PAGE A-12 THE POST-STANDARD Thursday, February 11, 2010

BUSINESSC O M P A N Y N E W S Toyota loses buyers’ confidence

CLOSE CHANGE

Russell 2000 index 595.82 +0.6510-year Treasury note 3.69% +0.04Gold (troy oz.) $1,075.80 -$0.90Silver (troy oz.) $15.03 -$0.40Platinum (troy oz.) $1,512.90 +$10.50Oil (price per barrel) $74.52 +$0.77

DAILY MARKET WATCHDow Jonesindustrials10,038.38

Nasdaqcomposite2,147.87

-2.39

Standard &Poor’s 5001,068.13

-3.00-20.26

Ashe LouisTestone, Marshall & Discenza,CPAs announced that two of itsmanagers have been named asprincipals for the firm. Theyare JAIMEE L. ASHE, CPA, andKARI C. LOUIS, CPA, CFE.

Ashe, of DeWitt, and Louis,of Mexico, were previouslymanagers in the firm’s auditdepartment. Ashe is responsi-ble for financial statementquality control, managementand supervision of engage-ments and is part of the firm’saudit and accounting commit-tee. Louis supervises, plansand reviews engagements, andas a Certified Fraud Examinershe conducts examinations andreviews fraud engagements.

Excellus BlueCross BlueShieldhas designated CommunityGeneral Hospital as a BlueDistinction Center for SpineSurgery and a Blue DistinctionCenter for Knee and Hip Re-placement. Blue DistinctionCenters for Spine Surgery andKnee and Hip Replacement arepart of the BlueCross andBlueShield Association’s ex-pansion of its Blue Distinc-tion® designation.

Cadaret, Grant & Co. Inc. an-nounced the promotions offour of its vice presidents:

MARYPAT GANLEYwaspromoted to first vice presi-dent, business developmentmanager.

Also, BONNIE GEE waspromoted to first vice presi-dent, variable annuities man-ager.

PETER GRIFO was promotedto first vice president, recruit-er.

And, DONALD JAYNES waspromoted to first vice presi-dent, compliance manager.

Ganley, Grifo and Jaynesare based at the company’sSyracuse headquarters. Gee isbased in Mt. Arlington, N.J.

Galson Laboratories, an in-dustrial hygiene analysis andmonitoring solutions company,has acquired Parker ServicesLaboratory, an industrial hy-giene testing laboratory andclient service center located inStevens Point, Wis. The test-ing laboratory operations andinstrumentation was recentlyrelocated to Galson Labora-tories’ headquarters in EastSyracuse.

JOHN STAFFORD was namedpresident of the auxiliary toCommunity General Hospital.He is the auxiliary’s 20th pres-ident. He retired from CarrierCorp. as a senior systems plan-ner, and has volunteered atCommunity General Hospitalfor more than 10 years.

The hospital also announcedEVIS PETRELA, M.D., and SU-SAMA VERMA, M.D., joinedits medical staff in December2009. Petrela, of CNY Ophthal-mology, is an active memberof the American Academy ofOphthalmology, AmericanMedical Association, NYSOphthalmological Society andOnondaga County Medical So-ciety.

Verma is the CommunityGeneral Hospital neurologydepartment chair and has es-tablished a private neurologypractice in the hospital’s phy-sician office building.

Beacon Federal has beennamed one of the 2010 BestCompanies to Work for inNew York. This is the secondyear that the bank has beenrecognized for its outstandingemployment practices.

Rival automakers hope to gainmore customers, who havebecome leery after the recall.

By Dee-Ann DurbinThe Associated Press

Detroit — In a few short weeks,Toyota has done what General Motors,Ford and other automakers have failedto accomplish for decades: Erase theperception that the Japanese automak-er’s cars are of much higher qualitythan those of its rivals.

A series of recent safety recalls —now totaling more than 8.5 million ve-hicles worldwide — has crackedToyota’s bulletproof reputation andgiven rivals an opportunity to capturesome of its customers.

Toyota stumbled as industry salesare just starting to climb after theworst slump in 30 years. It’s not yetclear which automakers will benefitmost, but several stand to benefit andare wooing Toyota drivers with new

ads and incentives.‘‘The perception game has

changed,’’ said James Bell, an execu-tive market analyst for the vehicle in-formation company Kelley Blue Book.

