Unslick Sticks: Aston’s been raiding the parts bin again

The first pictures of the interior of the one point seven five million dollar (US) Aston Martin One-77 were published today after the car’s official reveal at the illustrious Villa d’Este Concorso d’Eleganza.

Whatever you may think of the overall design theme, allow me to draw you to one tiny yet, for me, crucial detail: the indicator/wiper stalks.

Just in case you hadn’t got it in the opening line, this car costs ONE POINT SEVEN FIVE MILLION DOLLARS yet possesses black plastic sticks that would be right at home in something costing a hundred times less.

Lest we forget, the Bugatti Veyron, the hallowed company of which the One-77 would like to keep, possesses milled stalks with tolerances that would make a Swiss watchmaker weep. They’re also reputed to cost $4000 a pop.

For this wannabe sybarite (me, not the Aston), something ripped out of Grannie’s hatchback just doesn’t cut it.

More befuddling is that pretty much everything else in the cabin has been lovingly hewn from crystal, stainless steel, carbon fiber and Bang & Olufsen, materials that send a serious message about the craftsmanship of the car. Against this background, the presence of black plastic is somewhat of a shock.

To be fair, this car is number 1 of 77 and may be pre-production, but Aston’s got a history of bin raiding: the Vanquish was lambasted in the press for having Volvo S80 vents and Ford Fiesta stalks.

I would have thought, now that Aston is charging almost six times as much for this new beast as they did for the Vanquish, that they could have lashed out on something a bit more special. When you see the care an attention that has gone into detailing other parts of the car (the rear suspension block is my personal highlight), it really does seem a shame.

P.S Bonus points for anyone who can tell me where these parts have come from. They *could* be old Fiesta, but I’m not certain…

[Images: Drew Smith, Aston Martin and OmniAuto]

Filed under: Branding, Car, Design, Design Strategy, Perceived Quality, Premium, Aston Martin, Bugatti Veyron, Column Stalks, Concorso d'Eleganza, Ford Fiesta, One-77, Vanquish, Villa d'Este, Volvo S80

Update: Sue Cischke, meet Drew Smith. And Dan and Amy and Robb too!

Now with a 10 minute highlights reel of the original 40 minute interview

Last week I was offered the enormous privilege of taking part in a project being run by Joe Simpson and Mark Charmer of the Movement Design Bureau. They’ve been tasked with looking at the perception of Ford’s sustainability message, from top to bottom and inside out. Having watched the project develop over the last few months, I leapt at the chance to be involved.

I was asked to review Joe and Mark’s interview with Sue Cischke, Ford’s group Vice President of Sustainability, Environment and Safety Engineering and provide my observations based on what I heard. Given Sue’s long and illustrious history in the industry, it wasn’t a task I took lightly. My take on things now been published for the world (and Ford) to read and I’m looking forward to seeing the reaction.

It wasn’t all about me, however, and I commend you to read the fantastic contributions from Dan Stuges, of Intrago, and Amy Johannigman and Robb Hunter from the University of Cincinnati’s storied Department of Design, Architecture, Art & Planning.

One of the really exciting aspects of  this project is that 4 people have come together and drawn three different, but highly related (and, in my view, relevant) conclusions from Joe and Mark’s interview with Sue.

Although small in scale, the process amply demonstrates the power of the internet to enable collaboration and connection between geographically dispersed stake-holders, something that Clay Shirky talked about to great effect in his 2005 presentation at TED.

Head over to Re*Move to see the other critiques, plus a whole lot more on the Ford project.

Filed under: Collaboration, Design Strategy, Eco, Social Media, Sustainability, Things I like, Web, Amy Johannigman, DAAP, Dan Sturges, Ford, Intrago, Joe Simpson, Mark Charmer, Re*Move, Rob Hunter, Sue Cischke, University of Cincinnati

Keyhole Porn: Lamborghini Murciélago LP 670-4 SuperVeloce

Oh, what a tease!

Truth be told modern Lambos don’t turn me on much as vehicles for (dreaming about) owning. I’m much more likely to be found thinking indecently about an azure S2 Espada, brown/bronze LP400 Countach or, of course, the Miura in any colour going.

