• Detroit Free Press, Thursday, January 7, 2010 10:41 AM

Ralph Gilles, CEO of Chrysler's Dodge brand, is a 39-year-old designer with impeccable creative credentials who is charged with reversing the brand's precipitous slide in market share -- down to 8.9% last year from 11% in 2008, Greg Gardner reports.

"The challenge is to awaken ourselves and to let the world know we are alive and well," Gilles tells Gardner. "We underestimated how quiet we had been." His elevator pitch on what makes a Dodge a Dodge is: "Cars that make you feel good, that are niche-like in their demeanor, but have mass appeal."

Gilles, who had a major role in the design of the Chrysler 300, Dodge Charger, Magnum and Viper, has a fine arts degree from the College for Creative Studies in Detroit and an MBA from Michigan State. He says he is learning to look at the business through dealers' eyes and realizes that consumer awareness of the company's newer nameplates, such as the Journey, is low.

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