The Venetian Resort in Las Vegas served as host to the 3AF
(Asian American Advertising Federation) The 2012 Annual Asian
Marketing Summit on May 16-17. The goal of the annual summit was to
share marketing best practices and celebrate the leaders in Asian
marketing.
With Asian Americans representing one out of every 20 new
vehicles purchased in the U.S., it's easy to see why automotive
market leaders including Toyota, Honda and Nissan were well
represented at the conference.
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This month, the Jacob Javits Center in New York is the focal
point for the automotive industry as it hosts the 2012 New York
International Auto Show from April 4 to April 15. Each year,
automotive executives, dealers, suppliers, media, automotive
consumers and simply the curious descend upon New York to check out
the new cars, trucks, crossovers, hybrids, electrics and futuristic
concepts.
On April 4, part of the Jacob Javits Center served as a
launching pad for the first Annual NAMAD (North...
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On Friday, March 9, I had the pleasure of joining executives
from across Michigan and a few from as far as Ohio at the quarterly
Cornerstone Schools partner morning event in Detroit. Cornerstone
Schools is a model "higher learning incubator" in the city of
Detroit where over 500 well-dressed young ladies and men in
Pre-Kindergarten through 10th grade learn the skills they need to
become successful, contributing adults and possibly the next
automotive engineer, designer, purchasing executive,...
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One year ago (Wednesday,
January 12, 2011) the inaugural DRIVEN project was unveiled and I'm
still impressed with the resulting coffee table worthy book. I
remember receiving my invitation to submit my photo and bio that
described DRIVEN as "a tribute to African American achievement in
the automotive industry from its inception to today with a focus on
Living Legends" - at which point I stopped reading.
Once I read the words "Living Legends" my mind immediately went to
national automotive icons...
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I recently joined many of my Polk colleagues and automotive
industry leaders from across the globe at the
Polk
Automotive Loyalty Awards held on Tuesday, January 10. The
dinner and awards were part of the Automotive News World Congress
that took place at the Marriott Hotel in Detroit. During the
evening, Polk recognized individual vehicles, brands and the
overall manufacturer with the highest customer loyalty.
As the Head of Diversity and Inclusion at Polk, I follow the ethnic
loyalty awards...
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The 2012 Auto Show
Week began for me like years past with the
16th Annual Urban Wheel
Awards.
The Decisive Media event held at the Motor City Casino Sound Board
recognizes African American, Asian and Hispanic achievers in the
automotive industry. The event also serves as an annual forum for
networking among ethnic automotive leaders and highlights green
vehicle technology.
The evening began with an event honoring Bill Perkins as the first
African American Chairman of the
North...
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While reading the
Detroit News recently, I came across the
following article: "
Women-Focused
Auto Shop a Reaction to Disdainful Mechanics." The article
confirmed that at least some portion of the industry can see
the growing impact women are having on the automotive industry and
are not only just taking note, but are actually taking action
to support this growing market. The article focuses
on Mae de la Calzada, who opened LadyParts Auto Services,
a full service auto shop in Redwood City, CA....
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On Friday, December 2, Polk joined over 600 attendees representing
multiple OEMs, auto suppliers and other industries at the
Michigan Hispanic Chamber of Commerce's (MHCC) 22nd Annual
Fiesta Hispana Gala. The gala, which serves as a celebration of
Hispanic contributions across all industries, was an excellent mix
of networking, knowledge sharing, good food and fun.
With Hispanic consumers representing over 9% of personal new
vehicle registrations year-to-date through August, I was glad to
see the...
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As the Head of Diversity & Inclusion for Polk, my peers
and I often discuss multicultural marketing, primarily focusing on
the growing importance of effectively reaching
the African American (AA), Asian (AS) and Hispanic (HS) ethnic
groups with relevant, automotive-related messaging. In the process,
the non-AA, AS & HS community is often referred to as the
"General Market." After doing some research, I found the General
Market to be as culturally rich and diverse as the aforementioned
groups....
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Classic
car nuts brace yourself. What if I told you there is a place where
classic cars of all levels from "A Work In Progress" to "Bloomberg
Gold" status roamed the streets every day. What if I told you these
classic beauties were driven by everyday people and not just
cash-rich executives or successful entrepreneurs.
A friend of mine, who is a Cuban native and very successful auto
dealer in the U.S., recently visited his native Cuba. As I viewed
some of his photos from Cuba, I asked, "Are these...
