Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/14/obituaries/14mccurry.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Robert B. McCurry, 83, Auto Executive, Dies
By MICHELINE MAYNARD - The New York Times - Published: November 14, 2006
DETROIT, Nov. 13 — Robert B. McCurry, who invented the concept of cash rebates while an executive at Chrysler and later became one of the most prominent Americans at a Japanese car company, died Monday at his home in Rehoboth Beach, Del. He was 83.
The cause was complications of prostate cancer, said Joseph Tetherow, a spokesman at Toyota Motor Sales, where Mr. McCurry retired as vice chairman in 1992.
He turned out to be one of the industry’s most skilled marketers. In late 1974, with Chrysler dealers overloaded with slow-selling cars and trucks, Mr. McCurry came up with the idea of giving consumers cash back on their purchases.
The campaign was introduced on Jan. 12, 1975, during Super Bowl IX, in ads that featured the sportscaster Joe Garagiola.
Dressed in a carnival barker’s coat and straw hat, Mr. Garagiola declared, “Buy a car, get a check,” kicking off a practice that has been part of the automotive scene ever since.
Upon retiring from Chrysler, Mr. McCurry took a position with Toyota’s mid-Atlantic division in 1979 and joined the company’s American sales arm in 1982.
Attracted by Toyota’s simple operating system, which stresses the elimination of waste and continuous improvement, Mr. McCurry encouraged Toyota to broaden its approach from selling cars one at a time to individual customers, and to become more of an American-style player, taking a mass-market view.
Mr. McCurry, who had earned the nickname Captain Crunch at Chrysler — not after the breakfast cereal, but for the zeal with which he attacked challenges — surprised the industry with one of his early declarations at Toyota. He announced that he wanted the Japanese company, then in fourth place, behind General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, to hold 10 percent of the American market and sell at least one million vehicles a year in the United States.
In his years at Toyota, Mr. McCurry lobbied Toyota executives in Japan over a number of crucial vehicles — winning some battles and losing others.
In 1989, he was displeased when he saw the new version of the Toyota Camry that the company planned to introduce in three years. The Camry had recently gone into production at Toyota’s plant in Georgetown, Ky., which was its first American factory outside of a joint venture with General Motors in Fremont, Calif.
But that car was the same as the staid, if high-quality sedan sold in Japan and Mr. McCurry felt the next Camry should be aimed at American tastes. Instead, he was shown a car with “conservative, Japanese styling, what Japanese cars looked like at the time,” he recalled.
To their credit, Mr. McCurry said, Toyota engineers tried again and came up with a new, more-rounded design that became a hit when it went on sale in 1992.
Mr. McCurry also pushed for Toyota to build a big pickup truck that could take on a market that was a Detroit stronghold.
His efforts did not pay off immediately. “They were sensitive about entering another market, even though it was an important market,” Mr. McCurry said.
Toyota’s first effort at something bigger than its small pickup trucks was the T-100, a modest vehicle that Mr. McCurry later called a “political truck,” deliberately dulled down so that Toyota would avoid criticism. “It was a truck, but it was not a truck,” Mr. McCurry said.
But this week, Toyota will dedicate its newest plant in San Antonio, which will produce a new version of the Toyota Tundra pickup, the company’s biggest truck yet. It will go on sale early next year.
Despite the criticism he faced in Detroit for joining a Japanese company, Mr. McCurry never questioned his decision to become a Toyota executive.
“Once I was there for about a year and got to know the people in Japan, I knew it was a great company,” he said in a 2003 interview. “I knew they could accomplish what they wanted to accomplish,” namely, building top-quality vehicles in a consistent fashion. Detroit, he added, “lost that.”
Full article at link.
Robert B. McCurry, 83, Auto Executive, Dies
By MICHELINE MAYNARD - The New York Times - Published: November 14, 2006
DETROIT, Nov. 13 — Robert B. McCurry, who invented the concept of cash rebates while an executive at Chrysler and later became one of the most prominent Americans at a Japanese car company, died Monday at his home in Rehoboth Beach, Del. He was 83.
The cause was complications of prostate cancer, said Joseph Tetherow, a spokesman at Toyota Motor Sales, where Mr. McCurry retired as vice chairman in 1992.
He turned out to be one of the industry’s most skilled marketers. In late 1974, with Chrysler dealers overloaded with slow-selling cars and trucks, Mr. McCurry came up with the idea of giving consumers cash back on their purchases.
The campaign was introduced on Jan. 12, 1975, during Super Bowl IX, in ads that featured the sportscaster Joe Garagiola.
Dressed in a carnival barker’s coat and straw hat, Mr. Garagiola declared, “Buy a car, get a check,” kicking off a practice that has been part of the automotive scene ever since.
Upon retiring from Chrysler, Mr. McCurry took a position with Toyota’s mid-Atlantic division in 1979 and joined the company’s American sales arm in 1982.
Attracted by Toyota’s simple operating system, which stresses the elimination of waste and continuous improvement, Mr. McCurry encouraged Toyota to broaden its approach from selling cars one at a time to individual customers, and to become more of an American-style player, taking a mass-market view.
Mr. McCurry, who had earned the nickname Captain Crunch at Chrysler — not after the breakfast cereal, but for the zeal with which he attacked challenges — surprised the industry with one of his early declarations at Toyota. He announced that he wanted the Japanese company, then in fourth place, behind General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, to hold 10 percent of the American market and sell at least one million vehicles a year in the United States.
In his years at Toyota, Mr. McCurry lobbied Toyota executives in Japan over a number of crucial vehicles — winning some battles and losing others.
In 1989, he was displeased when he saw the new version of the Toyota Camry that the company planned to introduce in three years. The Camry had recently gone into production at Toyota’s plant in Georgetown, Ky., which was its first American factory outside of a joint venture with General Motors in Fremont, Calif.
But that car was the same as the staid, if high-quality sedan sold in Japan and Mr. McCurry felt the next Camry should be aimed at American tastes. Instead, he was shown a car with “conservative, Japanese styling, what Japanese cars looked like at the time,” he recalled.
To their credit, Mr. McCurry said, Toyota engineers tried again and came up with a new, more-rounded design that became a hit when it went on sale in 1992.
Mr. McCurry also pushed for Toyota to build a big pickup truck that could take on a market that was a Detroit stronghold.
His efforts did not pay off immediately. “They were sensitive about entering another market, even though it was an important market,” Mr. McCurry said.
Toyota’s first effort at something bigger than its small pickup trucks was the T-100, a modest vehicle that Mr. McCurry later called a “political truck,” deliberately dulled down so that Toyota would avoid criticism. “It was a truck, but it was not a truck,” Mr. McCurry said.
But this week, Toyota will dedicate its newest plant in San Antonio, which will produce a new version of the Toyota Tundra pickup, the company’s biggest truck yet. It will go on sale early next year.
Despite the criticism he faced in Detroit for joining a Japanese company, Mr. McCurry never questioned his decision to become a Toyota executive.
“Once I was there for about a year and got to know the people in Japan, I knew it was a great company,” he said in a 2003 interview. “I knew they could accomplish what they wanted to accomplish,” namely, building top-quality vehicles in a consistent fashion. Detroit, he added, “lost that.”
Full article at link.
