This car is not woke. The Design Vision Type 00 is as brutally masculine as anything I can remember, with dramatic proportions and strong design cues to its heritage, mixed with a bit of Tonka. A long, long E-Type-like bonnet (with no engine, what goes in there?), a sweeping tail silhouette, again reminiscent of an E-Type coupè, and a blunt front-end like, well, nothing else I can think of, other than perhaps the latest Range Rover Discovery - another Gerry McGovern design. Then there's the bluff grilled rump and massive wheels, with pothole-unfriendly, super-low profile run-flat tyres, covered by massive haunches. This all feels more brawny 'lion' than svelte jaguar to me, but blending it all together is a mighty achievement, even for a concept car - and the result is certainly like nothing else on the road. Yes, Elon, Jaguar still designs cars. It just needs to make them now.
I'm pleased that there are references to Jaguars past, as such a rich heritage is hugely valuable - it was Enzo Ferrari, no-less, that said "Jaguar's E-Type is the most beautiful car in the world" and, while this probably isn't going to garner the same acclaim, it's a pretty bold statement of rebirth and renewal. Luxury brands need provinance, and Jaguar hasn't cut its ties with the past after all..
The "copy nothing' ethos seems to have been pretty wholly achieved, although some innovations, like the absence of a rear window, are not unique. This may save weight, but this car does not appear to be a lightweight. This is more of a bruiser in the XKR on steroids mould, which was another Jaguar with a very long bonnet.
The rebranding elements also seem to gel with the product design somewhat better than they seemed, seen in isolation. The old squared off lettering in the previous logotype, wouldn't look right here, nor would a 3-D 'leaper'. The teaser ad screamed 'create exuberant,' 'live vivid', 'delete ordinary'. The rebrand campaign, at least its value propositions, all of a sudden, seem to make sense. Maybe this isn't the Jaguar brand car crash it first seemed to be.
Marketing magic
But how much free publicity has Jaguar's rebrand generated? Well, Inclusive's Media Scan suggests that between the 16th-22nd of November the teaser activity generated 723k mentions, compared to 44k the prior week, a reach of 125m versus 51m, and 427k people talking about the brand, compared with 30k the week before. A little controversy and high-risk marketing has delivered much more than a 10x multiplier on their spend, and ensured that everyone reached in phase one, last week, is interesting to find out what the product actually looks like, this week. Double-bubble. Marketing magic. But how does Jaguar sustain this interest until there are the electric models on the road? And will they really look like this? Those are their challenges now.
Bravo Jaguar, If the real cars are half as striking and individual as this concept, I think you might have pulled the rebrand off...
Peter Matthews
Nucleus Founder & CEO