From the October 2016 issue
Earlier this year, Carlos Tavares, CEO of France?s PSA Group, announced his intention to resurrect the Peugeot and Citroën brands in the United States. This may only be proof that he is completely nuts.
?We need to expand to protect the company from any one regional crisis,? Tavares told the Financial Times. In 2014, PSA took a $3.3 billion (?3 billion) survival bailout from the French government and the Chinese state-run carmaker Dongfeng (each got 14 percent of the company). That?s atop previous near-death experiences in 2009 and 2012 and, well, a rocky history dating back to when Peugeot took over bankrupt Citroën to create PSA in 1976.
Tavares?s Trojan horse for North ­Ameri­ca is built on PSA?s Mu and Multicity rental and car-sharing businesses. The idea is to establish fleets here over the next 10 years and eventually fill them with Citroëns and Peugeots. Then, voilà (that?s French), it?s an easy move into retail with reestablished brands. How PSA?s plan will fare in a country practically overrun with startups already trying to topple Uber and Lyft is open to speculation. But if Pokémon can scream back to prominence, dismissing ­Peugeot and Citroën may be foolhardy. ?That?s the nice thing about the United States market,? explains Robert Kozinets, a marketing professor at the University of Southern California?s Marshall School of Business. ?There?s room for a lot of marginal brands. They have to find their niche and they can have m...