Is Jaguar Serious?

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.

Per Reuters:

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?