I’m planning on linking to this in tomorrow’s Big Picture, but the car junkie in me found it just so fascinating I had to post early: Virtual Tour of VW’s Transparent Factory
Its way cool, despite the abysmal pun the editors threw in; "We visit this glass house, home of the new Phaeton. Sure enough, nobody¹s throwing stones." I guess (sure enough) the Eds couldn’t help themselves.
Source: Car and Driver
Here’s an excerpt from the article:
In a bid to prove to customers that this luxury car is indeed different from all the others, the company has set up a factory, at a cost of some 186 million euros (roughly $208,000,000 at current exchange rates) that is unique in all the world. The building is located in the heart of Dresden, Germany, an 800-year-old city known for its arts and craftsmanship. The factory’s walls are made almost entirely of glass — over 290,000 square feet of it. Its floors are covered entirely in Canadian maple. And its layout is visitor-friendly, set up to receive, per day, 250 tourists (by advance reservation at 5 euros each), customers, or prospects (gratis). There are no smokestacks, no loud noises, and no toxic byproducts. Parts arrive, and luxury cars depart . . .
Hat tip: Linkfilter
Update: January 7, 2005 4:32 pm
There is a terrific collection of photos here:
A photo tour of the Transparent Factory in Dresden http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=1837641
Talk about the Substance of Style, eh?
My reaction when I saw the picture, before reading the article past the title was “oh, neat!”
transparency is good for companies
ok, so this isn’t quite what you might expect, but what a great tangent….) as i was wandering, i ran into barry ritholtz – and he points to an interesting example of how transparency is working for at least one…