Report from the front lines

Obama's plan for our economy is proceeding according to plan - just what Dr. Ayers ordered.

Using demos to plan your ad buy?

Surprising?  Consider these numbers when you plan your advertising budget.  More at Direct Marketing News.

How Ford survived without a bailout

Apologies for the odd sizing.  Read more at Yahoo Finance.

Its official: you're subsidizing Peugeot

The joke's on you

As we predicted, the Obama administration is giving hundreds of millions of your tax dollars to failing French automaker Peugeot.

Attention U.S. taxpayers:  You now own a piece of a French car company that is drowning in red ink.

That’s right.  In a move little noticed outside of the business pages, General Motors last week bought more than $400 million in shares of PSA Peugeot Citroen – a 7 percent stake in the company.

Because U.S. taxpayers still own roughly one-quarter of GM, they now own a piece of Peugeot.

Peugeot can undoubtedly use the cash.  Last year, Peugeot’s auto making division lost $123 million.  And on March 1 – just a day after the deal with GM was announced – Moody’s downgraded Peugeot’s credit rating to junk status with a negative outlook, citing “severe deterioration” of its finances.

In other words, General Motors essentially just dumped more than $400 million of taxpayer assets on junk bonds.

"“severe deterioration” of its finances," indeed.  Next time your local Democrat-friendly congressman comes to town, be sure to ask him about this.

US taxpayers buying into French automaker?

1983 Renault Alliance

Congratulation, Finger Lakes taxpayers, you're now going to subsidize the French auto industry.  Our own government-run car company sees opportunity in the land of escargot.

PSA Peugeot Citroen may announce as soon as this week plans to sell a stake of about 7 percent in the French carmaker to General Motors Co. as part of a development alliance, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg.

GM, which still owes billions to US taxpayers, has been using those confiscated funds to dish out big bonuses to the same employees who ran the industrial giant into the ground.

Does it make sense that a company who can afford to pay bonuses needs government subsidies to sell its cars, like the Chevy Volt?

According to all the reporting news sources, most managers could see bonuses for 2010 equaling 15 to 20% of their annual salary. Other reports are indicating as much as 50% of salary, while some blue collars might merely get $10K on average.

Question is, why is there any bonus at all at GM?

It is no small thing that General Motors and Chrysler are still in business today, due to the extreme generosity of the American taxpayers.

So, why should either company even think of giving bonuses to the blue collar and white collar workers at all before paying back the loans?

For those with short memories, the rotting hulk pictured above is a Renault Alliance, the ill fated offspring of the last time a US automaker got in bed with the French.

Mad Men: Season 5

Mad Men's long delayed Season 5 returns to AMC with a 2 hour special on Sunday, March 25, at 9:00 eastern.  NCAA basketball scheduling may conflict, so be sure to set your DVR.

Starbucks for your Valentine

Who knew a such a politically correct outfit would support the second amendment?

The National Gun Victim’s Action Council (NGAC) will lead a national boycott of Starbucks Coffee products on Valentine’s Day, Feb. 14, to try to change the company’s “open carry” gun policy at its locations. Starbucks currently allows guns to be openly carried by patrons in its stores in the states where it is legal to do so.

Nervous corporate functionaries are known to buckle at the slightest test of their character, so let's support Starbucks.  Click here to enjoy fine Starbucks products on Valentine's Day in the comfort of your own home. 

Welcome at Starbucks

Microsoft axes marketers

Former Microsoft marketers pursue other options

Old time software giant Microsoft Corporation is loosing some of its core corporate business to hip young competitors like Google and Apple.  What can the industry dinosaur, which spent $13.9 billion on sales and marketing in fiscal 2011, do to stop the bleeding?  Cut the marketing department, of course.

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) is making plans for a companywide restructuring of its marketing operations, a move that may include hundreds of job cuts, according to people familiar with the matter...

Changes may include shifting some of the more technical marketing workers to engineering groups, cutting employees who don’t have needed skills or whose work is duplicated by other workers, and revamping how marketing groups are organized and where they fit into the rest of the company, the people said.

In what some might see as a desperate attempt to stay relevant,  the smokestack-era coding shop is looking to play some diaper dandies.

