Lido Green and Growing

Once a hard-charging guard for the College of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minn., Robert D. Lund voices a business philosophy that is pure Vince Lombardi. "The way to win," he says, "is to get out in front and improve your position. When you're green you're growing, but when you're ripe you're next to rotten." His hard sell seemed appropriate enough at General Motors' Chevrolet division, where as general sales manager he set a record of 3 million vehicles sold in 1971, but somewhat out of place at the Cadillac division, which he took over as general manager in January 1973. The haughty Cadillac traditionally is supposed to sell itself.

Lund nonetheless shook up staid Cadillac, and just in time, since the energy crisis (which he calls an "energy situation") hammered sales down badly early this year. He launched an advertising campaign in which Cadillac, of all cars, boasts of its gas mileage (15.8 m.p.g. under picture-perfect proving-ground conditions). He started a dealer sales contest, something unheard of at Cadillac in two decades. Prize: a week in Hawaii for 211 winners. In February he brought out Cadillacs in three new spring colors: Lido Green, Pueblo Beige and Mandarin Orange. Result: from a low of 11,581 in February, Cadillac sales climbed to 26,034 in May, a record for the month and almost 14% better than May 1973. That turnaround in a year of sales disaster for big cars makes Lund, at 54, a candidate for a job at G.M. headquarters, where retirements will soon open some top executive posts.

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