On the other hand, the epic Murciélago’s status as a piece of sculpture is undoubted, something that was confirmed as I rolled through the press images from the Shanghai motor show.

The above shot – heavily cropped from the image below – shows the superb game of peek-a-boo that the designers have played with Thor’s voicebox, otherwise known as the Murci’s V12.

It’s just a pity that the photographer’s assistant forgot to give the louvres a once-over with some Windex…

[Image: Automobili Lamborghini S.p.A.]

Filed under: Car, Eye Candy, Lamborghini, Things I like, Countach, Espada, Lamborghini, Lamborghini Murciélago LP 670-4 SuperVeloce, Miura

Cars, culture and how the General lost touch

My deep, abiding passion sits at the confluence of cars and culture.

For a while I thought I wanted to be the guy drawing cars but I soon came to realise I was more interested in the effect that cars have on people. The same goes for the flip-side: as the needs and wants of a culture change, people effect change on cars. It’s an engrossing cycle of cultural cause and effect.

So it was that I started my working life as a design strategist for the car industry. Like a pig in muck, I delight in observing the whys and hows of the choices people make when they buy a car. Connecting the emotional dots between the prospective customer’s personal needs, surface composition or the “face” of a brand and the eventual purchasing decision is a fascinating experience.

The most important lesson I’ve learnt, however, is that in my work my personal view counts for naught.

I’ve driven 400 Bhp bahnstormers that have left me stone cold and angry with the world (BMW 750i, Mercedes CL), been totally enchanted by an oddball French coupe that left others infuriated with it’s dynamic mediocrity (Renault Laguna) and I adore Volvo 200s and Citroen CXs. Clearly my automotive passions fall outside the mainstream.

Personally, I am but one consumer among millions (and one that’s unlikely to ever spend money on a new car). Professionally, however, it’s my job to elicit the passions, desires and fears both from individual customers and the cultural world they inhabit. I then filter this cocktail into a form that helps designer and eventual owner find a happy medium, that elusive product that sets synapses (and wallets) alight.

Grant McCracken has published a fascinating piece examining Bob Lutz’s role in GMs downfall. He argues that it was the former Car Czar’s imposition of his personal views on what a car should be, rather than understanding American culture, that lead to a yawning disconnect between American consumers and GM.

Of Lutz’s single-mindedness, McCraken has this to say:

“In point of fact, he knew relatively little about our culture. What Lutz knew was cars, and what he liked about cars, by all accounts, was speed….He loved muscles cars because they went fast. Lutz was worse than average as a river captain. I think it’s fairly safe to say that Lutz did not ever grasp the muscle car revival (the one portrayed by Hollywood in XXX, The Fast and the Furious, and now Fast and Furious). He must have gloried in the power and the glory and all that sound. Just as surely, he must have been mystified by fact that it was being produced in some case [sic] by tiny, winged Hondas.”

McCracken suggests that Lutz, to disastrous effect, let his personal emotions and story get in the way of understanding those of of GM customers. Lest we forget, this is the man that in the midst of the post-Inconvenient Truth environmental zeitgeist, declared global warming “…a total crock of shit.”.

Head over to McCracken’s blog to read the full piece, including an idea (one that I heartily support) about how the disconnect could have been avoided and why GM’s future, no matter what the courts have in store, looks bleak even after Maximum Bob’s departure.

Post script: My choice for Detroit Chief Cultural Officer? Freeman Thomas.

[Source: Grant McCracken, Chief Culture Officer: fixing Detroit now, 2009. Glenn Hunter, GM’s Lutz On Hybrids, Global Warming And Cars As Art, 2008] [Image: Andrew Philip Artois Smith]

Filed under: Branding, Car, Car Culture, Design, Design Strategy, BMW 750i, Bob Lutz, Car Culture, Citroen CX, General Motors, GM, Grant McCracken, Mercedes CL, Renault Laguna Coupe, Volvo 200

Coupe + SUV still = Fail

Did nobody tell Acura of the collective slack-jaw expression that met the BMW 5 GT in Geneva? Or of the decidedly muted market reception to the proportionally challenged, stupendously impractical X6?

I guess not: Acura wants to have this monstrosity in dealers before the year is out.

Somehow one of the automotive design sites managed to find something to recommend in the ZDX’s lazy BMW pastiche but I’m not buying it.