A former Microsoft exec tells us Microsoft had made it a criterion of their annual review to recruit a set number of students straight out of college. He reckons Microsoft last year let go the bottom 10 to 20 per cent of its staff, kept the top 20 per cent and made life "uncomfortable" for the 60 per cent in between. "The plan is to hire in people fresh out of college to get new talent and make Microsoft cool again. It's pretty broad within the company," he says.

Blue screen of death, perhaps?  Bold added.

SAAB bankrupt, drops warranty coverage

Swedish auto maker SAAB has been declared bankrupt.   SAAB's US dealers have been advised that warranties will no longer be honored, and all remaining new cars will be sold "as is."  Current SAAB owners are basically screwed.

According to a leaked memo to Saab dealers obtained by Autoblog, the bankrupt automaker is ceasing all warranty coverage on its vehicles in North America.

The memo was sent out Monday following a Swedish court's approval of Saab's bankruptcy petition and – as we suspected – all new vehicles will be sold "as is."

Government General Motors bought SAAB in 1989.  As GM swirled into it's own bankruptcy and socialization in 2009, it attempted to jettison the Swedish firm.  GM finally rejected an offer from Chinese automaker Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile, choosing bankruptcy instead.

Sweden's only other auto manufacturer, Volvo, beloved of bumper sticker leftists, is now actually Chinese owned.

SDL buys remains of Alterian

British software house SDL has finalized its takeover of floundering marketing services provider Alterian.  The acquisition follows the closing of Alterian's Chicago office last month. 

Sucessful entrepreneur Al Swearengen  offers some advice to the 75 former Alterian Chicago staffers:

Obamamobiles selling like cold cakes

Fired exec Laura Soave with slow selling Fiat 500

As part of Obama's plan to fundamentally restructure American society, bankrupt Detroit automaker Chrysler Corporation's remaining equity was confiscated and given to Italy's Fiat SpA.  The Italian industrial giant was supposed to teach us to love European-style mini cars.

Fiat/Chrysler/Obama's plan to get the masses to embrace the adorable but tiny Fiat 500 is floundering.  Sales are so bad that 29 of Fiat's 130 US dealerships did not sell a single car in October.  As a result, Fiat has fired Laura Soave, head if its US team, and laid off production workers in its unionized Michigan engine plant.

If that's depressing, just wait until  they take over our healthcare system.....  oh, yeah, they already did.

Alterian lays off 75

As Obama's "Recovery Summer" enters its second winter, we learn that consumer marketing services provider Alterian will close its Chicago office.  As a result, 75 consumer marketing professionals will join the army of the unemployed.

The London-based CRM company's restructuring follows a poor fiscal 2011. Alterian's revenue decreased from $53.3 million in the 2010 fiscal year, which ended March 31 of that year, to $52 million in the 2011 fiscal year.

As part of the restructuring plan, Alterian will make “substantial cuts to its operational cost base and initiated reviews of revenue recognition, and goodwill and other intangible assets,” the company said in an Oct. 27 investor statement. The company identified $14.3 million in operating cost cuts.

Part of the cost-savings plan includes reducing the staff from 450 employees worldwide to approximately 260, the company said in the statement. The company would not confirm whether the Chicago office closing is part of this strategy.

Alterian is currently in takeover talks with  British software shop SDL.  As the world's consumer markets flounder, the market analytics function is becoming just another generic web application.

Last exit for the "Big Yellow Box?"

Rochester's Eastman Kodak may be all done, folks.

Eastman Kodak Co. (EK), the unprofitable 131-year-old camera maker, is weighing options including a bankruptcy filing because of concerns raised by possible buyers of its patent portfolio, said three people with direct knowledge of the process.

Sam Henry looks at a sad day for Rochester, Upstate New York, and everyone who ever captured images on film.

This is a company whose “campus”once  covered a large portion of this city and whose wealth enabled Rochester to print its own money or script during the Great Depression and to carry on fairly unscathed.  So many in the community were touched by Kodak that you heard it said “the big yellow box takes care of us.”  And it did.

Last Crown Victoria rolls off the line

January Jones with Crown Victoria

Federal government fuel economy standards have succeed in killing off Ford's long running fleet workhorse.

