Wednesday 5 February 2014

Vauxhall grad heads for Detroit

Duncan Aldred, chairman and managing director of Vauxhall Motors and chief executive officer of Opel Ireland is to be based at GM’s headquarters in Detroit from 1 March.

Aldred is appointed US vice–president, Buick-GMC sales, service and marketing. This will be his first hands-on experience of life at GM in the US, no doubt paving the way for further senior roles within the corporation.

Aldred joined Vauxhall Motors as an undergraduate at its Ellesmere Port plant in 1990 and, with Vauxhall sponsorship, went on to graduate from Liverpool John Moores University with a BA (Hons) in 1992. 

He subsequently worked in various positions in Vauxhall sales and marketing and was appointed retail sales director in 2004.  In July 2006 he moved to Budapest as director, sales, marketing and aftersales for GM’s South East Europe region, transferring to Germany to take the role of sales operations director for GM Europe in 2009.

Returning to the UK in January 2010, Aldred became managing director of Vauxhall Motors, adding the chairman’s responsibilities in December 2011. In addition to these roles, he took the assignment of acting vice president, sales, marketing and aftersales for Opel/Vauxhall in January 2013.

In September last year Aldred was reported as saying: “We will be overtaking Ford by 2016. Just after the middle of the decade I expect us to be number one. So I have very high hopes for the Vauxhall brand in the UK. Our mission is to get Vauxhall right to the very top.”

Ford appeared undaunted by Aldred’s claims. It noted: “Vauxhall has always been feisty, but it’s been saying this kind of thing for 10 years.”



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