The headlines wrote themselves. ‘Go woke, go broke!’ said the Daily Mail, and ‘Sales Plummet’, said the Sun. Only a few months after its controversial rebrand, with the launch of a bright pink ‘Barbie-mobile’, we learned today that Jaguar’s sales are down by 97.5 per cent across Europe. In reality, the story is a little more complex, but even so, what was once one of the greatest car companies in the world is giving a masterclass in brand destruction. It would be better to sell it off to the Chinese than to continue under its current management.
It makes Telsa’s collapse after Elon Musk joined the Trump administration look mild by comparison. Jaguar, the company that produced models such the E-type, generally regarded by buffs as the best-looking car ever manufactured, is in freefall. Sales at Jaguar Europe are down by 97.5 per cent, while according to the European Automobile Manufacturer’s Association, the company registered just 49 sales in April, compared with almost 2,000 in the same month a year earlier. In November, the company staged a controversial rebranding exercise that seemed purposefully designed to annoy the ‘Gin and Jag set’ which have always been its most loyal customers. Instead of the high-powered petrol models that built its reputation, it was betting everything on a bright pink electric vehicle that didn’t even have a leaping cat on the bonnet and was promoted by adverts that had come straight out of Pride Week. ‘Radical’ would be the kind word to describe the move. ‘Deranged’ would be the more honest one.
In fairness, the plunge in sales is not just about the Barbie-mobile rebrand. Jaguar has also halted most of its production while it works on launching its new line up of models. And yet, even that is a very strange decision. After all, the car market is brutally competitive, and very fickle. If you stop making any cars for a few months, it is rash to assume the customers will still be there when you resume, especially as you are offering them something very different to what they are used to.
The blunt truth is this. Jaguar is staking everything on electric vehicles at a time when it is no longer clear whether battery-powered cars are the right technology for combatting climate change. And it is trying to radically change its traditional market, and appeal to a younger, more liberal group of consumers. It is getting very hard to see how that will work. It would probably have been better to simply sell the marque to one of the upstart Chinese car companies, which would probably pay handsomely for its ‘heritage’. After all, MG, once a great rival to Jaguar, has done pretty well under the ownership of Shanghai-based SAIC, even if its cheap and cheerful EVs don’t have much in common with the sports cars of its 1960s heyday. At least it would preserve the name. Instead, Jaguar looks to be heading for destruction – and it may be too late to stop that now.
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