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Nissan's Comeback: Marketing SVP Reveals Brand Revival Plans

• Jim Fitzpatrick • Season 1 • Episode 3

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What does it take to revitalize an iconic automotive brand? Vinay Shahani, Senior Vice President of US Marketing and Sales for Nissan North America, takes us behind the curtain in this candid conversation about Nissan's journey back to prominence.

Shahani's story is compelling – after ten formative years at Nissan, followed by successful stints at Volkswagen and Toyota, he's returned to his first automotive love with a mission. "I was a little sad to see what was happening at Nissan over the last couple of years," he admits. Now he's determined to restore what he calls "that irreverent, cool underdog Japanese brand" that once captured America's imagination.

The discussion reveals how Nissan lost its way – too many dealer KPIs, complicated programs, and organizational silos that made doing business unnecessarily difficult. Shahani's approach starts with simplification and transparency. Under his leadership, Nissan evaluated every dealer-facing program with just three questions: Does it help sell cars? Does it help take care of customers? Does it help make money? This process led to eliminating roughly a third of existing programs, freeing resources for initiatives that truly drive success.

Perhaps most revealing is Nissan's nuanced approach to electrification. While committed to a sustainable future, Shahani acknowledges the market isn't ready to "go from zero to 100 on battery electric vehicles." Accordingly, Nissan is diversifying its powertrain strategy, bringing its e-power hybrid technology to America starting with the Rogue, while also launching plug-in hybrid versions of key models. This pragmatic strategy addresses the reality that different customers have different needs.

Equally significant is Nissan's commitment to revitalizing Infiniti. Shahani made this a condition of his return: "If Nissan is not serious about Infiniti as a brand, then I'm not going to rejoin the company." The strategy centers on increased platform sharing between brands and accelerated product development cycles, reduced from over 50 months to just 30.

Looking to the future, Shahani envisions "stability of the network, where throughput is drastically improved, along with return on sales," for both Nissan and Infiniti. It's a vision built on strong products, simplified operations, and above all, what he calls the "relentless care of the customer."

Ready to dive deeper into automotive brand strategy? Listen now and discover what it takes to restore an iconic brand in today's challenging market.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

You're watching Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick. Hey everyone, Jim Fitzpatrick, thanks so much for joining me this morning on another edition of Inside Automotive right here at the CBT Automotive Network. Nissan is known worldwide for its innovation across a wide range of segments. However, the brand has faced its share of challenges in recent years. Today we are joined by Vinay Shahani, who is the Senior Vice President of US Marketing and Sales for Nissan North America, to share Nissan's broader vision for the US market especially, but for the future of the brand, and then how the brand is working with its dealer network. So, Vinay, thank you so much for joining us on the show today. Very much appreciate it.

Vinay Shahani:

Hey Jim, Thank you for having me. It's my pleasure.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Sure. So let's, before we jump in here started with Nissan, went to Volkswagen, went to Toyota and now back with Nissan Walk me through that decision to leave Toyota and go and come back to Nissan to help them get out of this situation that it finds itself in.

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, it's a great question and for me to adequately answer that, I'm going to rewind the clock a little bit and tell you a little bit about why I joined Nissan 21 years ago. You know I was finishing grad school and the CEO of Nissan came to speak to my class and I was just blown away at the story. You know, nissan was very much in a situation where their backs were against the wall in 1999. And within a couple of years, through some aggressive actions, through product development, through cost cutting and revenue optimization, nissan became kind of the darling of the industry. And you may recall the late 90s, early 2000s. You know you had the launch of the Xterra, you had the 2002-2003 time timeframe where the 350Z was relaunched. It was a great time for Nissan and the story was exciting. It was a underdog Japanese brand that was known for high quality but excitement and that's what really attracted me to the brand in the first place.

Vinay Shahani:

I joined the company.

Vinay Shahani:

I spent 10 years, as you said.

Vinay Shahani:

I was very fortunate that I had probably the best indoctrination into an auto company where I got exposure to the entire value chain, started in manufacturing, went to sales operations, went to product marketing, went out into the field and ultimately marketing communications and media, ended up getting poached by a former colleague from Nissan that had went to VW, from there went to Toyota, had a great experience there Along the way.

