George,

>What other definition of quality could you apply that isn't subjective? All too often, quality is equated with either the cost of the product or the extra features or luxuries it has. This would mean that you'd couldn't have a "quality" economy car. However, this isn't the case.
>

Ummm, OK. That's what I thought I was agreeing with you on. <g> 'Quality relative to requirements/specifications' versus 'Quality relative to potential (as known at the time)'. Sure, you could have a 'quality' economy car but you can't expect that economy car to have A: the same features or B: the same equipment/performance specifications.

>Let me give you a better example. I owned a Chrysler mini-van. It had a 7 year 70,000 mile warranty on the power train (transmission). From personal experience, a reasonable expectation would probably be that the transmission should last at least twice that long, or 140,000 miles. My wife is the driver, and a home health nurse. She puts a lot of mileage on our vehicles. Most of these miles, however, are highway miles and less taxing on the transmission than city miles. Not only did the original transmission fail to reach 70,000, but the replacement (installed by the Chrysler dealer and using Chrysler parts under warranty) failed to last that long as well. Since it was under warranty, this was an additional cost to Chrysler. By failing to live up to their own requirements, they incurred an additional cost. When the replacement failed as well, they lost a customer. This cost them as well, since not only won't I be purchasing another vehicle from them, but my sharing of this experience
>may cause others to purchase other makes.
>

I had a Dodge Caravan that had the same problem and just got rid of it 2 months ago. Of course, it had over 200,000 miles on it. <g>

In your example above, I agree that they did not live up to their quality requirements. It seems they have set their requirements on that transmission to somewhere above 70,000 miles. It failed and therefore I believe they failed in their quest for quality there. The point I'm trying to get across is that the big word 'QUALITY' means something different (I believe) in Lutz's Law. If you make it TOO GOOD (specifications or not) then you're killing yourself in that business. I can't say the same thing in my personal business. <bg> I might be able to get away with doing shoddy service twice but after that I can forget about doing business with them again. Commodity businesses can get away with it ... service businesses rarely can.

- A Hilton