The Monkey Shack

Executives from Detroit's "Big Three" automakers went to Capitol Hill yesterday to plead for $25 billion in emergency bailout money. First of all, I am fundamentally opposed to giving anything to anyone who files to Washington in their individual leer jet and begs for taxpayer money while their Gulfstreams idle on the tarmac.

Second, nobody has the right to uninterrupted growth and existence. Industries and businesses have to go through evolutions. Being good is the enemy of being great. All too often it breeds mediocrity and comfort doing the things the way they've always been done. But there is no such thing as entitlement or a birthright in business or marketing. There is no guarantee that you will be viable tomorrow, just because outdated ideas, strategies, tactics were successful before.

30 years ago, IBM was the leader in the growing field of personal computers. Then came around some company called Apple. Then Microsoft. By 1992, IBM was staring disaster in the face and posted what was at the time the largest single-year corporate loss in US history. So IBM innovated and reinvented themselves, moving away from components and hardware towards software and consulting services.

What has happened to Detroit should be a wake-up call to marketers everywhere. The current economic slowdown will separate the strong from the weak, the creative from the dull. Don't count on a bailout to make up for your inability to innovate and adapt.

UPDATE:
Read Mitt Romney's and Seth Godin's comments about what should happen in Detroit.