Do you think that Mini buyers really care where the car is assembled? BMW has built a successful brand with Mini. When I tell people that BMW is the company behind the Mini, this is generally well received.

German car companies are simply using their brand equity to leverage more sales. I guess I’m just confused, do you also have a problem with Coach bags assembled in China?

“[N]early every advert, publicity shot and poster I see of a Mini is nearly always the same. British racing green and a Union flag on the top.”

I would hasten to add “in England.”

That is, like Chevy’s whole “American Revolution” business on US television, Mini’s marketing, in Britain, plays up the British roots of the car, and glosses over the fact that it is, in fact, a BMW. Outside the UK, the Mini’s Britishness is not hyped up nearly so much, and my guess is that most Mini buyers, counted on a global basis (i.e. in the US), don’t particularly care.

When was the last time you saw a Vauxhall advert (in the UK) playing up the American/German/Belgian/Whatever origins of that car? At home, GM plays the patriotic card, while abroad it does not. Similarly, at home, Mini plays up the patriotic card, while abroad it is content merely to be a desired and damn good little niche product.

So it may be brand suicide in the UK, but I doubt anyone else cares.

If the “Britishness” of the car didn’t matter, then why do they push it in their publicity? Just sell it as a car?

Don’t get me wrong, I like the Mini (Especially the Mini Cooper S Cabriolet), but it’s the way BMW push the Britishness of it, then make it abroad.

If anything, my original post is how the UK car industry is going down the drain. I don’t want it go down, because my job is heavily reliant on it!

@Vega, with all due respect, I am heavily critical of German manufacturers because I know they can do better. It annoys me when I see them running at a sub par level. On a good day, the Germans can match (if not beat) the Japanese. So let’s see it happen!

OK now the pattern is getting clearer: It’s obviously not only Volkswagen, it’s all german automakers that you obviously have a problem with. Let’s face it: Porsches are made in Finland (Boxster and Cayman) and Slovakia (Cayenne), Mercedes and BMW are producing in the US, BMW also in South Africa etc. Magna (which is in Austria, not in the fatherland)has produced cars for, amongst others, Mercedes, BMW and Chrysler. Not really brand suicide.

But at least your reference system is consistent: In a world where one of the most successful CEOs (Wiedeking) is just a “puppet”, surely a blockbuster hit like the Mini must be a “total joke”. Black is white. Up is down. I get it.

I mean, really. The SAS are pretty kick ass, the beer is good, and I rank a British accent number two on the list of sexiest chick accents but…

Not much to brag about being British.

Having said that, the Mini SUV is an abomination -but not because its not made in Britain but because it exists at all.

Bad enough, the Germans are clinging onto the Britishness of the Mini, now they want to dilute it down even further by making them in Austria, thereby adding no Britishness to it, at all!

God the UK is slowly becoming a joke in car terms. Mind you, we still have Aston Martin……until them CEO sells them to a foreign car maker in order to add “value to the company”!

P.S. For the record, “The Sun” is not so much a newspaper, more a comic. So there may be no truth in this article at all. Personally, I think BMW would be committing brand suicide by making Minis outside of the UK. I mean, part of Mercedes-Benz’s identity is the German-ness of it. It wouldn’t have the same ring if your S-Class was built in Italy, would it? Or Porsches built in Japan?