Jaguar relaunch - genius or marketing madness with Rawdon Glover, Jaguar MD

0:28Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to Uncensored CMO. finally arrives. This is an amazing conversation. It was a real discovery. You're going to love this. Gordon Glover, welcome to the show. Thank you. Great to be here. Now, I'm delighted that we're having this conversation because it seems that Jaguar has become a very hot topic of conversation in a way that maybe it wasn't before. So you've done a great job of getting it into our consciousness. But before we come and talk about the new campaign, the new car, that kind of thing, I'd love to find out a bit about how do you get into the automotive industry in the first place and what's been your journey?

0:58I guess I, like a lot of people who don't really know what they want to do, I studied business studies, then thought marketing sounds quite interesting. I started my career with the Disney Corporation. I then moved into gaming actually and worked, set up the UK National Lottery. And then after sort of some years there, I saw an interesting opportunity as a marketing director of Audi in the UK. And I thought this should be interesting. I'll go and do that for a couple of years before I try and continue my, you know, a sense up the slippery pole of marketing roles. And 25 years later, something like that, I'm, I'm still here in the automotive industry.

1:35It sort of gets in your blood a bit really, but I've done lots of different things. So I was lucky when I worked for Volkswagen group, I worked across lots of different brands. I actually got out of marketing and then got into operations and general management. So I went to North America and worked over there for a few years and then joined jlr and so um that was yeah how long i've been here yeah about 12 years so this is my third role for jlr running jaguar a huge honor um prior to that i was running the uk operation which again for me was was probably my dream job that was the kind of if you think about i guess capabilities things that i'd done experiences i'd had it all felt it was kind of leading up to that point.

2:18And that is a, yeah, that's one of the best jobs in this company, I think, is the domestic market and was great fun. I loved it. I went through COVID, went through chip shortages, all sorts of interesting challenges in that. And then, yeah, then the Jaguar opportunity came up when I perhaps least expected it. Now, you took this role at a fairly interesting time, I guess, because you're coming out of COVID, like you say, you know, shortages in the supply chain and also a brand that sales were on the way down. So pretty challenging brief, I presume, pretty challenging time to be taking over the Jaguar brand.

2:49Yeah, I think, as I said, the job I was doing, I loved, and I was really happy doing it. But when I started, when I was first approached about considering this job, it was just something about the scale of it, the scale of the ambition, the complexity of what we're doing. so there's no there isn't really a playbook to say what we should do is we're going to cease production on all of our current vehicles and we're you know whether it's supply chain manufacturing whatever else we're going to stop we're going to completely reset we're going to reset at double the price point and we're going to completely reposition the brand in the process and we're going to do it with kind of one of the industry's most sort of cherished icons you know It's probably overused in the car industry, but I think Jaguar is a cherished brand, probably why there's been so much interest in what we're doing in a positive way.

3:43So I think, yeah, the scale of that was really interesting to me, the size of the challenge. And I think the best bit of career advice I ever had was don't sit on the comfy chair. Well, you definitely have not got the comfy chair now, right? We can confirm. Brief delivered. That's how I got here. That's how I got here. But it's a curious one to think about. how do you make a decision on a brand, as you say, that's loved by many, many people, amazing rich heritage? How do you decide between the evolutionary path and revolution? Because if you take Range Rover, you've done a spectacular job of updating it, modernizing it, but keeping effectively all the distinctive assets in place.

4:22Jaguar, you appear to have done something quite revolutionary. So how do you make that decision between evolution and revolution? Yeah, I think it's a really good question. And a really salient question for Jaguar, because if you think about most marketing jobs, I guess most people that listen to this podcast are interested or engaged in marketing. Brand management quite often is all about small incremental steps. You're a custodian of the brand. It's about evolving things very, very slowly over time. But I think there is a set of circumstances that were at play for Jaguar. So the technological landscape was changing massively, whether it's autonomous driving, whether it's electrification, the competitive landscape was changing massively we've seen a huge change in terms of competition coming across from asia you know the dynamics of our brand the age profile of our client base and i guess candidly the commercial performance of the brand if you kind of drew a venn diagram of all of those things coming together it really asked you know the answer clearly wasn't okay we just need to tweak here or tweak there.

