
113Lessons
market demand conditions. These shifts may be due to changes in
consumer preferences or new technologies. Time and again, highly
successful companies have been caught off guard by such shifts.
We discussed in Chapter 7 how Toyota began to lose its competitive
edge when its product quality no longer provided a sufcient competi-
tive advantage and emotional appeal to consumers became a bigger
competitive differentiator. Dell has faced a similar challenge. Its fast-
delivery, low-cost model has been assaulted by a shift in consumer
preferences for PCs that also have styling and emotional appeal. ...