You Gotta Have a Gimmick
What do the cast of "Gypsy" and Chrysler LLC chairman/CEO Bob Nardelli have in common? They can both currently be heard singing the familiar strains of the showtune "You Gotta Have a Gimmick."
The cast's doing it eight times a week in the latest Broadway revival of a show which doesn't get restaged quite as often as "Grease" but comes perilously close. Nardelli's doing it as he tries to reinvigorate his long-hurting brand by offering customers $2.99-a-gallon gasoline for three years. And if the novel plan helps grease Chrysler stock upwards, so much the better.
The Chrysler venture provides customers who buy or lease new vehicles from Wednesday through June 2 with a gas-buying card linked to their own charge account, with the automaker picking up whatever over-and-above $2.99 charge is in store over the next three years. According to AAA, someone buying a 2008 Chrysler PT Cruiser, which gets an estimated 21 miles per gallon in city driving, would save $355 a year.
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton and John McCain have taken some heat for their endorsements of a plan to suspend the federal excise tax on gasoline, 18.4 cents a gallon, for the summer travel season. Barack Obama, among others, has called the plan a gimmick, which it almost certainly is ... but, hey, saving 18.4 cents a gallon, by any means necessary, works for me.
Whether the Nardelli gimmick sends Chrysler sales into the stratosphere is impossible to predict at this stage; after all, we are still talking Chrysler here. But it's the kind of bold initiative that's at least garnering headlines -- the first positive ones for the automaker in recent memory -- and, if intelligently followed up, could well gain the company a new army of brand loyalists. Sort of like the point I was trying to make in my blog entry of last week.
As for me, I'm still pretty pleased with the mileage I'm getting from my Honda, thank you. But I'll be keeping an eye out for any similar gasoline-related gimmicks -- and maybe I'll be singing a new tune myself soon enough.
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