Trimming an overly complex operation
Create a process to manage complexity
Aggressively reduce the number of combinations
1500x reduction in combinations, $75M first-year savings

Not giving the customers what they don't want
Problem:
Fifteen million possible product combinations were overwhelming the company, but customers weren't impressed.
BigWheels, a top 5 car company, lacked customer focus.  In its global operations, the product offering by country was vast (15 million buildable product combinations), yet the company did not know which combinations were truly demanded by customers and which combinations had low demand.

As a result, BigWheels had a noncompetitive cost structure, poor manufacturing operating performance and excessive stocks at the manufactuere and at dealers.

To reverse BigWheels' poor performance, the company asked Bain to re-engineer major elements in its European value chain. The specific focus of the project was customer-driven complexity reduction.