It’s been six whole days since Jaguar revealed its latest “Copy Nothing” ad campaign ahead of the debut of its big electric car reveal at Art Basel next month, and we’ve gone through the full cycle of Internet outrage and counter-outrage. Honestly, I had to check how long ago it was because it feels like we’ve been talking about it for six months.
There have been some who have guessed that it’s all a ploy. A rug-pull. The ultimate setup to get people to care about whatever Jaguar does next. I don’t know specifically what Jaguar is planning, but I’m not sure that this is misdirection. I think this was a genuine effort to get people to see Jaguar as something new, one I think had some good ideas behind it, albeit one that got caught up in our never-ending Internet culture war.
So my question is stated once, but with two meanings: Is this a real campaign, and if it is, is Jaguar bold enough to stick with it?
Anyone who reads The Morning Dump is probably aware of Volkswagen’s problems. I may not be 100% certain Jaguar is serious about its makeover, but I am, however, 100% certain that Volkswagen is serious about addressing its problems in a severe way that’ll almost certainly involve job cuts in Germany. There was another F1 race in America last night, and yet there’s only one American team. It sounds like F1 is finally serious about letting Cadillac/Andretti into the sport.
Americans are seriously into F1 now, and still seriously into buying anything but sedans, it’s just that they want to pay sedan prices. How’s that going to work?
Jaguar Copied A Lot Of Things, But I Don’t Blame Them
I feel like the discussion around Jaguar’s rebrand is missing a lot of context. While I agree with Jason’s analysis that the specific choice of imagery is derivative and almost offensively try-hard, the rest of the Internet has dog-piled on the company in a way that’s been both predictable and a little disappointing. It’s a lot of stuff like this:
Dear Jaguar, @Jaguar
I am your customer.
My husband and I both drive Jags.
I’m on my 3rd.
NO MORE. #WokeIsBroke #BoycottJaguar #StayInYourLane pic.twitter.com/UQEIqqAxWe— State Spirit (@statespirit) November 20, 2024
First, I’m not even sure how this ad is “woke” and not, as Jason points out, just run-of-the-mill ad agency garbage. Second, the assumed creator of the ad has been subject to a lot of terrible targeting by the usual mix of the usual online miscreants. When hatred is your hammer, everything looks like a nail.
The ad has created such a ridiculous and outsized amount of reaction that some have made the assumption that it’s not serious:
Not to doubt a random person on Threads from Los Angeles (or the others who have espoused this theory), but the way that Jaguar’s leaders are talking about the campaign makes me think they are serious:
Jaguar managing director Rawdon Glover said in an interview with the Financial Times that the intended message had been lost in “a blaze of intolerance” on social media and denied that the promotional video was intended as a “woke” statement.
“If we play in the same way that everybody else does, we’ll just get drowned out. So we shouldn’t turn up like an auto brand,” Glover said.
“We need to re-establish our brand and at a completely different price point so we need to act differently. We wanted to move away from traditional automotive stereotypes.”
In fairness to the critics, it does seem like Jaguar has exchanged one group of stereotypes for another. It’s strange, and off-putting, and not in a way that’s any sort of fun.
In fairness to Jaguar, they had to do this. Jaguar isn’t merely a troubled but well-known organization that’s had a hard time finding success in recent years. Jaguar isn’t the Yankees. Jaguar is the Montreal Expos. They are effectively a non-entity. In the United States, at its peak, Jaguar was selling around 40,000 cars. Last year they couldn’t even sell 9,000.
Do you remember the biggest story about Jaguar this year up until this point? There was a big rumor spread around the Internet in March that the company’s Indian owner, Tata, was killing Jaguar to strengthen Land Rover. This was a misunderstanding due to the brand pausing production in order to shift to building fewer, more expensive niche cars. Think of it as the Rolls-Royce-inization of Jaguar.