5:30We needed to make a big change. We needed a complete reset. And perhaps what we'd been doing for the previous two decades was also further evidence of that in terms of what we were trying to do. We were really trying to play in the playground of the German premium brands. All of our products lined up identically in terms of the product process, the attributes. It was all like, okay, how are we going to compete here, here, and here? a very, very comparative sort of product and marketing approach. But the reality in that premium segment is it's dominated by manufacturing and procurement efficiencies.

6:07And in that context, it was just, it's brutally competitive. And what we've seen is that wasn't a place where Jaguar was going to thrive. Probably more pointedly, if you then think, well, when was Jaguar thriving? If you think about when Jaguar was at its best, it was selling a lot less vehicles at elevated price points you know it was renowned for making beautiful sedans and sports cars and in that context is it you know i think what we're doing is taking taking jaguar back to its natural habitat that's that's absolutely what we're doing because that was also you know probably the most recent time in history where it was you know a really commercially viable profitable business and that's i guess in a nutshell my the job I've been given the team that are working on it is we've got to make sure that Jaguar is here in another 90 years.

7:00We celebrate our 90-year history this year. And we think the best way to do that is to make vehicles that are going to be future icons, that are going to be things that people are talking about in 30 years' time in the same way as they are about the XGS and the E-Tite and some of those iconic vehicles of our past. That's, you know, in any strategy, you think about, you know, where do we want to play and how do we think we're going to win? If you look across our landscape, that's where we think Jaguar's got the best chance. And there's a lot of parallels. You know, you mentioned Range Rover. If we look at our business model as a relatively small manufacturer on the global scale, we make about half a million cars.

7:43Our business model works where you've got a really, really compelling product proposition. you've got a desirable brand and it's operating at a certain price point and range rover is probably the best illustration of that defender's probably the next best yeah and there are lots of parallels with defender in terms of what we did with defender you know not that long ago six six seven years ago i mean i remember vividly i was in i was in frankfurt when we unveiled the current defender I was running the UK at the time. I remember that sort of sense of anticipation, fear of, you know, what have you done to this iconic vehicle?

8:20But actually what the team had done, both from an engineering and design perspective, was exactly what we should have done. It was a 21st century Defender. It was clearly Defender, but it wasn't, you know, it wasn't a pastiche. It wasn't trying to, you know, go back. But it absolutely understood what is the DNA of a Defender. And in doing so, we were able to more than triple the volume and probably more than triple the price point. So if I'm looking for sort of parallels of what Jaguar needs to do, because we're looking to double the price point from where we have traditionally been operating about$55 ,000,$60 ,000,$55 ,000 UK sterling.

8:59That's the challenge that we've set ourselves. But when we look across what we've done with other brands, we think, well, actually, that's where JLR does succeed. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. I mean, one of the questions I think a lot of people had is, you know, the average age of a car buyer is, I think, 52. And I think something like 70 % of the nation's wealth resides in the over 50s, rightly or wrongly. And traditionally, that's where new cars, you know, are mainly bought, whereas actually, it appears you've made a contradiction to kind of target younger than that. And I found this statistic, which as you're chatting to Roy Sutherland about this, which he mentioned to me the other day, which blew my mind, which is Rolls Royce.

9:36Their average, across the range, their average buyer is 45, but the average buyer of their new Spectre, 35. That really blew my mind because you think a classic British brand, super expensive, super luxury, very exclusive. What is it about that brand? What is it about car buyers that have allowed that brand to go so young? Well, I think they've done a great job in, it's clearly a Rolls Royce, and they've done a great job in attracting a new audience. And a lot of the personalisation that they do is definitely key to that. But I think it speaks a lot to wealth is changing. Wealth is definitely getting younger.

10:12We see that the number of billionaires under 30 in China is incredible. And that's a global trend that's only going to accelerate. So if we look at the amount of inherited wealth that's going to land in the next 20 years, that's just going to turbocharge that whole dynamic. So, yeah, as you're right, you say probably 20 years ago, premium or luxury cars were very much the reserve of a certain age group. I think that's gone. Yeah. I think that's absolutely gone. And you see that in all sectors. You'll see it in watches, in luxury watches, you'll see it in clothing, and you absolutely see it in vehicles.