Vinay Shahani:

You know, the Nissan team was very kind to stay in touch and over the years had reached out with opportunities as they came up. And I'll have to admit, jim, I was a little sad to see what was happening at Nissan over the last couple of years and, you know, ultimately, when they reached out the most recent time, they said look, we need somebody who can help turn the ship. We know you know the company, we know you know the industry. And that was ultimately the call that I that I took, which was I want to help get this brand back on track. I've stayed in touch with a lot of dealers over the time and this was a big, big reason for me was I really think the dealer body is fantastic and I really want to do what I could to help.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

So so is it safe to say your first love was Nissan this whole time, and the Toyota thing was just a fluke.

Vinay Shahani:

Look, I mean I'm very fortunate. I've had great opportunities in my near 30-year career. You're right. I mean Nissan was my first real opportunity to dive in to the auto industry in a very deep and significant way and ultimately, what I see as the opportunity is to restore the greatness and really to get the brand back to that irreverent, cool let's say underdog Japanese brand, where quality, durability and reliability is the foundation but where we can really show that we're a full line manufacturer. We have, like what I like to say A to Z, you can get a Nissan Armada all the way to a Z car and everything in between a pickup truck, small crossover, big SUVs. I mean we've got it all, and I think that's the story that is, I think, most important for us to tell to get Americans to fall back in love with Nissan again, and that really gets me going.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Sure, sure, from your perch or your position at Toyota over those years. Looking back at Nissan, where do you think it went wrong? How did it lose its way? And I won't spend a lot of time on this because I want to get into the future as well, but it must have been difficult for you to look back at Nissan. You know your first love and your employer to say, you know, wow, why are you guys making some of the moves you're making? What kind of jumps out at you to tell dealers as to you know, this is where it went off the rails.

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, I think first and foremost to you know, this is where we where, where it went off the rails. Yeah, I think, um, first and foremost to our dealer partners, um, I think we got a little too complicated, a little too difficult to do business with, and I've read that in the NADA surveys. I've I've, as I mentioned to you at the beginning of this interview, I I've stayed in touch with Nissan dealers for the 10 years that I was gone. Way too many KPIs, that we were holding dealers accountable for too many programs, a lot of silos in the company where people would come up with great programs, but were they all related to what was most important, which was to sell cars, take care of the customer and make money for the dealer and for us? And that's where I think we got a little bit off track. And that simplicity of doing business is something that I think Toyota does really well. There are other brands that do it really well, and that's something that I'm trying to reinstill into the way we go to market with our dealerships in both the Nissan division and the Infinity division.

Vinay Shahani:

I'll give you one recent example when I read that in the NADA survey, I asked my team to take all of the dealer-facing programs and let's put them in front of the National Dealer Advisory Board. So we literally spent a full day with the Dealer Advisory Board and we went line by line, program by program and we asked them to look at every single thing and said tell us what you think from three perspectives. Number one does it help you sell cars? Number two does it help you take care of the customer? And number three does it help you make money? And if it doesn't accomplish all or some of those, then maybe it's something that we should either eliminate thrift or kick the can on.

Vinay Shahani:

And I was really amazed at how holistic that our dealer partners were able to look at this and say, look, there are certain things that you guys are doing that really you shouldn't be spending the money on. Roughly a third of the programs that we put in front of them. The dealer said, look, you can kill these and take that money that you're going to save and reinvest it into things that are going to make more sense, that are going to drive those three KPIs that I mentioned to you before. And we made a lot of progress together and you know that's the foundation. Going forward is really collaborative trust with our dealers and trying to move the needle together.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

What was at the top of the dealer's list, that they wanted you to invest more time or energy or money into.

