In a surprise move, Nissan has announced that it will not be attending the 2009 Detroit Auto Show or the 2009 Chicago Auto Show. Nissan says both decisions were made due to the current economic conditions. Granted, Nissan wasn’t planning on unveiling anything new at the show, so the company’s exhibit would have effectively been LA show redux anyway.
Nissan is just one of the many carmakers pull out of this year’s Detroit show, with Porsche , Mitsubishi , Suzuki , Land Rover , Rolls-Royce and Ferrari all planning to skip January’s NAIAS.
“We felt this was probably right now, not the best way to invest marketing money,” spokesman Alan Buddendeck told the Detroit News.
According to Buddendeck, the decision to pull out of Detroit and Chicago was solely based on available dollars and cents and not the merit of venues themselves. Buddendeck added that Nissan, along with its luxury Infiniti division (which won’t be at the Detroit and Chicago shows, either), got its 2009 product message across at last week’s Los Angeles Auto Show.
Buddendeck failed to mention exactly how much Nissan will save by skipping the shows, but did tell Automotive News that auto shows aren’t a “small line item on your marketing budget.”
At that Los Angeles show Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn said that the key to surviving the current economic downturn would be to avoid or significantly reduce burning cash. By skipping the Detroit and Chicago shows, Nissan will definitely keep a few extra bucks in the bank.