From mind-blowingly awful “power plenum” grille (plenums this ugly should stay put under the hood) to the hideous confluence of surfaces at the rear via the comically small rear door (look at the opening in the interior shot below), this car makes the vulgar X6 look like the stylistic patron saint of pointless cross-overs.

As one designer friend put it, this car confirms Acura as the world’s premier publisher of 1st-year design student projects.

The lack of subtlety and detailing in the age of the new Volkswagen Polo, with it’s delightfully co-ordinated grille mesh and headlamp bulb caps, speaks volumes about how seriously Acura takes producing a premium product.

Filed under: Car, Concept, Design, Motor Shows, New York, Things I Hate, 5GT, Acura, BMW, X6, ZDX

Lost in Translation: The Running Joke

As I’ve stated before, having to rely on Google Translate can provide some pretty humorous moments in my daily web trawl.

The latest piece of translatory tomfoolery comes courtesy of Der Spiegel and the butt of the joke is that that braying, wounded beast General Motors and their new partner in Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility, Segway.

The headline of the article is Der fahrende Witz which translates as The Running Joke.

It’s a harsh blow – one of a few on the tubes yesterday – to the new partnership which proposes a 2-seater Segway as an urban mobility solution (head over to Re*Move for more in-depth coverage of the product itself). Sadly, however, it neatly sums up GM’s PR probleme du jour: they can’t do anything right.

From the sidelining of Saab – the European brand with arguably the best claim to a progressive eco image -, rocking up to congress in the company jet, the soporific Volt launch schedule and even the cancelling of the EV-1 project (which is coming back to bite them in the bum as a reminder of how GM “hates” innovation and panders to the oil companies), there is such an air of desperate ignorance that when GM does get something right, it’s now seen as nothing more than a cynical attempt to polish the turd that is their corporate image. Travesties like the Terrain only add insult to injury.

Well P.U.M.A is one initiative we shouldn’t kick while GM is down. Even if it does smell (just a little) of a desperate “Here’s one we prepared earlier!” manoeuvre, GM needs to be roundly applauded for proposing such a decidedly non-car solution to urban transport. However, as my mate Joe points out, success will hinge on P.U.M.A’s implementation as a service, not a product.

So three cheers to GM for fighting on and leveraging innovation as a way out of this funk and let’s give them whatever encouragement they need to become a sustainable mobility provider.

Head over to Re*Move for the complete run-down and in-depth analysis.

[Cheers to BonBon for the tip] [Image: Segway]

Filed under: Design Strategy, Eco, Lost in Translaton, Things I like, EV-1, G. M., General Motors, P.U.M.A, Saab, Segway

(Over)supply, (Shrinking) demand and a way to deal with it

Read a fantastic article yesterday penned by former CIA analyst Tom Whipple. In it he looks at the current state of the American auto industry and the very real impact of peak oil.

The most salient point is this:

In the next few years, oil prices are going up so high that ownership and use of the automobiles and trucks in their present form will be a totally uneconomic proposition. How many of the current flavor of cars and trucks is Detroit going to sell with gasoline at $10 a gallon or higher?

The U.S. already has some 250 million 2-axle motor vehicles (cars, light trucks, vans) running around and sitting in traffic jams (and only 200 million licensed drivers). With some tender care and adequate spare parts, this inventory easily could be useful for another 20 or 30 years considering how much less they are going to be driven once gas prices go up. Even the most optimistic do not see how there will be much oil around for powering private cars 25 years from now.

When one considers that we already have in operation more than enough cars and trucks with low mileage internal combustion engines to last us through the rest of the oil age, the only logical thing to do is to stop making more. That’s right — stop building and selling anything that consumes liquid fuels at anywhere near the rate consumed by our current fleet of vehicles.

Ties in nicely with the point I made two weeks ago in Sexy Old Mercs, Brand Building and Platform 21’s Repair Manifesto doesn’t it?

Tom goes on to discuss what Detroit should be doing to secure it’s medium and long-term future, acknowledging the phenomenal negative impact that the complete collapse of the American car industry would have on the economy, not to mention the America psyche.

