By Peter M. DeLorenzo
Detroit. Today, in the latest chapter of things that will make you say, “huh?” I offer for your consideration the phenomenon of goats in trees. You can read all about this in National Geographic (and thanks to the publication for the info), but a brief explanation: On a dusty road from Marrakech to the coastal town of Essaouira, argan trees populate the rust-colored landscape. The gnarled, thorny plants grown exclusively in southwestern Morocco and western Algeria aren’t the prettiest of specimens, but they attract plenty of fans, specifically, herds of hungry goats who climb in their crooked branches, sometimes more than one dozen in a single tree.
Why does this happen? Argan trees produce a fruit that looks like a shriveled olive and ripens each year around June. The resourceful goats crave the bitter taste and aroma and climb up to into the trees to get at them (and up to 84 percent of their diet). The goats eat the whole fruit, even though it's the pulp hiding under the thick peel that tastes so good. The pulp covers a nut that humans desperately covet. Then what? The goats actually excrete the undigestible nuts, traditionally collected to make the oil. Today, mostly Berber women lead the time-consuming process: First, separating animal feed, then cracking open the nuts by hand for their oil-rich kernels to make very expensive cosmetics or food. For example, less than two ounces (50 milliliters) of Josie Maran 100 percent pure argan oil runs $48. That's because it takes more than 60 pounds of fruit to produce one quart of the liquid gold. In Morocco, the argan oil also soaks bread at breakfast or drizzles the top of couscous. (By the way, if you would like to see the goats for yourselves, check out the Morocco: Sahara & Beyond tour, hosted by National Geographic Journeys with G Adventures.)
Enough of that and yes, probably much more than you need to know, but it provides a proper introduction to the rest of my column. The other phenomenon I would like to talk about today? Auto executives with runaway egos. Wait, you thought those days were relegated to automotive history books with the departure of Sergio “The Great” or the exodus of Carlos “I’m The Ghosnster And You’re Not” Ghosn? Wrong, Lithium breath.
Again, for your consideration today, we have one Carlos Tavares, the newly-minted CEO of Stellantis, the corporate entity that is the result of the merger between Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and the PSA Group. Tavares is the auto industry’s latest “Master of the Universe,” as he seems to think it is perfectly acceptable for him to have 38 – count ‘em – 38 direct reports, more than twice the number he had at PSA. This is almost Sergio-level hubris on display here, folks.
Tavares has been quoted as saying that the team will be made of "strong characters, a great deal of talent and expertise." And people who understand that "Stellantis is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity." That’s all well and good sounding – and perfectly nuanced for the automotive press, which seems to be already on its way to canonizing Tavares as the “best and the brightest.” But who is kidding whom, here? And, as a sidebar, why do the members of the automotive press always seem to get sucked in by the latest automotive “messiah”?
Tavares is just the latest egomaniacal hard case auto executive in a shiny new wrapper. He may carry himself without the in-your-face bluster of Marchionne or Ghosn, but make no mistake, he is in lockstep with them every step of the way. It is what it is, apparently, and there isn’t a damn thing to be done about it.
Another phenomenon? As for the aforementioned esteemed members of the automotive press, I’ve pretty much given up on most of them. I guess it’s mentally impossible for some of them to separate fact from fiction, or to not succumb to the dulcet tones of the various Chief PR minions who are expert at manipulating their thoughts. As they get sucked in, the “legend” of these executives is slowly but surely manufactured, and the rest of us are left to sort through the wheat and the chaff. It’s another example of “it is what it is,” but it pisses me off and I won’t hesitate to point it out when I see it.
And finally, we have the phenomenon of auto executives who should think before they speak. Now granted, this is another impossible wish, because auto execs can’t seem to help themselves when they get within earshot of a reporter, but the latest example of it happened only yesterday, as Tim Kuniskis, the Dodge brand performance guru, tried to explain to CNBC how the current “Golden Age” of muscle wasn’t going to fizzle out – like it did in 1972 – but instead will survive and thrive with the onset of mass electrification of our nation’s fleet.
That’s fine and dandy, at least on paper, given the number of Hellcats Dodge has sold of late. “In the last five years or so, we’ve sold well over 50,000 Hellcats,” Kuniskis told CNBC. “That’s a lot of Hellcats in five years when you think about, you know, the price point of that car.”
It is indeed. That represents a lot of ca$h-ola. Kuniskis continued, “1972 was the beginning of the end of the Golden Age of muscle cars. They went away for fuel economy, for the oil crisis. They went away for safety. They went away for insurance, and they went away for increasing emission standards. It’s kind of crazy to think about we’re getting close to a similar list of things right now.”
This is True. But why did Kuniskis feel compelled to talk about this stuff out loud? “So, is this 1972 right now and we just don’t know it because we’re just drunk on the horsepower?” Kuniskis wondered. “I worry about that every single day because think about how long it took us to get here,” Kuniskis said to CNBC, citing the decades-long progression of the horsepower of cars to what Dodge and other manufacturers offer today.
But then Kuniskis went a Hellcat too far when he said, “I’m super excited about the future of electric because I think it’s what’s going to allow us to not fall off the cliff....Without that technology, without electrification. This is 1972 right now, this thing is going to end.”
I don’t disagree with his assessment, but really, Tim? This coming from a guy representing a company that is exactly nowhere when it comes to EVs. I mean, n-o-w-h-e-r-e. When, exactly, does he think this “grand transformation” is going to happen for FCA/PSA/Stellantis? And does he actually think – given the Dodge division’s current all-in with muscle brand positioning – that Dodge can hang on long enough to keep its muscle positioning?
I doubt it.
Not with the inroads by GM (and to a lesser extent Ford) and a host of other manufacturers are making in the EV space. The leading EV purveyors are well down the road when it comes to BEVs. I mean let’s get serious here, consumers are going to have access to trucks that will be able to dust the “brotherhood of muscle.” Kuniskis was well-intentioned (I think), but he inadvertently exposed Stellantis' almost total invisibility in the EV space. As we like to say around here: Not. Very. Good.
And that’s the High-Electron Truth for this week.
(National Geographic)