🛑 Now that everyone has said their piece about the new Jaguar, I want to come out and take a crack at it from a brand standpoint.
🥇 First, I would prefer something else than the new design. But Jaguar did not design those cars for me anyway. And, to say that the new design ignores Jaguar's heritage is silly as the latest design shares some of the same design elements of the E-Type.
🥈 Second, let's debunk the idea that $40 million for the project of repositioning Jaguar is a lot of money; let me remind you that repositioning is hard. The project has to accomplish two things: make people dissociate from what the brand used to stand for and associate it with something new in the consumer's mind. And did I mention that something new had to be unclaimed by other brands? Yes, it had to.
☠️ So, not easy to do!
Now that we have considered those two points let's talk about repositioning and why it is a success:
➡️ Jaguar was all but forgotten. Now, it's all about Jaguar and how people are up in arms about the heritage, the logo, the woke, and the design.
It successfully separates the brand from its previous positioning as a luxury brand competing against Audi, Volvo, Mercedes, Lexus, and Tesla in a saturated segment.
➡️ It attempts to place Jaguar in the same category (at least in theory) as the Bentley and Rolls Royce but with a bonus of modernity, hip, and electric.
➡️ It aims at the ultra-rich who want to avoid buying Grandpa's old Bentley.
❓ Having said that, the question remains whether the repositioning and redesign will save Jaguar from bankruptcy. I am curious if it will, as the brand still needs to address some of the old product issues that plagued it for a while, and the acceptance of the young ultra-rich still needs to be discovered.
💰 If money were no object, would you buy a new Jaguar? Or would you prefer the fixed the old one?
Technical Advisor - Process & Simulation at KBR, Inc.
2wThe world is moving incredibly fast and companies are trying to keep pace....but just...