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, I think core models is a great example. You know, I think in many cases with having 13 vehicles in the lineup it's pretty easy to get lost that typically there's two or three models that tend to form the foundation of the volume, the throughput. Yeah, I think we lost a little bit of sight of that. So we've gone very aggressively into a core model strategy where certain models you know, I like to say not every child is going to wear shoes, is going to wear shoes, some of them are going to have really nice shoes, some of them are going to have flip-flops, and you know so models like Rogue, Pathfinder, frontier these are American built vehicles where we're going very aggressive to put the full marketing might behind these models. And there's certain models where it's like, okay, we're going to have to back off a little bit so that we can stay most competitive on the segments that are the biggest and offer the biggest opportunity. So that's probably one of the best examples I can give you.

Vinay Shahani:

On the flip side, there were certain programs that we were doing like. The second delivery program is a great example. Second delivery was a recognition that the technology in our vehicles has come so far that typically, when you're a customer and you've bought a vehicle, you may not want to spend the extra hour at the end of your vehicle purchase to go through all the technology and features in your vehicle. Most people want to get home. So what we did was we offered a second delivery program where we would send a representative to the guest's home or workplace where we can go through and spend some more time explaining these great features. And our dealer partners in the dealer advisory board were saying look, it's a great program, it's a nice-to-have program. It's not something that you need to be doing right now and rather spend that money elsewhere to be more effective. So that's the type of interaction that we had that I think was really fruitful for me and my team.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Sure, sure, and I want to imagine that, coming out of Toyota, I mean obviously such a world class brand loved by every one of its dealers, as you know.

Vinay Shahani:

I would imagine that you're reaching into that toolbox of experience of over 10 years with Toyota to to bring some of those approaches over to Nissan as well, that that works so successfully, right, yeah, I mean, I think the beauty of what they do is they put the dealer at the center of everything they do, and I think the recognition for me is we can do anything we want from a national marketing perspective or a sales and marketing perspective, but ultimately it's our dealer. That is the face of the brand to the consumer. They bring the brand to life. That is the face of the brand to the consumer. They bring the brand to life, and I think that is something that I've worked really hard to kind of remind everyone on the team that this is the way forward for us. It's about our dealer partners and really trying to make sure that we're sharing information on a frequent basis.

Vinay Shahani:

I like to say err on the side of overcommunication, because I think at some point we had lost a little bit of that mojo along the way. So there's a lot more frequent meetings with our dealer advisory board. I'm doing, probably a couple times a month, an all-dealer call where I'll explain here's what's happening with the business. Here's some of the priorities that we're focused on, and here's what it means for you, and I think that kind of back to basics approach is um is just what the doctor ordered in this kind of environment that we're in yeah, yeah for sure.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Um, obviously, the industry in the last you know five or six years is, is trying to get their hands around the ev situation that, uh, the government's been putting on dealers and oEMs alike, and both OEMs and dealers have been really struggling in this area and saying, hey, back it up, we don't have consumers there yet at the rate you think we're going to have consumers wanting EVs, and really it seems as though Toyota, namely, has done a beautiful job of pushing more people to kind of a hybrid situation and done it very successfully. More people now are coming in and wanting that, as well as other brands out there, as you know. However, nissan not so much Talk to me about that Nissan make a change on to say, look, we acknowledge the EVs and that the hybrid EV, the plug-in hybrid, could be the crossover that we're looking for or that bridge to an all EV environment one day.

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, look, I don't think any car company denies that we need to create a more sustainable future for our industry. There's no question about that. I think every car company is fully aligned on that. I think the adoption of electric vehicles pure battery electric vehicles today has proven that the country is not ready to go from zero to 100 on battery electric vehicles to go from zero to 100 on battery electric vehicles.

Vinay Shahani:

So I think, first and foremost, there's going to need to be some innovation. There's going to need to be some scale that brings costs down for battery electric vehicles to be more viable as a solution for more people, along with the infrastructure right, I mean, the charging infrastructure is a big thing that needs to come a long way if we're going to see adoption go up. That's right. I think in the meantime, you're right, we need to have other options, other options in between the bookends, and what I mean by that is if you consider internal combustion engine as one bookend and a battery electric vehicle on the other side, of which we have two today the LEAF and the ARIA. There needs to be some solutions that come in between, and hybrid is no question rising dramatically in popularity.

