When the degree of "involution" in the automobile market continues to escalate, serious anxiety spreads throughout the industry, and many companies are involved in price wars, which intensifies the competition situation of the entire industry.
The tense nerves, the working state of chicken blood, and the press conference with all their might, made the automobile industry, which was supposed to "meet the people's growing needs for a better life", gradually lose the sense of relaxation it should have.
This lack of relaxation was regained at the Range Rover Night on April 12. This is an event full of cultural connotation and artistic beauty, whether it is the venue layout or the event itself, it reflects the style and taste of Jaguar Land Rover as a luxury brand, and also allows us to see the best way to break the "involution" - high-end and differentiation.
On the same day, Wu Chen, President of Jaguar Land Rover China and Chery Jaguar Land Rover Joint Marketing Sales and Service Agency, also announced the official launch of the new Range Rover Sport SV Edition One Limited Edition, once again elevating sporty performance and luxury to a new level, bringing an exceptional travel experience to valued customers. The car is limited to 15 units in Chinese mainland, and the official suggested retail price is 2.438 million yuan.
"The new generation Range Rover combines stunning modern aesthetics with elegance and takes luxury, craftsmanship and performance to new heights. If the Range Rover brand is the crown of luxury SUVs, then the SV is the jewel in the crown – exclusive and revered. The Range Rover brand will create a unique new modern luxury lifestyle with a unique state of luxury. Wu Chen said.
At the same time as the event, the global Range Rover brand experience platform "Range Rover Realm" officially landed in China, and invited Tim Yip, the best art director of the Academy Awards, as a special guest artist, in the PuXuan Hotel, which can enjoy the magnificent scenery of the Forbidden City, the perfect fusion of oriental classical poetry and Western modern art, showing the spiritual realm of "people, cars and life in one", and also making "luxury" more tangible embodiment and landing.
"The end of luxury is the Range Rover. In an interview with "Huashan Sword V", Wu Chen emphasized many times that in the current market, we must be firm to be ourselves, take our own path, and believe that the future scenery will be more vast.
With "high fashion", the peak charm of "new modern luxury".
"Last year, we did a great job. This is Wu Chen's opening remarks.
The "big event" he refers to is that at the Shanghai Auto Show a year ago, Jaguar Land Rover announced that its brands would be re-split and sorted out into the four major brand families of Range Rover, Defender, Discovery and Jaguar.
The goal is clear: to further emphasise each brand's development goals, brand appeal and personalization, reinterpreting the "new modern luxury".
"We meet the unique needs of users by emphasizing each brand's brand personality, brand 'sense of need' and brand appeal," Wu said. The four independent brands will further create a more refined driving journey for customers' lives, meet consumers' expectations and needs, and achieve more value creation. What we need to think about now is how to empower the brand by telling a good product story, and at the same time let the aura of the brand bless the product. ”
He said that among the four major brands, Guardian represents the courage to move forward and embrace the impossible. Although there are many "square boxes" in the Chinese market at present, the original technology and off-road spirit of the Guardian cannot be imitated. Originality is the truth, in the next 3-5 years, the Defender brand will usher in greater development, the Range Rover brand is the birth of the benchmark, the pursuit of "winning as a model", so the next step will increase investment in SV.
Put simply, the Range Rover SV offers a more personalised, high-end bespoke experience, with not only exclusive logos on the exterior and interior design compared to regular Range Rover models, but also some special performance and configuration options. The new Range Rover Sport SV Edition One Limited Edition is the ultimate in "haute couture".
In fact, as early as 1957, Land Rover set up a department dedicated to car tuning. After more than 60 years of accumulation and innovation, the SVO Special Vehicle Technology Center has 200 industry-leading designers, engineers and technical experts.
In order to better promote the SV business, on the basis of the existing SV models and customization services, the Range Rover SV Bespoke private customization business will be officially launched in the "Range Rover Land" from now on, and the first Range Rover SV Bespoke private customization center will also open in Beijing in the second half of this year, giving Chinese customers the opportunity to create a "unique Range Rover for you" with the SV Haute Couture team.
Specifically, after the launch of the Range Rover SV Bespoke private customization business, the exterior and interior will bring more refined, richer and more personalized choices and original customization options to meet the needs of the most discerning customers, so that private customization has unlimited possibilities.
The all-new Range Rover Sport SV Edition One, for example, is available in a limited edition with over 1.6 million different customisation options, but also takes performance to new heights. Powered by a new 635 hp twin-turbo V8 engine with mild hybrid technology, it can reach a top speed of 290 km/h and accelerate to 100 km/h in 3.8 seconds in the newly optimised SV dynamic mode.
Jamal Hameedi, Head of Global Business at SV, said: "It is the fastest, strongest, sportiest and most technologically advanced Range Rover Sport ever. From luxury specs, to sporty performance, to all-terrain capability, it's been enhanced like never before. ”
Wu Chen also said that SV business should be the best: first, to tell a good brand story, second, to meet customer needs, and strive to open the door to SV's top private exclusive for customers, and third, to solve every pain point in the customer journey. "Range Rover Realm will also be launched in the Greater Bay Area, East China and Southwest China this year, covering core cities, allowing more users to experience the ultimate respect for the Range Rover brand. ”
We will strengthen our brand rebranding and unswervingly promote our electrification strategy
In line with Range Rover Realm, we have seen different branding and marketing campaigns for the four major brand families over the course of the past year. For example, the fastest-growing Defender has only entered the Chinese market for three or four years, but its recognition and recognition are very high, which is inseparable from Jaguar Land Rover's crowd positioning and brand activities for Defender.
