I Love BMW

By Guest Blogger: Roshanne Sarty -- Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Today we visited BMW’s head office in Munich. I had been looking forward to this part of the tour since I registered for the trip, and the famous German automaker did not disappoint. The visit included a tour of the BMW production facilities and the BMW World showroom. The production facility tour literally blew my socks off and showed BMW’s commitment to quality, innovation, and technology. I had the opportunity to visit the GM Shanghai plant in China during the 2008 MBA China Study Tour, and the difference between the plants was like night and day. The BMW plant was much more advanced than GM both in terms of efficiency and technology, and thanks to my recent ‘Operations Management’ course this winter, I was able to fully appreciate the high level of customization at the BMW plant as compared to GM. While Shanghai pumps out standardized models of vehicles that sit in inventory and eat away at profits, the Munich plant produces customized vehicles based on individual customer orders and follows a Just In Time (JIT) process. There are 200,000 vehicles produced in the Munich plant each year (the 300 series sedan and touring models) with only 1.5 of those vehicles being of the same type. This level of customization is unbelievable and BMW is able to make final customer changes to each vehicle up until the last moment.

Following the plant visit, the tour of the BMW World showroom was equally impressive. The building itself is an architectural beauty and was designed with the concept of speed and air in mind. There is a ‘cyclone’ portion of the building that is shaped like an hour glass from the outside, while the massive interior has a ceiling that represents the clouds in the sky. There is no way I can describe in words how impressive the building is, and the attached pictures don’t do it justice either… so the only way to fully appreciate this facility is to see it in person. One way of doing this is to order a BMW and pick it up in Munich, an option that BMW offers to its international customers. The basic idea is to travel to Europe, hop into your spanking new beamer in Munich, travel the European roads in style, take advantage of the country’s lack of speed limits, and then have the your vehicle shipped back to your home town. Sound enticing? You bet it does. Who wouldn’t?

BMW met and exceeded all of my expectations and left me with a serious case of car envy. Now all I have to do is figure out a way to trade in my 1995 Ford Probe POS for a shiny new Beamer. Guess I’d better start saving…