Another in the Digital Family Advisor Series: What’s In a Brand Name?

By Richard M. Sherwin

“Hyundai” (pronounced Hun-day, like Sunday) means “modern” in Korean, to convey Hyundai’s continuing new technologies and designs. The company is part of a Korean “chaebol”, or conglomerate.

About 25 years ago a much younger and nervy Bob Plunkett, anchorman extraordinaire and Richard Sherwin, columnist were doing a story about the worst car makers in the world. We barely got on a highway with a junker known as the Yugo. And we never made it back only a few miles away to the start point in Central Park…where we had to leave the now dead Yugoslavian auto.

Ten years before that, we ventured onto the high speed drag strip known as the Sprain Parkway in Westchester, N.Y. with an AMC Pacer only to realize that its brakes were so bad (later reported by Consumer Reports) that not only was the car recalled, the entire line from AMC was disbanded.

We were too young to try out the Ford Pinto and Chevy Chevette, disasters waiting to happen, which was lucky because they often caught fire and blew up.

We’ve also been privy to super expensive and over-hyped cars that turned out to be busts like the DeLorean and Jaguar X-type and even a few Cadillacs, Lincolns and even one particular Mercedes Benz.

So whether it’s a new $100,000 sport car or an entry level station model, we are always skeptical.

But in the late 1980s an even more obscure car was launched called the Hyundai Excel. Our test drive in Central Park and the torturous FDR Drive in New York City was only slightly better than the instant clunkers, we tested earlier.

This vehicle though, that sounded like a knockoff of Honda Civic, and looked like a Toyota Tercel, peaked our interest because we were made aware that the parent company was actually a decades old famous Korean conglomerate that owned and operated everything from industrial plant & engineering companies to engine and machinery to electronic systems and even construction companies and was also related to a humongous ship building company.

The Excel had been roundly criticized by almost every leading car book as under powered and poorly designed. But it was inexpensive and our insider sources anticipated that this new car company would, in time, flourish.

Only a few years later, there are more Hyundai Sonatas in the tony upscale malls and parking spaces formerly occupied by Hondas, and entry level Toyotas were being filled by soccer moms and dads in Hyundai Elantras. And in the last few months, quite a few Lexus, Infinity and even Mercedes parking spots are now occupied by the higher end Hyundai Genesis.

In fact, Hyundai’s new Equus is heading to a top position in the ultra echelon of automobiles….and its Blue Link service is starting to gain as much attention as GM’s OnStar and Microsoft’s Sync On-Board operating systems. Hyundai has gone a long way in a short amount of time, our less than professional, truly horrendous experience at a Long Island, NY dealership notwithstanding.

How did Hyundai grow from the slowest automobile on the highway to a multiple award winner in almost every category?

“Hyundai’s industry-leading improvements in quality and overall customer satisfaction the last few years are certainly not by chance. Earlier this decade, our chairman gave a company-wide directive that product quality was to be a top priority for Hyundai going forward. He especially empowered our quality and product development teams to have a greater voice and control over all key quality issues,” said Derek Joyce, manager of public relation for Hyundai.

Joyce emphasized that the CEO directed that these quality improvements should have top priority from a company funding perspective. “The dramatic quality improvements you now see from Hyundai are the result of years of hard work and investment from every team within our company.”

Derek admitted though, that despite the steady success, Hyundai still needed a buzz word or a spokesperson to get the word out.

“To effectively communicate this increase in quality, we turned to Jeff Bridges as a key advertising spokesman, whose baritone voice conveys the sense of trust our customers now have in our brand. In addition, we are developing vehicles with more distinctive product character that appeal to our target customers in terms of safety, design, driving dynamics, quality, value, and innovative technologies. All of these product decisions are driven by extensive market research that focuses on the unmet needs of Hyundai buyers.”

Ross Rubin, a senior executive with research firm NPD, compares Hyundai technology acumen to fellow Korean conglomerate Samsung. “Many years ago Samsung’s consumer electronics and mobile product divisions needed a miracle to get out of the entry level, not so well-made reputation it had earned. Its chairman and his special team realized they were sitting on a goldmine of technology from Samsung’s vast holdings in other areas and started to incorporate this technology into its CE and mobile products and, in only a short time, the company was challenging Sony and Panasonic and North American companies for supremacy in those markets. Even Samsung’s marketing and advertising took on a new, higher class feeling,” said Rubin.

“I believe Hyundai followed that Korean manifest in their automobiles, which accounts for their rapid rise in quality workmanship, new automobile technologies and of course, who wouldn’t believe Jeff Bridges?” Rubin added.