Was this the company’s best move? Maybe, maybe not, but there just weren’t a lot of other options. Tata is not a global entity and isn’t in a great position to share platforms. The most profitable new Jaguars were SUVs, and the company already has a very profitable SUV-maker. Jaguar either had to die, which would be a pity, or it would have to find a way to make money selling fewer cars.
While the backlash was inevitable and, in some ways, probably wanted (when was the last time Elon Musk tweeted about Jaguar?). People are acting like Jaguar is a living thing again. I doubt this is exactly the response Jaguar wanted, but it got a response.
As one ad exec who doesn’t work for Jaguar put it in an AdWeek article on the campaign:
“On Monday almost no one was particularly interested in Jaguar. It’s now Thursday, and millions are waiting for Jaguar to unveil its take on an EV.
“That’s what bold brand moves do—they turn people’s heads, shift their expectations, and yes, cause a bit of discomfort in the process.
People are talking about Jaguar. People are looking forward to the launch of the car. Part of me hopes Jaguar sticks to its guns and keeps doing what it’s doing because trying to appeal to an increasingly tiny slice of buyers with better options wasn’t working. Now it’s trying to connect with an entirely new set of buyers. That’s a dangerous gamble, and I don’t know that it’ll work. At the same time, backing down is unlikely to work, either.
At best, I think Jaguar has to hope the car connects with buyers who find this interesting on an emotional level. The car is the star here and, good or bad, this ad campaign is going to have everyone on the Internet talking about whatever it is Jaguar reveals.
The car better be good.
‘We Can’t Just Stick A Band-Aid On It’ – VW Brand CEO
Germany is in crisis. It is heading towards both a literal winter and a figurative one. It’s not clear what will save the company at this point, but job cuts are coming. Ford has already announced job cuts in the country and massive German company Thyssenkrupp is cutting thousands from its steel division.
Volkswagen has been the holdout, though only because it hasn’t quite settled on the scope of cuts in Germany. The cuts are coming.
Volkswagen sees no chance of avoiding layoffs and plant closures in order to cut 4 billion euros ($4.2 billion) in costs, the brand’s chief executive said in a newspaper interview, amid an escalating dispute with workers.
Thomas Schaefer’s comments further deepen a conflict with unions, who have threatened strikes at the carmaker from December and have asked the company to present solutions in ongoing negotiations over pay and capacity that exclude both factory closures and major job cuts.
“Ultimately, any solution must reduce both overcapacity and costs. We can’t just stick a band-aid on it and keep dragging it along. That would come back to bite us later in a serious way,” Schaefer told weekly Welt am Sonntag.
I might try to explain why this has happened to Germany at large at some other point, but I’m not sure I have the interest in getting into the argument quite yet.
Cadillac Might Finally Get To Race In F1
I was more than a little mad when Formula One indicated that Cadillac/Andretti racing would be left out of the sport. It seemed random and a little cruel given that one of the teams is Kick Sauber.
Now it seems like Cadillac will get in relatively soon, albeit via Ferrari engines.
From Jenna Fryer at the AP:
The team will be called Cadillac F1 and powered by Ferrari engines when it enters the sport in 2026. General Motors is expected to complete its own Cadillac power unit ahead of the 2028 season.
Multiple industry insiders spoke to the AP about the grid expansion on condition of anonymity because an announcement ahead of Saturday night’s Las Vegas Grand Prix could potentially steal the spotlight from the showcase event on the F1 calendar.
F1 is now American-owned, which means that the Department of Justice’s antitrust investigation into the sport is something it has to take seriously. I wonder if this doesn’t just conveniently solve that problem.