Vinay Shahani:

We have our own version of hybrid, which we call e-power, which exists in other Nissan markets around the globe, which we've already stated that we're going to bring to the United States. Starting next year, it'll start with our number one volume vehicle, which is the Nissan Rogue, but as well as introducing a plug-in hybrid electric version, which will actually come later this year, which is also on the Rogue. So I think, ultimately, what we're looking to do is, first and foremost, acknowledge that one size fits all does not work for this country. You know, depending on where you are and what your use case is, you may need a battery electric vehicle, you may need a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle, or you may be able to get away with a hybrid electric vehicle, and ultimately, we want to make sure that we have all of those solutions available for our customers.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Right.

Vinay Shahani:

And so I think, over time, you're going to see that these diverse powertrain options which the two new ones for us would be plug-in hybrid and hybrid will start to appear and pervade more of the lineup within the Nissan and Infiniti showrooms over the next couple of years. That's absolutely one of the goals.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, yeah for sure. And now we're seeing, you know, byd and other manufacturers come out with a you know five minute, 10 minute charge on batteries, which would really do so much for the auto industry as a whole, specifically in the EV sector, right, if we start to see these OEMs and manufacturers put together something like this, right?

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, that, as well as battery technology, I mean one of the things that nissan is has been working on the commercialization, commercialization strategy for solid state. So solid state battery has the potential to double, triple, quadruple the energy density of a battery cell. Right, and you just think about that, you know that is another way to extend the range, not just quick charging, but also the battery, the um, the uh power that the battery can can kind of uh capture and, uh, you, you, you can go around some of the range range anxiety issues and adoption issues that you've had with battery electric vehicles once that gets commercialized. So there's a lot of different ways in. Every company is taking kind of their own approach and we're certainly working hard on that here at Nissan.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, that's great. I spoke to one of your dealers last week and they've got three Nissan stores and of course, my concern, or my question, I should say, was how do you feel about Nissan as a brand Among all of your other brands that you've got? They've got about 20 in the chain. Three of them are Nissan, and the individual said to me not only do I love Nissan, they're all making money. All of my Nissan stores are making money. Fixed Ops is doing great. Even New Cars is doing okay. We're making it in used cars as well. Parts department. One of them had a collision center, but One of them had a collision center but but but. They felt I'm all in, in fact, on Nissan and in fact I would buy more Nissan stores if I can, because I really feel as though the ship is turning at Nissan. Is that the consensus? Does that? Is that representative of most of the dealers that you hear from today?

Vinay Shahani:

I hear from a lot of dealers and I feel very fortunate that the majority of the network feels very comfortable reaching out to me, and that's that's a that's something that I've I've really worked hard to kind of do for for me so that I have this really clear pulse of what's happening within the network. I'm glad you heard that feedback from the dealer with whom you spoke. I'm not going to lie to you Not everybody feels that way. I hope it's the majority, but I don't know that it is the majority. But I think there's a few things that we can count on and I think you're starting to see this.

Vinay Shahani:

We have a completely new leadership team, both globally and here in the United States. We're all pushing hard for change. We understand that the brand needs to improve, brand perception needs to improve, the product lineup needs to improve, the powertrain diversity needs to improve, and that's precisely what we're investing the money on right now. If you look at our capital expenditures, the majority of it is going into new product development, but I think strengthening the partnerships with dealers is going to be critical to delivering strong customer satisfaction and really driving additional penetration, especially here in the US, which is the most important market for Nissan globally Right.

Vinay Shahani:

I think you've heard about some of the actions, some very serious actions, we're taking to improve the competitiveness of the company fixed cost reductions, restructuring our manufacturing base, you know, leveraging the robust industrial footprint that we is built here in the United States, and that number is going to improve. That helps us, you know, handle this tariff situation in a better way, but it also gives us more flexibility to deliver on the products that consumers care about the most here in the United States, because we're building them here in the United States. So I think these are some of the important things that I think the dealers are starting to hear about, along with this simplification which I mentioned at the beginning of this interview, which I think is going to help really improve our dealer relations, and hopefully the majority of the dealers will feel the way that the dealer that you spoke to articulated just in that time frame.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

I spoke to another one of your dealers and they said they felt very good about the installation of you specifically coming into the company and then others that you brought along with you on the team, and they said that's great, but we're concerned about whether or not Japan will allow them to do what they need to do. What can you say to the dealers out there about the relationship of you and your team in conjunction with you know what's going on in Japan and will they step back and say hey, you know, vinay, go do what you got to do and let's get the job done, or is there still a constraint there that makes it difficult? Yeah, what?