Last year, on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the Defender, Jaguar Land Rover held a new brand campaign "Warriors, Heroes", and for the first time, many Defender owners were officially gathered. Wu Chen said that at that time, the car owners drove their guards from all over the world to gather from all over the world, singing and dancing together, and talking about their own stories, which was very touching. This year, the brand campaign will continue.
"We will not blindly follow the product, in our opinion, the real intelligent luxury, is not the stacking of large screens and refrigerators, color TVs, large sofas, but a set of vehicle workmanship, materials, technology is equal to one, which is Jaguar Land Rover as a luxury brand adhere to. For example, our Defender is recognized as the original in the field of hard-core off-road SUVs, and each generation of Defender models is the culmination of ATRS all-terrain technology, and at the same time, the Defender has also gained countless fans of hard-core off-road enthusiasts with its own hard-core off-road aesthetics and original aluminum body. Wu Chen said that as a traditional luxury brand, Jaguar Land Rover has a large customer base, and it also has the recognition of customers, and the foundation is more solid. Therefore, there is an opportunity to take a step forward, both in terms of time and financial resources.
So, how to ensure the uniqueness and resource matching of the four brands in the long run? Wu Chen said——
The first is the adjustment of the internal mechanism of the headquarters, each brand will set up a separate business department in the UK headquarters, and in the future, such a mechanism will be set up in China, and each team will be responsible for a brand, giving full play to the role of horizontal coordination.
Secondly, in terms of channels, Jaguar Land Rover currently has 210 4S stores, and on this basis, it will adjust and upgrade the form of dealerships according to the needs of different brand customers. "Jaguar Land Rover will no longer expand its dealer network in the form of 4S stores, except in certain regions. If customers need it, we will bring users a richer brand experience and maximize brand benefits in more diversified forms such as experience centers and boutiques, with the empowerment of digitalization. ”
On the experience side, in order to promote the further implementation of "new modern luxury", the world's first dealership store applying the standard of new modern luxury has settled in Beijing Huitong Luhua, and Shanghai has also welcomed Asia's first independent Range Rover haute couture center. Next, this new retail model will also be gradually promoted to dealer stores across the country.
"The Chinese market is big enough, and the most important thing is that as long as you make differentiation and focus enough, you can win the market space it deserves. Wu Chen said.
In his view, "reshaping the future" is not a slogan for Jaguar Land Rover, but a set of long-term strategies that can be implemented and supported by the bottom, which has very profound reference significance for the whole industry that is in the "throes" of the transition period.
Take electrification, for example.
Some people believe that the electrification of China's auto market has been surging in the past two years, and Jaguar Land Rover's electrification transformation is not lagging behind? But Wu Chen said that on the one hand, Jaguar Land Rover's strategy for electrification transformation has never hesitated or changed; on the other hand, the transformation should be market-oriented, not blind and hard.
According to the plan, the first model of the Jaguar brand will be a four-door GT pure electric model, which is expected to be officially launched in 2025.
"It's an eye-catching and exciting car that is very British, and it will also refresh the brand. Wu Chen said.
Meanwhile, Range Rover's first all-electric model based on the MLA luxury electrical architecture will make its global debut in 2024 and will be available to Chinese consumers next year. The all-electric Range Rover Sport will follow. The first Range Rover family electric model, built on the EMA platform architecture, will be available in 2025. Subsequently, the electrification products of the Defender and Discovery families will also be launched one after another.
Wu Chen has repeatedly emphasized that for Jaguar Land Rover, electrification is just a new power mode, and it will not give up its luxury genes. So, an electric Range Rover is also a Range Rover, but it gives the user an additional power option. "If you're looking for a quieter, quicker Range Rover, you can opt for an electric Range Rover, and if you don't have a particular preference, the Range Rover is quiet enough and has plenty of power. We don't deliberately distinguish between electric and petrol Range Rovers, we just offer different options to our customers. ”
epilogue
It is this clear awareness and action that enables Jaguar Land Rover to "stand alone" in the "involutional" car market.
According to the data, Jaguar Land Rover's retail sales in the Chinese market in 2023 will be 106377 units, a year-on-year increase of 25%. Among them, Range Rover delivered more than 25,000 units year-on-year, up 31% year-on-year, Defender delivered nearly 20,000 units year-on-year, with sales up 59% year-on-year, Discovery annual sales increased by 14%, and Jaguar's annual sales increased by 23% year-on-year.
In particular, Range Rover and Defender, which represent the height of the brand, have become irreplaceable in the market segment. For Wu Chen, who has just joined the team for a year, he said that he is lucky enough, and he also hopes to contribute more personal energy in the context of great changes in the industry to promote the four brands to greater development space.