Jaguar Slashes Prices Because It Really Needed To
Jaguar-Land Rover might be looking to expand their manufacturing operations, but it isn’t because the car side of the business is booming.
Out of the 36 brands sold in the United States, Jaguar is seeded 32nd year-to-date with 10,221 units sold, ahead of Maserati (7,506), Smart (4,682), Bentley (1,685) and Alfa Romeo (443), and behind Fiat (28,421), Scion (32,691) and Porsche (34,876).
(Holy crap, Porsche is selling more vehicles than Scion and Fiat!)
To stem the tide, Jaguar is cutting prices and introducing free maintenance in the United States, addressing the two main concerns prospective buyers have with the brand — high purchase pricing and maintenance costs — according to Automotive News.
The Jaguar XF, once the most expensive offering in its segment, received a price reduction of $5,275, landing the final MSRP at $52,895 with freight. F-TYPE pricing remains similar, but with additional equipment for added value. Other models see adjustments between $1,500 and $3,000 either to pricing or enhanced packaging.
The new EliteCare program provides 5-years or 60,000 miles of complementary scheduled maintenance on 2016 model year vehicles.
Hopefully the new F-PACE and entry-level XE, with a starting price of $35,895, will turn things around for the British marque.
More by Mark Stevenson
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Jaguars problem is marketing . Say what one will about cheesy Hollywood XKRs in corny James Bond films, but it kept the brand in people's minds.BMW? Lexus? MB? Obvious luxo brands. Jaguar? Uhh.....oh, yeah that's like the British Infiniti, but without the post-50K mile reliability (hence resale). Range Rover makes SUVs , so they'll do alright without the need for heavy marketing.
I worked for a multiline luxury dealership from 2004-2008, and Range Rover sold a lot of Escalades...people would lease or buy ONE Rover, and they turned out to be so nightmarish that they would march across the parking lot to the Cadillac store and get an Escalade the next time. Mercedes MLs and RLs had the same effect. The fixed operations manager's wife leased a Mercedes RL350 and by the end of the lease, the service department had turned in $33,000 in warranty repairs trying to keep that heap running. She wound up in an Escalade too, by the time the dust settled. That dealership has since added Jaguar to their lineup, and dropped Cadillac, so I wonder how that plays out when their buyers get disgusted with a particular brand of SUV, they have no fallback unless they go to the Chevy store across the street...
Jaguar seems like a brand which has largely lost its reason to be. Chasing the Germans is a fools errand, and Jaguar no longer leads in Grace, Pace and Space. The combination of high initial price, me-too technology and a loss of real uniqueness and passion combined with a long history of poor reliability and a revolving door of owners leaves consumers with little reason to pay attention. If you want OMG uniqueness, get a Maserati. Why a Jaguar? is an increasingly difficult question to have a great answer to.
Wow. Jaguar's barely outselling Maserati. How the once-semi-mighty have fallen.