On 27 April, Porsche held an online launch of the new car, and its Taycan family launched the first pure electric crossover multi-purpose car, the Taycan Cross Turismo. But in the live broadcast room, a group of rights defenders frantically swiped the screen in the comment area, and the scene was very embarrassing.
In the past four months of 2022, luxury car brands have become the hardest hit areas for rights protection. Mercedes-Benz EQC due to frequent motor failures by the owners of the collective rights protection, BMW many models have the problem of "burning oil" and suspected sales fraud has become a major complaint, and now, Porsche is also because of the Reduction of Million Luxury Cars and suspected fraud and anger a large number of car owners.
In these cases, we can find that "de-allocation" and "suspected fraud" seem to be the mainstream crimes of recent luxury car rights protection, why do they have no fear? Who spoiled these luxury car brands?
Porsche was exposed as "allocation reduction + dishonesty"
Porsche owners angrily brushed the screen in the live broadcast room to defend their rights, because Porsche because of the shortage of chips, the vehicle delivered to the owner did not have an electronic steering column, but first installed a manual steering column, and promised the owners to supplement the electronic steering column afterwards.
But soon, Porsche changed its mouth to say that it would not make up for the electric steering column, and only provided a voucher of 2300 yuan as compensation, and the owner went to the 4S store to install the electronic steering column separately at a cost of 30,000 yuan.
Some car owners believe that Porsche plays double standards, pointing out that they have marked on the official website abroad that "due to the lack of chips to temporarily provide manual steering columns", but the Chinese official website does not have this label, which makes domestic car owners feel that they have encountered unequal treatment.
It is reported that the models involved in the reduction are mainly Cayenne Cayenne, Taycan, Paramela Panamera, and a small number of Macan, most of which are priced at the million yuan level. Black Cat Complaint, a complaint platform owned by Sina Weibo, received collective complaints from more than 60 Porsche owners in one day. Porsche owners have also set up a rights group of more than 500 people.
As a super luxury brand, Porsche has launched more than 500,000 yuan of SUVs - Macan to penetrate the mainstream market of luxury brands such as BBA and has been successful in the Chinese market. According to the data, Porsche delivered a total of 95,671 vehicles in China in 2021, and China has become the world's largest single market for Porsche brands for seven consecutive years, which shows the importance of the Chinese market to Porsche.
However, the Porsche cars that Chinese car owners have spent millions of dollars on have not enjoyed the treatment that luxury cars deserve, and the new cars delivered are not even equipped with electronic steering columns. At present, it is not known how many Porsche cars in the Chinese market have been reduced, but according to media reports, some Porsche sales staff mentioned in communication with the 12315 staff that there are more than 20,000 new cars involved in the above problems.
A number of luxury brands have flipped this year
Porsche is not the first luxury brand to overturn this year, before Porsche, Mercedes-Benz, BMW owners of the collective rights protection incident are boiling over.
On the eve of 315 this year, nearly 100 BMW car owners jointly sent an email to the Defective Product Management Center of the State Administration for Market Regulation to reflect the problem, hoping that the manufacturer could solve the problem of burning oil by recalling the problem vehicle, but as of now there is still no follow-up.
In addition to burning oil, BMW X3, X4, 5 Series, 3 Series, X4, Z4, and Z4 are also suspected of sales fraud, including "using a castrated version of the ID7 car system", "lack of manual description function", "unable to upgrade remotely", and so on. As of press time, Che quality network received 98 BMW-related complaints in April, and the problems were basically "sales fraud, which is inconsistent with publicity".
Mercedes-Benz side, before the 315 has encountered many times the collective rights of car owners, the matter stems from the motor failure, since September 2021, there have been Mercedes-Benz EQC owners complained about "the motor burned out", "the motor is still burned out after replacement". Although Beijing Benz announced its recall plan on February 18 this year, deciding to recall some EQC electric vehicles with production dates from August 15, 2022 for the period from November 30, 2018 to December 15, 2021, owners are still not satisfied, denouncing Mercedes-Benz as "a guinea pig that makes Chinese consumers endlessly act as a defective product".
In addition to the above brands, the volvo XC60 also caused public anger for secretly reducing the allocation in the first two months. According to the owner, the 2022 Volvo XC60 produced in October and November is suspected of reducing the induction rear tailgate function, but the manufacturer and dealer have not informed consumers.
Although allocation reduction and false publicity have become a common problem for many car companies, when luxury brands such as Porsche, BMW, and Volvo also have these low-level problems, the spearhead of public opinion is easy to point to these luxury car brands that should have enjoyed luxury-level treatment.
Why do luxury car brands have no fear?
Judging from the above-mentioned attitude of these luxury brands to the rights protection of car owners, they seem to care less about these negative public opinions, and they are a little arrogant and calm.
For example, Porsche arbitrarily "broke the contract" and replaced the electronic steering column worth 30,000 yuan with a voucher of 2,300 yuan; BMW's suspected sales fraud incident was still fermented for several months. If the previous luxury car owner was a noble customer, then the current luxury car owner is just an ordinary user.
Why do these luxury car brands have no fear? It can be said that China's fast-growing luxury car market has spoiled mainstream luxury brands.
After China's automotive industry shifted from an incremental market to a stock market, the demand for additional purchases and exchanges brought about by consumption upgrading has grown rapidly, so luxury cars have become an important driving force for the growth of the passenger car market, and are also regarded as the segment with the most growth potential in the industry.
In the first quarter of 2022, the market share of luxury passenger cars reached 13.7%, and last year's highest month was as high as 15.4%, while in 2017, the luxury car market share was only 7.4%, an increase of 6.3 percentage points in five years.
BBA and luxury brands such as Lexus, Volvo and Porsche have enjoyed the dividends of the rapid growth of China's luxury car market, and sales in China have increased significantly in the past few years.
Porsche, for example, sold less than 10,000 vehicles (9,090 vehicles) in the Chinese market in 2009 and has approached 100,000 vehicles (95,671 units) in 2021, an increase of nearly 10 times in 12 years.
Bmw, Porsche, and Volvo, which have been exposed to allocation reductions and false publicity, even in the most difficult 2021, sales in China still maintain a growth momentum, but the shortage of chips should not be a reason to secretly reduce allocations. One or two negative public opinions may not be able to crush a company, but the image and reputation of the enterprise will be quickly lost in these events, and eventually collapse completely.
Establishing a good brand image is a long and difficult process, and destroying the word-of-mouth image may only take one wrong step. Good image and good reputation are not easy to come by, and they are good and cherished.