tiredofspam wrote:
Sorry, I don't agree.

There have been many decisions to water down brands to save money.
Without going into a long dissertation, the MBA takes the choice away,
they don't add to the choices. Since they are all taking the quality
away and making it cheaper (not less expensive), what used to be common
place, is now no longer to be found. Good??? maybe for some bottom
lines. But not good in general. The downward spiral can not be stopped.

We are lacking talent, because we have made it so. Yes the consumer is
partly responsible, but the MBA is responsible, and so is corporate
America (kills free thinking and ingenuity) . So I think each gets a
third of the pie.

As it was explained to me, by someone much older than me, the VIPs in
the big corporations don't have much incentive to "rock-the-boat" (take
chances). I'm thinking of Ford and GM especially. But the likes of
Microsoft (and Cisco?) too. My point is that it's not just the MBA
"save a dime" mentality, but the corporate (compensation)
structure--which is to blame. It's something like, "I'll just take my
bonuses, retire nicely, and get outta here (without rocking the boat)".

Bill




On 4/10/2012 10:14 AM, Jack wrote:
On 4/9/2012 11:27 AM, Swingman wrote:
On 4/9/2012 9:14 AM, tiredofspam wrote:
Ryobi had been owned by John Deere during the 90s. John Deere stripped
the company of all quality, then sold the business. I had known someone
who worked for Ryobi back then. The complaint I heard from him was how
JD was just destroying the quality, and making them a useless brand.

MBAthink ... ramped up during WWII, took hold in the sixties, perverted
since to the ridiculous extreme of
bottom-line-fixation-damn-all-else-****-the-consumer-while-I-get-mine
mentality.

The same "MBAthink" that builds Ryobi, B&D, Grizzly etc also build
Laguna, Northfield, Festool etc. The consumer drives the markets, not
the MBA's you speak of. Lots of people are willing to spend 80 bucks on
a shop vac, very few will spend $550 for one. "MBAthink" says if I can
sell 10 million Festool vacs and make a ton of money, I'll do it. They
can't, so they don't. I'd say that is common sense, not MBA think but
it's not even common sense, it's how it is, or you go out of business.

I can buy a Ryobi planer, a Grizz planer, or a Northfield planer. It's
up to me, and all the MBAthinkers do is make the choices possible.