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To help the public gain insight into
the impact diverse market customers (African American, Asian and
Hispanic) are having on the U.S. light vehicle industry, this is
the tenth and final installment in a series of blogs focused on the
Top U.S. markets based on volume year-to-date (YTD) through June
2011.
The focus of this blog is the Miami market, also known as "The
Gateway to the Americas," "The Capital of Latin America" or simply
"The Magic City." The area could be referred to as "The...
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To
help the public gain insight into the impact diverse market
customers (African American, Asian and Hispanic) are having on the
U.S. light vehicle industry, this is the ninth installment in a
series of blogs focused on the Top U.S. markets based on volume
year-to-date (YTD) through June 2011.
The focus of this blog is the Houston market, also known as "Space
City" for its ties to NASA, "Hustle Town" by the growing Hip Hop
culture or simply, "H-Town." The area could also be referred to...
Read More »
To
help the public gain insight into the impact diverse market
customers (African American, Asian and Hispanic) are having on the
U.S. light vehicle industry, this is the sixth installment in a
series of blogs focused on the Top U.S. markets based on volume
year-to-date (YTD) through June 2011.
The focus of this blog is the Boston market, also known as
"Beantown" or my personal favorite "City of Champions" which refers
to Boston's recent streak of dominance in sports with the Boston
Red Sox,...
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To
help automotive customers gain insight into the impact diverse
market customers (African American, Asian and Hispanic) are having
on the U.S. light vehicle industry, this is the eighth installment
in a series of blogs focused on the Top 10 U.S. markets on volume
year-to-date (YTD) through June 2011.
The focus of this blog is the Washington DC market also known as
"The Capital City," "The District" or simply "DC".
The Washington DC DMA is the No. 8 market in the country based on
new light...
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To help automotive customers gain
insight into the impact diverse market customers (African American,
Asian and Hispanic) are having on the U.S. light vehicle industry,
here is the seventh installment in a series of blogs focused on the
Top 10 U.S. markets based on volume year-to-date (YTD) through June
2011.
The focus of this blog is the Dallas market, also known as "D-Town"
or simply "Big D." The area could also be referred to as "The
Capital of Full-Size Pickups" since it is the first of the...
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To help automotive customers gain insight into the
impact that diverse market customers (African American, Asian and
Hispanic) are having on the U.S. light vehicle industry, this is
the fourth installment in a series of blogs focused on the Top 10
U.S. markets based on volume year-to-date (YTD) through June
2011.
The focus of this blog is the Philadelphia market, also known as,
"The City of Brotherly Love," "Home of the World Famous Philly
Cheesesteak" (which I personally love) or simply,...
Read More »
To
help automotive customers gain insight into the impact diverse
market customers (African American, Asian and Hispanic) are
having on the U.S. light vehicle industry, this is the third
installment in a series of blogs focused on the Top 10 U.S. markets
based on volume year-to-date (YTD) through June 2011. The focus of
this blog is the Los Angeles market, also known as the "City of
Angels" or simply put "LA."
This market could also be referred to as "Home of Asian OEMs," with
nine of the 12 U.S....
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To help automotive customers
gain insight into the impact diverse market customers (African
American, Asian, Hispanic) are having on the U.S. light vehicle
industry, this is the second installment in a series of blogs
focused on the Top 10 U.S. markets based on volume year-to-date
(YTD) through June 2011.
The focus of this blog is the New York market, also known as "The
Big Apple," "The City that Never Sleeps" or simply, "NY." The area
could also be referred to as "European Luxury Central" since...
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On Monday, August 1, I was honored to be asked by Ken Smikle,
President and founder of Target Market News to participate on a
panel titled, "The African-American Auto Market: what
we're buying." I was further honored to be joined on this panel by
some of the sharpest minds in automotive marketing today,
including: Don Butler (Vice President, Cadillac Marketing), Ayana
Jordan (Chevrolet Diversity Advertising Manager), Tim O'Neill
(National Advertising Manager Buick and GMC), Deborah Gray...
Read More »
To help automotive customers gain insight
into the impact diverse market customers (African American, Asian
and Hispanic) are having on the U.S. light vehicle industry, this
is the fifth installment in a series of blogs focused on the Top 10
U.S. markets based on volume year-to-date (YTD) through June
2011.
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