Within six months of graduating from the Cleveland Institute of Art, in 1987, I was working at a design firm who was responsible for creating the retail environments for the then new GM Saturn car.
I was flown to St. Helena, California to participate in a brain storming session at the beautiful Meadowood Resort, to construct the marketing strategies for the GM Saturn car.
I was chosen among my male counterparts because they were targeting young professional women, and they where competing with Honda. My male counterparts referred to me as the token. It gets better.
Even though GM was targeting young professional women, I’m sorry to say that I was the only woman in attendance, and I was largely ignored.
I withdrew and the facilitator eventually noticed this and asked why. I stated boldly, “Because you probably won’t listen to me” mirroring my experience at car dealerships. That hushed the room.
Now the rules of a blue-sky session are that you cannot criticize an idea, only add to it. He said, “Well you have to contribute, we flew you out here.”
Fair enough, maybe these men were ready to listen? “Why don’t you sell the car for the same fair price to everyone and stop this horrendous haggling process.”
The room erupted. One of the top ten GM dealers from Texas sitting across from me actually stood up, he was about 6’5” and big, with a pie plate sized belt buckle. He proceeded to pound his fist and shout, “That will never work!”
Well, clearly it did. And who knows where GM would be today if they had continued to listen better to their market. The experience helped me realize that one day; I’d figure out how to best market my own art.
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