GM hopes to be known for best value in strategy!

March 28, 2006

BY SARAH A. WEBSTER--FREE PRESS BUSINESS WRITER

General Motors Corp. might someday be known as the beloved Wal-Mart of the auto industry, if its latest marketing strategy goes according to plan.

The world's largest automaker, which slashed prices by an average of $1,300 on more than 80% of its cars and trucks in January, said on Monday that it hopes to reinvent itself as the value leader.

"We don't want to be known as the incentive leader. We want to be known as the value leader, across all of our brands," Mark LaNeve, vice president of vehicle sales, service and marketing at GM's North America operations, told journalists during an upbeat briefing at the top of GM's Renaissance Center.

"We're trying to get at offering -- every single day, not just when we decide to run incentives, but every single day -- the best price in the marketplace, the best value for customers."