People Want SUVs But Want To Pay Sedan Prices
Here’s a fun stat, for the first time since Edmunds started tracking it, the first 10 months of the year saw “car” sales hit just 19%, the lowest ever. At the same time, SUVs hit 58%, the highest ever. That’s good news for most automakers as SUVs and crossovers tend to carry a price premium. That’s not-so-good for consumers as the Detroit Free Press reports:
“As passenger vehicles lose further popularity and drop to their lowest share of sales we’ve ever seen, automakers continue to bolster their SUV lineups to meet consumers with vehicle types they prefer,” said Jessica Caldwell, Edmunds’ head of insights. “What’s complicating things for the industry is that this ongoing transformation is set against a challenging landscape of rising costs and limited affordability. Producing the bigger vehicles that consumers desire at prices they can actually afford is an arduous task that every automaker is already grappling with in the current market.”
This is where vehicles like the Nissan Kicks and Chevy Trax tend to shine, although I think there’s still gotta be some kind of market for actual cars in the United States.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
I’ve always liked this Moloko song “Fun For Me” because it sounds like the answer to the question: What if Portishead was goofy? It turns out I’m good with that for exactly one song, and no more.
The Big Question
How serious is Jaguar?
The title reminds me of the infamous Sex Pistols, Bill Grundy interview. “Tell me one thing, are you serious?”
https://youtu.be/LtHPhVhJ7Rs
“They’re WONDERFUL people”
In the argument of sedans over SUVs, why show what was arguably the worst sedan made in the last twenty years(second gen Malibu) in the header image? That’s an image I won’t get out of my head any time soon.
I think the one thing that will kill Jaguar permanently is to become yet another boutique EV maker selling cars, SUVs and the like for $150K plus……there are too many out there already – all failing, and the competition from the Chinese EV makers will finish the job.
When’s the last time everyone was talking about Jaguar? See…. it’s working. As Oscar Wilde said “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about”
Longtime Jaguar owners…
There are dozens of us! Dozens!
Pretty sure the issue Jaguar has is that for the last number of years, they HAD no more customers. Regardless of what they end up attempting here with their ad campaign, I sort of doubt that they care much about their loyal customers, who by the numbers, don’t really exist. Obviously those online accounts are more than likely, liars.
I think the beating they took last week was deserving for just how derivative the campaign appeared to be. It made me laugh. As for the term “woke”, God help me make it through Thanksgiving without hearing that word.
I keep hearing that word and I don’t know what it means. But from the sound of it, don’t want whatever it is in my history. So can someone PLEASE explain what the heck “woke” means?
Woke: aware of and actively attentive to important societal facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice)
So, not offensive to Karen’s, got it.
Originally, the term referred to being politically conscious, especially in regard to the premise of systemic racism.
Now it’s being used as a catchall by the right for basically anything that might even be remotely progressive. And often in a totally incoherent way. In this case, Jaguar’s add campaign would be “woke”, simply for featuring people who are not white in weird clothing. It doesn’t take much.
Luckily for all the persons looking to cancel Jaguar for maybe the least offensive thing about this whole new Jaguar. The Audi White Power Package is ready to take their money.
Given the news from Germany this morning, the White Power Package is probably the least of our worries.
The Jaguar outrage is a pretty ridiculous since they haven’t even shown the car yet. Any car person I know that actually is into cars, does not really give a single F what the ad campaign was for the car they are driving. All these people are just preemptively slinging hate, over what? Some marketing nonsense? Why?
That said, I am worried about them. Jaguar has a rich heritage and history and is responsible for so many epic cars… but I don’t know where they should go today. They can’t really compete with Audi/BMW, they don’t have the bank accounts, or the volume. So they need to move to a lower volume/bespoke manufacturing, but… yeah, not sure what the plans are.
I do think that a company that ditched technology entirely (no touch screens, no backup camera, no lane assist) and focused on mechanical interaction/analogue feel of all touchpoints might be a winning combination. I can tell you that when I’m driving my old 911, civic, jag, or any of the other old piles of bolts around, I don’t miss technology at all. I do miss air conditioning….
I’m deeply fascinated that people, Autopian and seemingly all other media platforms are spending so time and energy discussing a new Jaguar branding platform and marketing campaign, and not a new car, platform or new technology. We like to think we are independent thinkers, but it might seem that we’re actually much more concerned about how we, and the brand we choose to associate ourselves with, is perceived rather than how good the product actually is.