10:49So for us, that's definitely a macroeconomic trend that we're aware of and we wanted to tap into. And I guess a key point for us, yes, we want as many of our existing buyers to come on that journey with us, whether as fans, as enthusiasts, or, you know, would be great as buyers. But it was very clear from the demographics of our previous, you know, client base, we needed to attract a new audience. changing people's perceptions about what you stand for. And I guess this will be a theme of our conversation today, I'm sure. Brain's quite lazy. It pigeonholes things. I know what to think about brand X, brand Y.

11:26And to actually deconstruct that and get them to rewire it and to get them to think differently about that brand is not easy. Even if you've got billions to spend on communications, rewiring is difficult. So that sense about how do I get somebody to change their perception, the best approach we felt we could take was to be disruptive was to be you know and in terms of the you know our overall brand positioning of the vehicle when we looked at the competitive context we definitely thought there was a white space in terms of yes a more a more disruptive brand but without necessarily some of the sort of ostentation of some of the other brands that are disruptive in that space so in terms of yeah the lines of the vehicles and the design it's it is very clean it's very very very pure but actually as a brand yeah we wanted to stand out we wanted to cut cut through so yeah that was a key part of the strategy for us and how do you make that decision on because i think a lot of the challenge that came back was that you discarded a lot of the sort of distinctive assets i mean i was wondering about the you know the leaping cat and the jaguar on the front how do you decide between what to keep and what to what to discard good question um some things were quite straightforward so if i think about the icons associated with jaguar one of them would be the would be the grout what's known as the growler so it's a growling cat well that's really got connotations with throbbing combustion engines which you know for much of our history over 90 years that's exactly what it had so it was entirely appropriate to have that on the front of the vehicle well these next generation of vehicles are all electric does it make sense to have a growler for a car that doesn't grow you know for us it didn't perhaps our most definitely our most treasured asset in terms of you know in terms of the icons associated Jaguar is the Leaper so the Leaper is retained but it wouldn't be appropriate just to say well just we've retained the Leaper and we're just going to put it on the front of a completely new design language And, you know, as part of that process, I'm sure the team would have done that, but it wouldn't work.

13:34So what we needed to do is think about, right, how do we reinvent the Leaper to look appropriate in the context of that new design language? So actually the way we'll use it, we've got this visual device, 18 horizontal lines, which we call the strikethrough. And it's in the negative space in the strikethrough. it's much it's beautifully simplified and also now importantly leaping forward because if you actually look at the tagger actually it's actually pointing to the left whereas now subtly it will now it'll now move forward and where we're going to use that that um that particular icon we'll use it very sparingly and we'll use it on almost the most precious points within the vehicle so think about type 00 it's got that beautiful brass exterior plinth running just behind the front wheel arch.

14:22And it's almost like a hallmark of authenticity on there. So it's not going to be used at massive scale. It's, yeah, we're going to be very measured in terms of how we use it because it is that most treasured asset. So as we went through, we needed a new typeface. That was, you know, when you then look back at it and said, okay, it needs to be more modern. So the script and effectively our device mark was then born. And again, we've, again, slightly disruptive mixture of lower and uppercase vehicles, but that was more around how you get a beautiful symmetry and circular consistency of each of the languages.

14:58And we have this, and also then that actually opens up to all sorts of interesting artistic abstraction, probably for later on when it's a more established icon. But so we've looked at it and said, what do we need to keep? Definitely the Leaper. What perhaps we need to shed? Things like the Growler. And then what are those new icons that we need to develop? So you'll see that monogram come into play. You'll see the strike through. So those are the horizontal lines that you see most vividly on the rear of the vehicle. But you also see them, for example, on the intersection of the bonnet and the windscreen and then into the vehicle.

