“Is this the right thing to do for the rest of our lives? I seriously doubt it.”
— General Motors Corp. CEO Richard Wagoner on GM extending its 0% financing to spur vehicle sales that suffered from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
“I continue to think that these levels of marketing costs are unhealthy for the industry.”
— Ford Motor Co. CFO Martin Inglis on Ford reluctantly matching GM's financing incentives.
“Later a remark that was made got back to me, and it was: ‘We're not going to have a GM dealer tell us how to run Ford.’”
— Robert Maguire, NADA chairman and a Chevrolet dealer, on what happened after he tried to tell Ford Motor Co. CEO Jacques Nasser that Blue Oval was causing discontent among many Ford dealers in the NADA.
“Don't strangle my only child hoping I'll be able to conceive another one.”
— Ralph Seekins, incoming chairman of the National Ford Dealer Council, on dealer efforts to eliminate Ford's Blue Oval dealership certification program without providing a way to compensate for potential profit losses.