According to Kelley, 27 percent ofnew car shoppers who were consid-ering a Toyota before the recall are nolonger contemplating the brand. Near-ly half of the buyers who have de-fected from Toyota say they maynever consider the brand again. Kelleyquestioned 406 people before the re-call and 285 after it. All were U.S.buyers who said they planned to buy acar in the next 12 months.

Ford, Chevrolet, Hyundai andHonda have made the biggest gainswith those customers, Kelley BlueBook said. Sixteen percent of new-carbuyers said they weren’t consideringFord before the recall, but are now.

David Tompkins, vice president ofanalytics with Edmunds.com, said thecrisis also is starting to affect Lexus,Toyota’s luxury brand, which has seenthe number of buyers intending to pur-

chase the brand drop by 25 percent inthe last two weeks. Those customersare now looking at Audi, Acura andVolvo. His data is based on 3.5 millionWeb site visits per week.

Publicly, rivals insist they’re notgloating.

‘‘There may be an opportunity forus to get some consideration fromfolks that we didn’t get before. We’dlike to sell them our vehicles based onthe merits,’’ GM’s North AmericanPresident Mark Reuss said Wednesdayat the Chicago Auto Show.

At Ford, chief U.S. sales analystGeorge Pipas noted that CEO AlanMulally has long admired Toyota andimplemented its global production sys-tem at Ford.

But Bell said that at a recent execu-tive-level meeting at one of Toyota’srivals, participants were grinning fromear to ear.

‘‘GM and Ford in particular are re-ally rubbing their hands together andsaying, ‘Here’s our chance,’ ’’ he said.

FOREIGNEXCHANGE

CLOSE PVS.Britain .6415 .6374Canada 1.0617 1.0689Euro .7280 .7259Japan 89.90 89.63Mexico 13.0700 13.1000Russia 30.2599 30.3453

(US $ expressed in foreign currency)