Essentially he advocates an almost immediate halt in the production of vehicles getting less than 30mpg, much stricter (read 100 mpg) economy standards and the transition of the massive government fleets to natural gas. He also discusses the conversion of the existing passenger car fleet to at least partial electric power.

I must admit that this last point seems like a lot of ball ache for only a small improvement (this also happens to be my long-term view of production hybrids although I recognise their important transitional role). Surely a subsidised electric conversion programme would be a better bet? Especially if I could get my hands on one of these.

Happily, at no point does he discuss scrapping perfectly good cars that only need a little helping hand to keep them running in a more appropriate fashion.

Anyway, enough from me. It’s a great, well balanced article that’s well worth five minutes of your time.

[The Peak Oil Crisis: Seize the Moment found via The American Energy Crisis Image: Driek]

Filed under: Car, Design Strategy, Eco, Sustainability, Peak Oil, s2kev, Tom Whipple

2010 GMC Terrain

And you gave them HOW many of your taxpayer dollars!?

Get mad people. And then do something about it.

Filed under: Car, Design, Design Strategy, Things I Hate

The relentless pursuit of premium and why it’s a waste of time

I read an interesting post the other day on the Orange Envelopes Blog about the importance of consistency, authenticity and history in the creation of premium brands.

When I think about John Heaney’s argument applied to the automotive industry, there’s fertile ground for ripping certain brands to shreds. The market is littered with the humourously devalued remains of cars that have tried to punch well above their weight (VW Phaeton anyone?) yet still product teams chase the top end of the market in the head-long rush for fatter margins.

The most recent budget upstart wanting their slice of the premium pie is Hyundai with the unbelievably priced Equus. The 70-odd thousand Euro saloon is designed to sit atop the Huyundai range and consolidate the company’s upmarket ambitions (remembering that Hyundai has the critically acclaimed Genesis sitting just beneath).

But we can’t talk about the Equus and Genesis without taking a brief wander through the other vehicles in Hyundai’s range.

From the i20 up there’s not a single model that would sell on an authentically premium message. The closest you get – and it’s a long way off – is the Grandeur. The only person that this baroque monstrosity will tempt out of their German exec is Reg, the mini-cab driver who’s looking to offload his 20 year old, 6 owner E-Class.

I’m not saying that brands can’t create a more high-value proposition by appealing to the market’s more sybaritic side, but there is a limit to how far you can go. For me the Equus is writing premium cheques that the Hyundai brand can’t cash.

Let’s not forget that this is the company that made it’s name on the back of the Pony, Excel and Accent. These were cars that majored on dirt-cheap, reliable and thoroughly uninspired transport for those that didn’t care about what they drove, as long as it got them where they were going. It’s hardly the basis on which to quickly build a premium car empire. Surely the long, bloody wars fought by Acura, Lexus and Inifniti should be warning enough as to how long and hard the road to luxury superstardom will be.

The frustrating thing for me, as a design strategist, is that Hyundai has produced some fabulous concepts over the years that were focussed on creating a unique, innovation-led image that was much more in tune with the brand’s Korean heritage. Call it creating the K-Factor if you will (you heard it here first…).

When you think of Korea and Korean products, you don’t think of traditional luxury, you think of the amazing array of exceptional, high-tech product design from companies like LG and Samsung. The Qarmaq, Helion and Veloster translated some of this Korean cool into automotive form and gave a taster of what the brand’s designers could achieve given the freedom. The Equus shows what happens when the board wants a new limo, to horrifying effect.

In looking back to Heaney’s argument, Hyundai has neither the history, consistency or authenticity to make the Equus work outside of Korea.

It’s funny to think that the Korean brand to watch over the next couple of years is Hyundai’s budget sidekick, Kia. By being left out of the premium party they are free to develop their own, unique product identity that’s true to it’s affordable, Korean roots. If they can keep the creative juices that lead to the Soul flowing, Kia could well emerge as the cheaper Volkswagen, offering high-value, design-led products at a price point that’s completely in tune with the brand’s history.

Would You Buy a $30,000 Timex? | Orange Envelopes | Small Business Strategy, Design Thinking, Marketing and Branding.

Filed under: Adventures in Brand Extension, Branding, Car, Equus, Genesis, Grandeur, Hyundai, i20, John Heaney, K-Factor, Kia, Premium, Soul