Nissan’s recent losses and huge layoffs has sorta woken them up to the importance of good design. They’ve created a sexy Maxima and are advertising the hell out of it. Sadly, I wonder if they equate sexiness with design (the majority of their cars lack that same appeal and lack the advertising attention). Other manufacturers like BMW know design can be visceral and practical at the same time even without being blatently sexy.
This also makes me shake my head at Xerox. If they only gave us what we want (copies and printers that don’t jam) they’d be so much more successful. When a company’s tagline doesn’t explain what products they sell (“The Document Management Company”) then no one will buy them.