“At everything we do, we do the best we can”

By Mark Boada, Executive

Back in 1998, when Jim Christiano retired from a long career at General Motors, he created a new company to serve the needs of automotive fleets looking to relocate their vehicles. He called it, simply enough, PARS – short for Professional Automobile Relocation Service – and set up shop in Gainesville, Virginia, some 35 miles west of Washington, D.C. As Jim puts it, the idea was simple: to move vehicles from Point A to B.

However, as the company grew, so did the market. Customer demands changed, and, in response, the company and its menu of services moved from simple to the broad and very complicated. The problem – if you can call it that, because it was also key to the company’s growth – was Jim’s basic business philosophy. It comes down to two basic principles.

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By Chad Christensen, Strategic Consultant, Element Fleet Management

Upfitting is an integral part of ensuring service fleet drivers can accomplish their jobs, but it is one of the most challenging aspects of fleet management.

To help optimize the upfitting process, the Element strategic consulting team put together a guide for avoiding common upfitting mistakes.

Mistake #1: Selecting an upfitter based solely on price or location
Choosing the least expensive or nearest upfitter isn’t always the best option. When selecting a truck upfitter, think beyond cost and location. Upfitters can vary in workmanship and use different quality materials.

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By Ed Pierce, Fleet Industry Marketer

In a recent INC. magazine article by Garrett Moonco, founder and CEO of CoSchedule, he referenced research his team conducted among 1,500 or so marketing professionals about what makes them successful.

His conclusion was that there are four consistent traits that characterize successful marketers:

1. Marketing strategy documentation
The study found that marketers who document their marketing strategy are 538 percent more likely to report success than those who don’t. Given that the marketing strategy is the guide for decision-making, prioritization, and the proper mix of ingredients, top marketers have a clear sense of where they are going and how they need to get there. They have a better chance for success.

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KBB

If you want to get the most car for your money, you have to do more than research your way to a fair price and secure good financing rates. Simply choosing a vehicle that has better resale value than the others on your shopping list is one of the easiest ways to save money when buying a new car.

“Our Best Resale Value Awards are based on what we consider the best research and analysis process in the industry. Our resale value projections take into account current vehicle data, sales data, market conditions for each vehicle, competition within vehicle segments, expectations of the future economy and the combined experience of Kelley Blue Book’s team of market and pricing analysts. This is hard-earned data that can save you thousands of dollars, and it’s yours for free.”

Read the article at KBB.

San Francisco Chronicle

When a pair of California Highway Patrol officers pulled alongside a car cruising down Highway 101 in Redwood City before dawn Friday, they reported a shocking sight: a man fast asleep behind the wheel.

The car was a Tesla, the man was a Los Altos planning commissioner, and the ensuing freeway stop turned into a complex, seven-minute operation in which the officers had to communicate with the vehicle’s autopilot system because the driver was unresponsive, according to the CHP.

The arrest of 45-year-old Alexander Samek on suspicion of drunken driving reignited questions about the uses, and potential abuses, of self-driving technology.

Read the article at San Francisco Chronicle.

MSN

After General Motors announced the closing of five North American assembly and powertrain plants, Trump said GM should pay back the billions it cost taxpayers to rescue the company out of bankruptcy “if GM doesn’t want to keep their jobs in the United States.”

On Tuesday, he said he might yank all electric-car subsidies, including the $7500 federal tax credit which goes to consumers, not to General Motors and said he is “very disappointed” with GM CEO Mary Barra. The company also announced plans to fire 15 percent of its salaried employees across the world, which could see thousands more jobless in the United States.

Read the article at MSN.

Forbes

The Trump administration has turned a deaf ear to arguments from the auto industry regarding the taxing of every automobile coming into the U.S. from any country other than Canada and Mexico. Higher auto tariffs will harm American families and workers, costing tens of thousands of jobs.

The European Union has made enormous investments in stateside plants building most of the vehicles sold in the U.S. in those plants. Mercedes builds vehicles in Alabama. BMW‘s biggest plant in the world is in South Carolina. Volkswagen has a plant in Tennessee with growing volumes of vehicles built there. Asian companies also have enormous manufacturing footprints in the U.S.

Read the article at Forbes.

By Ed Dubens, CEO & Founder, eDriving

Telematics technology is largely credited with changing fleet management.

In fact, a quick search of telematics online suggests that it is a vital part of fleet management, that monitoring drivers is increasingly accepted, and that telematics provides fleet managers with the information they need, when they want it and how they want to digest it.

Yet, as technology adoption becomes more and more commonplace for fleets and having personally witnessed some of the world’s largest fleets successfully reduce the number of collisions, injuries and license violations, as well as their total cost of ownership (TCO), I have an insight to share with fleet managers: telematics alone is not enough!

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The Washington Post

Researchers at the Risk Institute at Ohio State University found that distracted driving raises the odds that a crash will cause severe injury or death, compared with other crashes, particularly if those distraction-related crashes involve rear-end collisions or occur in work zones or on interstate highways.

The risk and severity of distraction-related crashes seem to diminish with roundabouts – perhaps because those roadway configurations force drivers to pay attention. The analysis found that in-vehicle distractions accounted for 48 percent of the crashes.

Read the article at The Washington Post.

Fast Company

For over 75 years, Harvard’s Grant and Glueck study has tracked the physical and emotional well-being of two populations: 456 poor men growing up in Boston from 1939 to 2014 (the Grant Study), and 268 male graduates from Harvard’s classes of 1939-1944 (the Glueck study).

Due to the length of the research period, this has required multiple generations of researchers.

The conclusion? According to Robert Waldinger, director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, one thing surpasses all the rest in terms of importance: “The clearest message that we get from this 75-year study is this: Good relationships keep us happier and healthier. Period.”

Read the article at Fast Company.