S&P100STOCKS

NAME TKR LAST CH %CH

AT&T Inc T 25.12 -.14 -.6AbtLab ABT 53.26 -.09 -.2Alcoa AA 13.16 -.12 -.9Allstate ALL 28.60 -.13 -.5Altria MO 19.38 -.08 -.4Amazon AMZN 117.36 -.67 -.6AEP AEP 33.02 -.18 -.5AmExp AXP 37.75 +.21 +.6Amgen AMGN 56.84 -.37 -.6Apple Inc AAPL 195.12 -1.07 -.5Avon AVP 29.32 -.14 -.5BakrHu BHI 45.26 -.29 -.6BkofAm BAC 14.67 +.20 +1.4BkNYMel BK 27.39 +.33 +1.2Baxter BAX 56.13 -.25 -.4Boeing BA 59.54 -.20 -.3BrMySq BMY 23.92 -.33 -1.4BurlNSF BNI 99.96 +.05 +.1CVS Care CVS 32.73 +.01 ...CampSp CPB 33.32 ... ...CapOne COF 35.56 +.28 +.8Caterpillar CAT 53.15 -.38 -.7Chevron CVX 70.75 -.56 -.8Cisco CSCO 23.76 -.13 -.5Citigrp C 3.20 +.02 +.6CocaCl KO 53.79 -.22 -.4ColgPal CL 79.82 -.35 -.4Comcast CMCSA 15.31 -.08 -.5ConocPhil COP 48.26 -.23 -.5Costco COST 59.15 +.57 +1.0Dell Inc DELL 13.75 +.20 +1.5DevonE DVN 66.41 -.89 -1.3Disney DIS 30.03 +.19 +.6DowChm DOW 27.51 -.28 -1.0DuPont DD 32.38 -.09 -.3EMC Cp EMC 16.76 -.19 -1.1Entergy ETR 76.67 +.41 +.5Exelon EXC 44.30 +.08 +.2ExxonMbl XOM 64.85 -.35 -.5FedExCp FDX 78.29 -.93 -1.2FordM F 10.94 -.21 -1.9GenDynam GD 67.64 -.40 -.6GenElec GE 15.69 +.09 +.6GileadSci GILD 45.97 -.33 -.7GoldmanS GS 153.63 +1.14 +.7Google GOOG 534.45 -2.00 -.4Hallibrtn HAL 29.23 +.15 +.5Heinz HNZ 43.70 +.03 +.1HewlettP HPQ 48.02 -.10 -.2HomeDp HD 28.65 -.22 -.8HonwllIntl HON 37.72 -.10 -.3Intel INTC 19.69 +.04 +.2IBM IBM 122.81 -.40 -.3JPMorgCh JPM 38.87 +.48 +1.3JohnJn JNJ 62.73 -.03 ...Kraft KFT 28.93 +.03 +.1LockhdM LMT 75.11 -.34 -.5Lowes LOW 21.80 -.04 -.2MasterCrd MA 226.90 +3.45 +1.5McDnlds MCD 63.25 -.32 -.5Medtrnic MDT 42.15 -.21 -.5Merck MRK 36.20 -.27 -.7MetLife MET 34.93 -.22 -.6Microsoft MSFT 27.99 -.02 -.1Monsanto MON 75.57 -.15 -.2MorgStan MS 27.51 +.38 +1.4NYSE Eur NYX 24.36 +.71 +3.0NOilVarco NOV 42.55 -.13 -.3NikeB NKE 62.64 +.13 +.2NorflkSo NSC 46.99 -.15 -.3OcciPet OXY 78.39 +.48 +.6Oracle ORCL 23.11 -.40 -1.7PepsiCo PEP 60.38 +.33 +.5Pfizer PFE 17.74 -.14 -.8PhilipMor PM 46.81 -.04 -.1ProctGam PG 61.67 -.09 -.1Qualcom QCOM 37.43 -.48 -1.3Raytheon RTN 53.51 +.10 +.2RegionsFn RF 6.36 +.07 +1.1SaraLee SLE 12.93 +.28 +2.2Schlmbrg SLB 63.65 -.11 -.2SouthnCo SO 31.28 -.01 ...SprintNex S 3.36 -.29 -7.9Target TGT 48.95 -.19 -.4TexInst TXN 23.44 +.06 +.33M Co MMM 78.62 -.10 -.1TimeWrn rs TWX 27.38 -.03 -.1UPS B UPS 57.07 -.34 -.6US Bancrp USB 23.61 +.12 +.5UtdTech UTX 66.64 +.12 +.2UtdhlthGp UNH 32.71 -.29 -.9VerizonCm VZ 28.87 +.12 +.4WalMart WMT 53.24 -.01 ...Walgrn WAG 33.30 -.31 -.9WellsFargo WFC 27.18 +.47 +1.8Weyerh WY 39.25 -.54 -1.4WmsCos WMB 21.15 +.09 +.4Xerox XRX 8.45 +.07 +.8

100 Leading U.S. Stocks

LOCALINTERESTSTOCKSNAME TKR LAST CH %CHAlcatelLuc ALU 3.18 -.08 -2.5AllncFnc ALNC 25.77 +.12 +.5Anaren ANEN 11.30 -.01 -.1BeaconFed BFED 8.97 ... ...CSX CSX 43.08 ... ...CarrolsRst TAST 6.41 +.03 +.5CmtyBkSy CBU 20.34 +.29 +1.4Conmed CNMD 22.38 +.01 ...ConstellA STZ 15.13 -.07 -.5ConstellEn CEG 32.26 -.02 -.1Cooper Ind CBE 42.45 +.02 ...Corning GLW 17.52 -.24 -1.4Daimler DAI 46.24 -.15 -.3EKodak EK 5.94 -.06 -1.0FstNiagara FNFG 13.42 +.03 +.2HSBC HBC 51.55 +.10 +.2HartfdFn HIG 23.07 +.73 +3.3Keycorp KEY 6.88 -.04 -.6M&T Bk MTB 72.67 +.68 +.9MagnaI g MGA 57.00 +.04 +.1MetLife MET 34.93 -.22 -.6NatGrid NGG 49.47 +.44 +.9Nucor NUE 39.92 -.54 -1.3OneidaFn ONFC 9.65 +.50 +5.5ParTech PTC 5.80 -.20 -3.3PathBcp PBHC 5.50 ... ...Paychex PAYX 29.08 -.03 -.1Penney JCP 24.53 -.22 -.9RockTen RKT 38.21 -.59 -1.5US Airwy LCC 6.31 -.13 -2.0

Mike Greenlar / The Post-Standard

ELLEN ZORN (front), of Cicero, and Monica Malfitano, of Manlius, check out the Mazda MX5 at the Syracuse Auto-mobile Association Charity Preview held at the Oncenter Wednesday night.