The last Ford Crown Victoria rolled off a Canadian assembly line Thursday, marking the end of the big, heavy Ford cars that have been popular with taxi fleets and police departments for decades.

Since 1979, almost 10 million Crown Victoria, Mercury Grand Marquis and Lincoln Town Cars -- so-called Panther Platform vehicles -- have been sold.

Crown Vics at work in NYC

The crude but rugged Crown Victoria, also sold as the Lincoln Town Car, has for years been widely used by fleet operators such as limo services, taxi companies, and police departments.  Fleet operators have not continued to purchased the Crown Vic because they're idiots who want to waste fuel.  These managers need to meet customer demands, pay their bills, and stay in business.  Balancing all the conflicting variables has resulted in rational a business decision to go with Ford's land yacht.

“The [ Lincoln ]  Town Car has traditionally been an easy-to-fix vehicle,“ said Tarek Mallah, general manager Dial 7 car service, a so-called “black car“ service in New York City. “It's got legroom. It was designed as a livery vehicle to start with. It's passenger-centric.“

Mallah said he still isn't sure what he'll use to eventually replace the Town Car.

Now that their betters have decided the Vic has got to go, here's what future taxi passengers will be twisting themselves into.  New York City's ruling elite has decided that all future cabs will be built by Nissan.

Obama supports new jobs...

WestStar's new, low cost work force

...in Costa Rica.

Barry will pitch his "jobs" plan at a high tech manufacturing facility in North Carolina today.

WestStar Precision employs skilled machinists, using sophisticated computer-controlled technology, to manufacture precision components for the medical, aircraft, and other industries.  Just the type of operation we're counting on to provide job growth when the US economy recovers, except for one complication - WestStar's new jobs are being created in sunny Costa Rica.

Our new office and manufacturing facility in San Jose, Costa Rica, also has approximately 10,000 sq. ft. with similar equipment as the main office. This facility is designed for high volume production to support our international and domestic clients.

WestStar could have added that capacity in the US, but instead chose our neighbor to the south, for good reason.

According to an April 2004 article in the Raleigh News & Observer, Portman moved the jobs overseas to “take advantage of low labor costs.”

Why, one might ask, did the administration's Ivy League smarties risk ridicule by choosing WestStar for Obama's speech about creating American jobs?

The owner of the company, Ervin Portman, is a local Democrat on the Wake County, N.C. Board of Commissioners. He donated $1,000 to Obama’s 2008 campaign. Portman and his wife together donated several thousand more to other Democratic candidates and the state Democratic party.

Yahoo fires Carol Bartz

Bartz in happier days

As Yahoo continues its swirl down the bowl of failed web ventures, they've just fired CEO Carol Bartz.  We realize Yahoo is desperate, but what on earth were they thinking when they hired Carol?

Bartz was known as a successful exec at Autodesk, a large software company that serves technically oriented businesses, but remains virtually unknown to the world's consumers, Yahoo's target market. From a Wall Street Journal article published in 1992:

Though the world's sixth largest PC software company, Autodesk is hardly a household name for a couple of reasons. One is that it dominates a niche: software that allows relatively inexpensive personal computers to produce powerful models for engineers, architects and other professional designers.

The other reason is Autodesk's founding genius, John Walker, a reclusive programmer who doesn't allow the company to distribute his picture or publish it in its annual report. In a rare interview granted for this article, a prickly Mr. Walker insisted that a reporter sit in front of a video camera, declared that Autodesk claimed a copyright on the ensuing discussion and debated the meaning of each question.

Bartz was brought in from Sun Microsystems as Walker was having a fit over how her predecessor, Alvar Green, was running things.

A year ago, Mr. Walker issued the ultimate in flame mail, a 44-page letter brutally attacking Mr. Green for allegedly trying to bolster short-term profits by neglecting investment in new products and marketing. Mr. Green later decided to resign, but stayed on until the selection of Ms. Bartz, 43, who formerly ran worldwide field operations for Sun Microsystems Inc.

Ironically, Bartz reports she was rudely dismissed from Yahoo with a phone call.

We give Carol full credit for positive results in Autodesk's difficult environment.  That environment, however,  couldn't have been more different than Yahoo's.  

Update:  Yahoo stock up on news of Bartz firing.

Update #2:  Yahoo has now been put up for sale.