Vinay Shahani:

you're speaking to is empowerment for this regional leadership team. Get the job done, or is there still a constraint there that makes it difficult? Yeah, what you're speaking to is empowerment for this regional leadership team, and the first thing I would say is it starts with the appointment of Christian Meunier, who's my boss. He's the chairman for the Americas region, which is Canada, all the way down to the southern tip of South America. Christian was my boss 20 plus years ago.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

He and I are very close.

Vinay Shahani:

We've stayed in close touch over the years. I could not be more thrilled to welcome him back to the company and I think he loves to say that he wouldn't have come back to the company if he didn't have the guarantee that he was going to be empowered to work closely with me on the commercial side to really empower this region. And we're starting to see that. As of April 1st we have a new CEO, ivan Espinosa, someone who I've known for a long time. Christian is known for a long time. Ivan trusts us implicitly.

Vinay Shahani:

We have a new chief performance officer, a guy by the name of Guillaume Cartier. Christian and Guillaume go way back. So I think we have a team that understands what needs to happen here in the United States. They certainly understand the need to be empowered because ultimately, the US is, unlike any other market in the globe, right, and if we are not empowered, then we're not going to be able to deliver on the expectations of the consumer here in the globe. And if we are not empowered, then we're not going to be able to deliver on the expectations of the consumer here in the United States. So I think dealers are starting to see that. I can understand why they were concerned because, frankly, the proof was in the pudding in the last few years, where they didn't see the empowerment.

Vinay Shahani:

They saw the US having to jump through hoops to get approval on trivial things that Toyota and other companies which would come very naturally to the region. So I'm very optimistic that this is going to change and I'm already starting to see a change and I think the dealers are starting to see that we're making much quicker decisions. We're not having to spend a lot of time on approvals with Japan. I think this is a good thing for everybody.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

One of the comments I have heard from dealers both Nissan dealers and non-Nissan dealers, but thought leaders of the industry is that you are over-dealered. Would you agree with that statement and, if so, what's the strategy around that?

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, I think the real root cause is sales per outlet is not where it needs to be.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah.

Vinay Shahani:

Right. So the network was designed for a higher, let's say penetration of a normal TID, let's say a 15 to 16 million unit TID. At one point Nissan was chasing 10 percent market share. I wasn't with the company but I remember hearing about that and they were doing unnatural things to try to get there.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Wow.

Vinay Shahani:

I think the difference about what we're chasing today is recognizing that we need to improve throughput and we don't want to do it in an unnatural way. So this is going to happen through brand building, through telling the story of Nissan in the right way, but having the right programs in place that are focused and simple, to really put retail sales at the center of what we're trying to accomplish and taking care of the customer as well.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Right.

Vinay Shahani:

And we're starting to see that it's starting to take foot. I mean, we've bottomed out from a share perspective. I think December was a high threes. January is low fours February and March. Four, six, four, seven. Are we where we need to be? No, but we're moving in the right direction.

Vinay Shahani:

I think over the next year or so we're going to look for very organic growth, really on the back of new products. So we just completed the launch of the all-new Nissan Kicks. We just launched the all-new Nissan Murano and the all-new Nissan Armada. All three of these vehicles are gaining share relative to their prior versions that existed in the marketplace. This year is no exception, where we have two new vehicles that we're launching Actually three, when I think about it. Number one would be the all-new Leaf, number two is an all-new Sentra, and then we'll have, as I mentioned earlier, we'll have a plug-in hybrid electric version of the Rogue.

