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economist suntribune wheels thursday sept 12 2002 25 in life there are the dreamers and the doers dreamers conjure up schemes and projects that are handed to those who roll up their sleeves and get the work done lee iacoccas amazing track record in the automobile business is proof that in rare circumstances there are individuals who excel in both disciplines as well lacocca can take credit for several key mile stones in automotive history including the mustang the mini- van and believe it or not monthly financing born in 1924 the son of italian immigrant parents lido anthony lacocca spent his forma tive years toiling at odd jobs and working long hours in a grocery store in his home town of allentown pa his entrepreneurial leanings would appear to have originated from his father who tried his hand at all sorts of occu pations including operating a hot dog stand selling real estate and renting cars lacocca graduated from lehigh university in his home state and followed that with a masters degree in engineering from princeton university in 1946 at the age of 22 lacocca landed a job with the ford motor company but instead of remaining within the engineering ranks at ford lacocca was more interested in the sales and market ing side of the car business where he perceived all the action to be starting out in oneof fords zone safes offices lacocca by then he anglicized his given name lido in favor of lee moved around dur ing the next 1 0 years learning the car business and quickly rising through the ranks into sales man agement in 1956 while running the philadelphia zone office he developed the 56 for 56 promo tion for a 20 per cent downpay- ment a ford customer could finance his new car for 56 a month over three years today this type of lowball comeon is com monplace but in the 1950s few cars were sold this way buyers went wild over the low payment plan and ford sales went through the roof at the con clusion of the scheme iacoccas district was the topproducing zone in fords network and he was rewarded with a series of promo tions that had him running the marketing side of fords car and truck divisions for the next four years by 1960 lacocca had been installed as vicepresident and general manager of the ford divi sion one of the youngest execu tives at 36 to hold such a high office fords projections for the coming decade indicated a sub stantial growth in the 18-34-year- old population along with a signif icant rise in the number of twocar families as more women entered the workforce based on these demograph ics lacocca encouraged the development of an affordable sporty car that would seat four passengers and would sell for a base price of less than us from mustangs to minivans his leadership revolutionized the automotive landscape lacocca 2500 the car needed to appeal not only to the young but the young at heart and would be available as a strippeddown shell with a six- cylinder engine for the budget- minded or an accessoryladen luxuryoriented performer with a powerful v8 and everything in between after three years on the drawing boards complete with an overload of prelaunch mar keting hype the ford mustang was unveiled at the new york worlds fair in april of 1964 iacoccas original prediction of 100000 mustang sales in the first year was surpassed in the first three months and the car went on to sell to more than a halfmillion buyers before the end of the year iacoccas star never shone brighter he was simultaneously featured on the cover of both time and newsweek magazines and rapidly led to his ascension into fords senior management ranks by 1970 lacocca had become president of ford and was widely touted as the compa nys next chairman when henry ford ii retired but the brash outspoken lacocca fell out of favour with his boss a conflict that eventually resulted in his dismissal in july of 1978 lacocca was down but not out for long rebounding to become chief operating officer at chrysler corporation a few months after leaving ford at chrysler lacocca quickly found he had his work cut out for him the very day he started the automaker announced a third- quarter loss of us 160 million its worst performance in history the severely cashstrapped com pany required fast action if it was to stave off bankruptcy along with shutting unprof itable plants and slashing corpo rate staff including reducing his own annual salary to just 1 lacocca also extracted conces sions from the united auto workers union he also approached the united states government and successfully lobbied for 15billion in loan guarantees to keep chrysler afloat by 1981 chrysler had rebounded with a small profit and two years later had repaid all of its government loans as profits soared lacocca himself became chryslers chief advertising spokesman earnestly delivering such memorable phrases such as if you can find a betterbuilt bet terbacked car buy it under iacoccas leadership chryslers compact kcars dodge aries and plymouth reliant were launched but his most memorable success was the minivan a product he pitched without success while at ford by the time he retired in 1992 chrysler was in robust financial health based mainly on the strength of its minivan sales and was poised to further make significant gains with its cabforward style of redesigned sedans lacocca also found the time to write two books as well as be chairman of the organiza tion responsible for the restora tion of the statue of liberty since his retirement lacocca has been involved in a number of business ventures with mixed results lately he has been associated with electric bicycles as well as the lido lidomotorscom a streetlegal neighborhood electric vehicle nev that looks suspciously like a golfcartsized chrysler pt cruiser love him or hate him and there are plenty on both sides of that particular fence this straighttalking inyourface car execcomepitchman could always be counted on to get the job done like a clutchhitter in baseball lacocca could hit em out of the park when his team needed it the most and thats the true measure of success in any league malcolm gunn is wheelbase communications chief road tester and historic writer wheelbase is a worldwide supplier of automobile news reviews and features its kids stuff 9057271251 this message brought to you as a community service of the economist suntribune markham mazda fjlr9x 3 1998 volvo s70 t5 se redauto loaded roof leather traction stk p0207 reg 23995 sale 22800 1998 acura 16 el premium black auto air leather roof loaded stk u2627a reg 17595 sale 16800 2001 mazqa tribute esv6 brown abs auto loaded rust pkg leather one owner stk p0249 reg 31995 sale 29800 2001 acura 17 el touring blue 5sptafr cruise alloys pwtpc pfvc touring stk p0244 reg 21495 sale 19800 2001 suzuki grand vitara green 5 spd awd loaded air one owner stk d5264a reg 22995 sale 19800 2000 mazda mpvlx green auto air cbt pw pl pm tiltcruise tint stk p0260 reg 21995 sale 19500 2000 volks golf gti vr6 black 5sp leather sunroof 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