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BRIGHT IDEAS
||
INDUSTRY
W
onder why your friends are always
texting you lurid details about their
personal lives? Psychologists from the
University of Michigan Institute for Social
Research and the New School for Social
Research think they know. They recently conducted a
study in which either a computer or a human asked 600
iPhone users personal questions via voice or text message.
While the scientists are still in the early stages of analyzing their find-
ings, what they learned startled them: Regardless of whether the interviewer
was a person or a robot, people responded more truthfully to questions
about sensitive topics like exercise frequency and binge drinking when it
disappointing relaunch of the Bug
in the late 1990s.
By the end of 2010, shortly a er Brown-
ing’s arrival, Volkswagen’s U.S. sales had
rebounded a little, standing at 256,000
a year. But the company still lagged far
behind GM, which was selling nearly that
many cars per
month
, while Volkswagen’s
traditional rival, Hyundai, was moving
roughly 538,000 annually. VWGoA was
being stubbornly, persistently viewed as
a niche brand: the people who brought
you the Beetle. Worse, it was still perform-
ing like one.
The conventional wisdom at VWGoA
now is that success depends on the extent
to which the company can promote itself
as the maker of a range of affordable,
driver-friendly vehicles—which, to a large
degree, means moving out from beneath
the shadow of the Beetle. To that end,
Volkswagen recently poured $4 billion
into its U.S. interests, money that has
bankrolled a new manufacturing plant
in Tennessee. The plant’s core aim is to
help VWGoA do what it has failed to do in
recent decades: become relevant.
The way to go about this, Browning
and his colleagues have decided, is to start
making cars specifically geared to the U.S.
market. For example, the new Je a and
Passat—the biggest money-spinners in
VWGoA’s portfolio—boast the larger inte-
riors, streamlined controls and greater fuel
efficiency that American drivers demand.
While giving people what they want
may seemlike ano-brainer, it’s a significant
departure onBrowning’s part. VWGoAhas
for years been hindered by a certain, let’s
say, inflexibilityon thepart ofVolkswagen’s
German engineers. With the newstateside
approach, Browning says, the companyhas
finally conceded that “Germanengineering
… and the needs of theAmerican consumer
are not mutually exclusive.”
VWGoA’s challenges in accommodat-
ing its customers go beyond engineering,
though. The company’s so performance
has been exacerbated by what Browning
describes as its “unacceptable” track record
in sales and service. To address this issue
and the negative PR it has engendered
over the years, he established the highly
visible office of vice president of customer
experience—a kind of “satisfaction czar.”
(It may or may not be portentous that the
first czar has already moved on ... to GM.)
Things do seem to be looking up for
VWGoA. Its domestic sales rose 26.3 per-
cent last year, with the company moving
roughly 300,000 cars and turning a profit
in the U.S. for the first time in almost a
decade. For a large part of 2012, VWGoAhas
been selling its new Passat at the rate of
10,000 amonth—up from 10,000 a
year
for
the previous model. “Clearly, we need to
tell newchapters of the Volkswagen story,”
says Browning. “We’re not just [about] the
Beetle anymore.”
ERIC TEGLER,
a Maryland-based journalist
specializing in cars, travel, finance, military
affairs and more, writes for
The Economist
.
64
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