If Jaguar actually had a product to talk about, we might be able to discuss how good it is. This is all we got, though.
Yeah I know, but we’re all getting played.. these superficial and polarizing brand engagement discussions is exactly what the EY strategy consultants wanted from the beginning. It’s just a red herring.
As for SUVs for the price of sedans.
I’m about 10 years from retirement. When I retire, I don’t need 2 vehicles. Right now I have an ancient minivan and an ancienter Sedan. If they both last until retirement, I can absolutely see myself downgrading to a single vehicle for me and my wife to use.
We likely won’t need a minivan, but we will need something with a big cargo opening like it. And unless I hit the lottery or the stock market goes absolutely insane in the next 10 years, I won’t have the money to be comfortable with Minivan pricing.
Which leads to thinking an SUV is a good fit for our next vehicle. I still feel horrible about that, but I console myself by calling them “Hatchbacks with a lift kit” which sounds better than a Crossover or “softroader” or the like.
You just described the Subaru Crosstrek, which in my area is very popular indeed.
That’s how I see my current car. It’s a giant hatchback. Only with AWD and being classed as a compact SUV. It’s so nice being able to toss whatever into the cargo area. Large stuff just, well, fits.
Jaguar wants to control the narrative of the new product announcement as best they can and that’s to get as many eyes on the launch as possible, rather than most people seeing it on whatever social media post pops up on their feed. Since rage baiting and controversy is what works on social media, that’s likely how the product will be framed after the announcement.
By creating this fluffy pre-announcement buzz that is essentially meaningless, as we’ve compared to fragrance ads, they hope to maximize the impact of their own messaging around the new car and rebrand. Is what I think, anyway.
I feel bad for not caring about Jaguar.
I guarantee you that “state spirit” does not now, nor have they ever, owned a Jaguar.
The people who whine and moan and claim they’re going to boycott a company are never customers. They are liars. They want to marginalize others and maximize their own privilege and they always use dishonesty to further that goal. They pretend they’re long time customers. They pretend that the group they’re targeting is known for doing things they aren’t. They claim knowledge that they don’t have.
What’s woke here? The models have more than one skin tone. They want their lives to only contain people who look and live like them, and they’re going to make up as much shit as possible in order to achieve that goal.
So the team will be called “Allante”?
People on social media are irrational and close minded? When did this happen? I’m so confused.
Wow, I saw what looks like basically a perfume commercial and others saw “woke” and “DEI”. Crazy world we live in.
I hope Jag makes it because they’ve always been an aspirational brand for me, but I think they will likely fail. If they’re trying to go upscale like Rolls or Bentley, I don’t think it’ll work because, as far as I know, they’re not thought of as being in that class. I would consider them a competitor to Benz or BMW, pricey, but attainable. In the EV space, I think they’re just going to hemorrhage money for a couple years and fold. That market is too crowded and the demand for high priced examples is week – see the Mercedes EQS.
If anyone every asks what the stereotypical waif-like runway model from the 80’s-90’s that makes everyone else wonder “who looks like that?”, and was easily pointed to for reams of women turning to all sorts of serious eating disorders for ‘a look’ — they look like the new Jaguar.
There’s a reason it fell out of favour. I hope they fail.
So if a Jag is a “brand” and not a nice little motor for Arrfur, I wonder what its perfume (coming to you soon, every “brand” needs one) will smell like?
My guess is sickly boiled sweet smell, which is ever so trendy at the moment.
Any one who suggests spraying armpits with WD40, instead should be ashamed.
Recently my Jag has given off the sweet smell of burning coolant.. that could be a nice note.
Hot dirty gear oil sourced from a long forgotten authentic vintage stock of gear oil made from actual extract of rotten sperm whales.
Absolutely would buy. And get thrown out of the house when my wife gets a whiff. But still worth it.