Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Box Cars

Henry Ford once said something akin to this, it costs as much to build an ugly vehicle as it does a good-looking one, so why not build good-looking vehicles? Given this statement from one of the most successful businessmen and entrepreneurs in the history of world, why have so many car companies not taken this sound and digestible nugget to heart? It seems, however, that automobile manufacturers have moved bovine-like in a tangential direction. One company decided to mass produce a joke vehicle. On a recently released company memo, one high-level executive stated that he wanted to make the most unappealing, most box-like piece of crap ever and see if the gullible fools on the outside would lap it up if they paired it with a modern, trendy, and hip advertising campaign. While going to the bathroom in the executive washroom, he bet the suit in the next stall over $100 semolians that his design would sell 100,000 units in the first year of production alone. The other executive, having seen the design, laughed so hard, he fell off the toilet. When he got back up, he took that bet. Today, he is $100 poorer. One of the ugliest vehicles in automotive history sold like hotcakes as bleeting consumers trampled over each other to take possession of this new, head-turning coupe-de-garbage.

If all of these developments were not bad enough, every other automobile manufacturer jumped on board this gravy train. Each in turn churned out their own identical replicas of this doofus-hipster piece of crap. Ford, Nissan, Chevrolet, Lamborghini. Nobody could keep up with the demand from a ravenous public. Even when that infamous memo became public information, sales continued to skyrocket. Nobody wanted to be left behind the raging fad. Well, the joke will sooner or later be on them, for, you see, another aspect of this corporate joke is that the cars are so cheaply made that they are designed to crumble into a heap of compost within two years of purchase. My guess is that nobody will complain about this "feature", as the brochure touted the new vehicles as Earth friendly and fully recyclable.