15:33They flow through actually the inside of the vehicle as well. So, yeah, it's not just a branding device that we'll use in digital and other things. It's a physical, integral part of the vehicle design itself. it's interesting you mentioned about um obviously the move to electric because if i think about my last experience with jaguar apart from waymo actually which we'll come on to talk about in a minute because i'm a big fan of that but i remember doing a jonathan palmer race day uh got to drive porsches lotus um xkr and i remember like going thinking i'm going to really love the porsche and leaving going i love the xkr but the reason i love the xkr was just that it was the noise of the engine it was the feeling of speed it was the handling just it was very alive and that's the kind of like feeling of jaguars of old isn't it whereas in the world of electrification you don't have that same you get performance but it's delivered in a very different way and it's it's i suppose we're in an age where that's now ubiquitous as a propulsion method propulsion isn't it so it how do you see you differentiating it you know for the new age of electrification versus what might have been all about performance and power and noise and you know emotion yeah i think the the jaguar story really is quite simple in some respects in that we wanted the vehicle to look the way it looks and the best platform the best powertrain for that for us to enable the design proportions that we've drawn was was electric what that also gives you is certain characteristics that are important for jaguar obviously it will be the quickest the most powerful Jaguar ever.

17:10We've worked really hard on, for the production vehicle, in terms of the dynamics, it has to drive like a Jaguar. So yes, it's an EV, but actually, and many, you know, I've driven many EVs, I've owned many, I think I-Pace is a great car to drive. But actually what we needed to do with this vehicle is make sure it drove like the very, very best Jaguar. So it needs to have power in reserve. It needs to be a really engaging drive. You need to be thoroughly involved with it, whether that's the chassis setup or the way in which the power is delivered. The team actually that did all of the chassis work, they started by let's spend time driving all of the classic Jaguars to find out what is the absolute essence, whether it's an F-type or an XJC or an E-type or a D-type.

17:58Kind of say, right, actually, yes, we now really understand what we're actually going for and how did we then deliver that with an electrified powertrain. And we're really excited about that, actually, in terms of actually what they've been able to do. Because, yeah, I think the car has all of the hallmarks of a Jaguar. They are great. Yeah, it won't be the noisy car that you've just talked about. But in terms of the engaging feeling, power and reserves, great speed, but also when you step out of the car, it's fine. You've had an incredibly engaging experience, but it's not drained you. It's not exhausting.

18:35I think it should be something that gets that right balance in terms of comfort and engagement. And we're really excited about the capability that we've got with this platform and this powertrain. I love your reference to Jaguar's of old of being the kind of heart and soul, like the E-Type, for example, and kind of reinventing that classic. What process did you go through to get to this design? Because the design is pretty striking. I don't think anyone's not got an opinion on it. And it really does jump out at you, doesn't it? So what goes into creating something of that scale? I think this is a great illustration of, I guess, the whole process for us, really.

19:15Because what you would normally do in this process in the automotive world is the engineering team would have already decided what platform it's on. And then you'd give to a design team, well, OK, that's the platform. And here's the brief. We didn't do any of that. what we started with is we started with a design competition where we basically split the resource of all of the jlr design teams so it's a really large pool of talent and we had a competitive process where effectively they were all given the same brief and they had three months to basically explore creatively in that process we ended up with 17 full-size vehicles clays but painted for all the world, it looked like a production vehicle, which were then with probably four different design languages.

20:06But the purpose of that really was to make sure there was tension in the process. We needed to make sure that we really pushed the envelope in terms of it. We never go for a safe design, well, I've got it, okay. We needed to say, no, I've really got to push the boat out, otherwise somebody else is going to win this competition. So, yeah, we ended up with a huge array, universally this design language was chosen. So that's kind of a different way. And I think it's important to understand why it looks like it looks. But then the next part of the process is, well, okay, what platform are you going to put that on?

20:42And there isn't a platform. It doesn't work on any of our platforms, doesn't work on the competitive platforms. So effectively, we devised what we call JEA, the Jaguar Electric Architecture. Because what we felt is actually the best chance for Jaguar to succeed is to be really, really pure and really, really consistent with the design language that the design team had come up with. So that then led us to, let's say, a dedicated architecture, which meant we could then deliver that. Because I think it's probably a lot of people listening to this podcast will go, well, I've just seen a concept car.