Vinay Shahani:

Are the opportunities for us to really sort of elevate our game, go after more share and help increase throughput? I think that's kind of the approach that we're choosing to take, rather than saying, ok, we're going to cut the number of dealerships around the country, which is also one way to do it. Other car companies have done it, but that tends to be an expensive proposition. Yeah, we want to take the approach of being very focused, singular minded, building the right products for the right place at the right time, making sure that our quality, durability reputation is where it needs to be by telling the stories of the fact that you know. Nissan, for the last seven years, has been the highest ranked Japanese brand in terms of JD power in initial quality. The Murano and the Kicks won JD Power vehicle dependability study in their respective segments. These are things that are going to change consumers' ways of thinking about the brand and, I think, are going to help improve our market share.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Let's touch a little bit on Infiniti. Incredible brand, incredible vehicle. Not a lot of changes over the last years. What's your strategy? What are some of the things you want to get done with that brand?

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, you know, infiniti is an iconic brand. It's been around since 1989. From the time that I left Nissan in 2013 to where they are today, it's been really a tough thing for me to accept. This was something that I was very prescriptive about before rejoining the company. I said if Nissan is not serious about Infiniti as a brand, then I'm not going to rejoin the company, and so we agreed that it's going to be a priority. I think Nissan can only be strong if Infiniti is strong, and that's simply because these luxury segments are where the spending power is from a consumer perspective. It's where the margin opportunity is as a car brand. That's right. I think.

Vinay Shahani:

Where we've really missed the boat in the past, jim is in the area of platform sharing between Nissan and Infiniti. Past, jim is in the area of platform sharing between Nissan and Infinity. I think, for whatever reason, call it, you know different leaders who've come and gone through the Infinity side. They've made deals with other brands. I think that's the wrong approach. We need to keep the scale in-house. So, as an example, we're studying how can we create Infinity versions of next generation Nissan products and, from my perspective, that should be the automatic question Anytime a new Nissan is going to be developed or conceptualized, the automatic question should be what is the infinity version going to look like?

Jim Fitzpatrick:

There you go.

Vinay Shahani:

Not always going to pencil, but from a systematic way of thinking and the way we do business. I think that's how we need to start looking at it and I think, through the right differentiation, but having common platforms, common powertrains, that's how we're going to get infinity back on its feet and that's exactly what my team and I have been working on, along with Christian, to try to get our colleagues in product development to move the needle as quickly as possible. I think one of the key things that's going to enable that is a reduction in the time frame for our product development lifecycle. So typically, it takes us 50 to 55 months to develop a new product. We've already announced that we're moving to a 30 month product development cycle and I think this is going to help us accelerate how we can bring new Infinity products to the market. That's ultimately going to help the Infinity division move back to where it needs to be.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, that's great news for Infinity dealers. Now, as you know, the only people out there that have got no patience at all outside of consumers are dealers. So if we were having this conversation five years from now, as we know, that goes so quick. I mean, look at COVID. I can't believe it was five years ago, but five years from now and you just mentioned you gave me some numbers there on what it takes to bring these to market. But what does the company look like For the dealers that are listening? I know they're probably taking some notes on this question but what does it look like in 2030?

Vinay Shahani:

Yeah, that's a great question, jim, and the way I picture success in five years is stability of the network, where throughput is drastically improved, along with return on sales, and that goes for both Nissan and Infiniti, I would say from a corporate perspective, nissan also returning back to the stability that we need from a profitability standpoint, from a throughput standpoint, I think from an openness perspective with respect to outside partners you've heard us talk about this in the past couple of months. I think there's an openness to bringing other partners in. That may or may not be the case. I think Nissan needs to stand on its own two feet before partners come into the picture. So that's really going to be the focus is our financial stability and to make sure that everything we do is focused on taking care of the customer. It comes back to relentless care of the customer.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's the most important thing, and I think that's what's going to get us back into the successful territory that we need to be in that sounds great the very passionate and enthusiastic Vinay Shahani, Senior Vice President of US Marketing and Sales for Nissan of the Americas. Thank you so much for joining us here on CBT News. I very much appreciate it. I was looking forward to today's conversation. I've got a lot of friends that have Nissan stores and they provided me with some good questions, so thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Love to do a follow-up with you to see how things are moving along.

Vinay Shahani:

Let's do it. I'm happy to do it. Thank you so much for your time.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Great, awesome Thanks. Thanks for watching Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick.