* Olympic Turnaround-Despite its marketplace thrashing, Opel still managed to turn in a remarkable corporate performance during the year. The GM subsidiary has been burning money for years, down to a mixture of a cruddy model line up, questionable build quality and shocking manufacturing inefficiency.
Opel Chief, ex-BMW director Carl-Peter Forster, initiated a massive turnaround plan called Olympia in 2001. Results so far are living up to its name. Olympia has reduced a crushing loss of 674 million Euro in 2001 to just 227 million Euro in 2002. I know it's not easy to say "just 227 million" and keep a straight face. But that's an improvement of 66%, and well ahead of expectations. Opel says it expects to be profitable by the end of this year.
On top of that, Opel has taken significant and well received steps towards improving its product line up. An all-new Vectra, its bread and butter mid-range model, was launched in 2002 and to generally positive reviews. A further two models have just hit European streets, in the form of the Signum mid-sized executive sedan and the Minerva, a downsized version of Opel's most successful product of recent years, the Zafira van. The model offensive is scheduled to continue until 2006.
While Germany's other top manufacturers might not have had a great deal to be joyful about on the home front, they are all presumably casting grateful glances towards their export departments. VW, Audi, Mercedes and BMW were all able to keep total output on the cheerful side of positive with sales abroad.
* Not Just a Pretty Face-Alfa Romeo has launched an all-new communications strategy to convince buyers that its qualities are more than skin deep. Dubbed "Beauty is not enough", it follows a Europe-wide market survey that put the Italian brand's image firmly in the "just a pretty face" category. Alfa scored poorly in the perception of its vehicles' performance and technology.
Meanwhile VW has been looking to its advertising past. Since the '50s, VW has had a reputation for neat advertising-something that began with VW of America's efforts to beat the boys from Detroit on a fraction of the budget. In celebration of its unparalleled ad pedigree, spanning 5 decades, VW recently mounted an exhibition of its award-winning print ads in Berlin.
* A Tram Good Idea-VW is also becoming something of a tourist attraction in the historic east German city of Dresden, which is home to the company's so-called Glass-Manufactory. The see-through assembly plant has become a regular stop-off point, not only for Phaeton customers eager to see their purchase in-process, but also for the city's many tourists. Most recently, however, attention has shifted to the dedicated "Car-go Trams," two 60m-long dedicated trams that run 10 times daily between the Glass-Manufactory and the out-of-town logistics center. The idea was developed by VW logistics and the city of Dresden in order to enable the company to build its showpiece assembly plant close to the city center, while avoiding the traffic and environmental burden of a endless flow of delivery trucks.