Nissan's Profit: SHIFT_2.(ugh)O

Found this article by Advertising Age's Jean Halliday to be intreging. She writes on how Nissan posted its first profit drop in eight years for the fiscal year ended March 31 and saw vehicles sales fall in its two biggest markets: 4% to just over a million units in the U.S., and 12% to 740,000 units in Japan compared to the prior period. According to Nissan Motor Companies' President-CEO Carlos Ghosn, Nissan has lost its marketing magic. Athough the automaker's models are well-received by consumers, the Nissan and Infiniti names fall "somewhere in the middle of the pack" when it comes to brand strength. He seemed to be committing to a marketing push to solve the problem:

“Building our brand power is critically important.”

It's a big turnabout for a company that staged one of the industry's most dramatic comebacks following near-death in the late 1990s. Though it's still in the black, Nissan's profits were off 11% globally for the year and more than 50% in the last quarter. All told an interesting article about the part brand can play in the mind of the buying public. And one more thing—a tidbit I found remarkable is the fact that in 2006 Nissan spent 943 million dollars in advertising alone, some 7.9 percent LESS than the previous year. J-e-e-s-h that's some big money.

Read the rest of the article here.