market. Couple that with the growing strength of BMW, Lexus, Infiniti and others and you have a slow death march.

Now that market growth had been steadily upwards for the last 6 years, thanks to an array of attractive and powerful vehicles, a more consistent design approach and a well thought out plan for market coverage, it has become a creditable alternative to the Japanese and the Germans.

However this is not enough because once you get to parity as an alternative, you need to create a value proposition that will move people out of their preferred brand and into the Cadillac brand. This is no easy feat. In the Software business we call it the 10x problem. In order for someone to move from Product A to Product B, you have to have 10x the value to the customer to overcome the inertia of moving.

For example, for a BMW person to move to a Cadillac, you have to overcome the brand loyalty that BMW has. This is a major challenge because these people are fiercely loyal. You have to overcome the neighbours remarks about “……..you bought a Cadillac, instead of a BMW??!!!….”.

The question is what is that 10x value proposition??…. (and it can’t be rebates or price reductions, that creates a whole set of other problems).

My argument would be to go green FAST.  I don’t mean slap an electric engine onto the side of the engine and market the hell out of it. Make a clear and unequivocal statement that the brand will be defined by Carbon Reduction, Low MPG and Luxury products. You can still buy Luxury but you can have a better conscience.

I know that developing these products takes time, but there are incremental steps you can take to build out a comprehensive strategy:

• Start Carbon Offsets Now even if it means purchasing huge forests so you can offset that way
• Offer other Carbon Offset programs such as Carbon Credits
• Build Green Programs at Lansing Factory including Carbon Offsets and Power Reduction
• Make Strong commitments to moving to more fuel efficient products including hybrid and diesel technologies, hell goto diesel/hybrid technology and kick the pants of MPH
• Make the Cars Recyclable

I know that a lot of you think that Cadillac owners don’t care about these things, my point is they WILL care about these things soon and the luxury car vendor that figures it out first will get the sales boost and it currently looks like Lexus. I also know that GM is notoriously bad at picking trends in the marketplace and typical spend their time lobbying rather than thinking about their business, but times they are a changing……..