Auto Show Gives to Charity12 organizations benefit from fundraising preview

By Fernando Alfonso IIIContributing writer

Roger Burdick first got the idea of acharity preview for the Syracuse NewCar Show while at the 1998 NorthAmerican International Auto Showcharity preview in Detroit.

‘‘I was just blown away by thecrowd,’’ said Burdick of that event,which benefited 12 charities and raisedmore than $3 million, he said.

The idea of a charity preview inSyracuse was born.

‘‘We already have the party,’’ Bur-dick told Barbara Rothschild, execu-tive vice president of the Syracuse Au-tomobile Dealers Association, whenhe returned from Detroit, ‘‘I think weshould make it a charitable event.’’

In its first 10 years, the Syracuseevent raised $1.32 million. This year’spreview, which was Wednesday nightat the Oncenter, was expected to raise$198,000 for 12 charities, said KellyPelcher, president and general manag-er of Burdick BMW in Cicero.

Underwriting for the preview is pro-vided by businesses like Toyota,JPMorgan Chase & Co. and M&T

Bank Corp., Pelcher said. As a result,the charities keep all the money raised,she said.

‘‘This is probably our favorite fund-raiser,’’ said Marion Makhuli, CEO ofthe National Kidney Foundation ofCentral New York. The foundation isone of the original charities still in-volved with the preview.

The money raised is used to performmore prevention screenings in thecommunity, she added.

Guests at this year’s preview in-cluded local dealers, businessmen andwomen, politicians and the public.

Among the browsers was Rep. DanMaffei, D-DeWitt, who said it was his

first time at the show.‘‘It’s great for Central New York,

it’s a happening event,’’ he said. ‘‘Themore people the better.’’ Maffei, whodrives a 2001 Buick, was in the marketfor a new car.

‘‘It’s getting to the end of its usablelife span,’’ Maffei said.

Elizabeth Ross, of Chittenango, saidit was her sixth time at the show.

‘‘It’s my favorite event of all timein Syracuse,’’ said Ross, of The Ar-mory Group at Morgan Stanley SmithBarney.

If you go . . .What: Syracuse New Car Show.When: 4 to 9 p.m. today and Friday,noon to 9 p.m. Saturday, noon to 5p.m. SundayWhere: Nicholas J. Pirro ConventionCenter at Oncenter Complex, 800 S.State St., Syracuse.Cost: Adults, $8; seniors, $5;younger than 12, $2.50 and youngerthan 5, free.

Charities benefitingAlzheimer’s Association Central NewYork Chapter, Camp Good Days &Special Times, Crouse HealthFoundation, Elmcrest Children’sCenter, Enable, Hospice of CentralNew York, Huntington FamilyCenters, Kidney Foundation ofCentral New York, LearningDisabilities Association of CentralNew York, Make-A-Wish Foundationof Central New York, Meals onWheels of Syracuse, SyracuseBehavioral Healthcare.

B U S I N E S S B R I E F I N G

Scotsman Press buys3 newspapers in Fulton

The Scotsman Press in Syra-cuse has purchased the ValleyNews, Fulton Patriot and Val-ley Advertiser newspapers inFulton.

Tom Cuskey, associate pub-lisher with Scotsman Press,

said Scotsman has been print-ing the three Fulton papers forabout 40 years.

‘‘Vince and Ron Caravan,the owners, wanted to get outof the business and approachedus,’’ Cuskey said. He said theCaravans have owned the Ful-ton papers for about 50 years.

The Valley News is a twice

a week newspaper while thePatriot and Advertiser areweekly papers. Cuskey wouldnot divulge the sale price.

There are 26 full- and part-time employees, Cuskey said.

‘‘At this point, no changesare being made to the papers,’’he said.

American Airlines adds$50 fee for standby

Next time you think aboutflying standby on AmericanAirlines, be prepared to givethe gate agent your name and$50.

The days of hanging aroundthe agent’s desk, hoping for afree switch to an earlier flightare over at American for manypassengers.

The nation’s second-largestairline said Wednesday thatstarting with tickets bought onFeb. 22, only elite frequentfliers, travelers in first or busi-ness class, military personneland people who bought priceycoach tickets will be allowedto fly standby for free.

Everyone else switchingflights on their day of travelwill have to pay $50 to get aconfirmed seat.

— Staff and news service reports

D I L B E R T

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