21:16And actually, by the time the production car comes out, all the joy will be gone and all the fun will be gone. Obviously, I'm really close to the production car. I don't think anybody's going to be disappointed. there's such a strong link between the type 00 car that we've previewed and the first production car the four-door gt and that's really a tribute to i guess yes the design team but also the engineers so i think as we were chatting earlier on one of the things that surprised me when i came in a kind of cup you know two and a half years ago i knew the design team were really passionate about know the purity and you've got to maintain the integrity i'd seen that from my old job but And I was thinking, well, how are the engineers going to live in this space?

21:58What are they going to be like? Are they going to be so fed up of all of the challenges that that's going to bring? But it's quite the opposite. They were just as evangelical about, now, our job is to find innovative engineering solutions to make sure that we absolutely retain the purity of that design. So, as I say, it was an evolution from we want a creative process, create intention to get a really bold design. We then need to design, OK, right, we need a dedicated platform. and then the really hard yards of right okay that's the architecture and platform how do we make sure it meets crash safety how do we make sure for a car for example with a very flat front and you know certain proportions has incredible aero because we do need yes it's got to look great but it's got to perform well as well right it's got to have great range and it does and that's really been the story of the next i guess two three years as the engineers have really got involved and that's yeah i'm really excited when we get to unveil the production card to really get into some of how they've done that because there's some yeah some incredible stories that'll be very very interesting to find out as well but i think that was part of what stunned people because when the initial um designs came out that they look so concept carry if you know what i mean you know they look kind of a bit futuristic um not like a finished car and then you did your paris reveal with the actual car, people still thought it was like a concept car.

23:18No, no, this is the actual car. But you've kind of followed that through very closely, haven't you? But I think, I know we were chatting earlier, but I think the colour choices, the finish, it all brings that kind of slightly otherworldly feel to the car, doesn't it? Yeah, I think colour is a really important part of the brand world in terms of what we want to create. We want Jaguar to be, we want it to be exuberant, we want it to be visceral, we want it to really stand out. So colour choice is important. We tend to show the car with satin paint, which actually, you know, the lines are beautifully simple, but also in a satin paint, it absolutely accentuates that.

23:56So you're right, there is a kind of otherworldiness about it. And it creates, I mean, it's great, but it also creates some challenges because I think, particularly when you're looking at it on your phone, you don't really get a sense of the proportions. You don't really get a sense of the craftsmanship craftsmanship in terms of just how it's put together so one of the key learnings for us actually the experiential part of how we market the car making sure we get people to see it and get to see it physically because i've seen that for myself so many times where people have kind of come in i've already decided i don't like it i don't like the rear i don't like this i don't like that and then they actually spend some time with it and stand back from it or you know and get some time to appreciate it and actually you know more often than not actually it it really changes the opinion so that's have you shown this the jaguar owners club right so let's take it to the the toughest audience here how did they react yeah we did we did uh i was it was for me i've done i've done quite a few of these sort of things but that was one of the most sort of heart in mouth we had all of we had a number of the various enthusiast clubs who were probably the most pure the most passionate about the brand and its heritage and its history and provenance And we had lots of kind of executives, so previous CEOs from Jaguar and all sorts of, you know, people that know their stuff, that really understand the Jaguar brand.

25:19And we brought them into one of our locations. We had about 150 people. And it was like, cracky, here we go. That's like, you know, this is going to be interesting. And actually a lot of them came in a little bit arms folded, a bit like, actually, you know, what have you done? And I would say pretty much, you know, to, you know, everybody that I spoke to that night said, you know what, actually seeing it and also hearing a little bit of the narrative, some of the stuff we're talking about today, just explain why, why is that gone? Why is that stayed? Why this? Why not that? when you get a chance to lay that out people go okay i do get it and i also get how that sort of harks back to well that's what jaguar used to do you know we talk you know we everybody talks about the e-type you know when and i think you know the e-type was a controversial car when it first when we when that was unveiled in 1961 in in geneva people never seen anything like it it looked like it landed from space.

26:18But that's Jaguar at its very best. That's what Jaguar should do. So a new Jaguar shouldn't land and everybody goes, yeah, that's nice. It should be, wow. And we should be, and we are, fine with polarising. If Jerry McGovern were here, our chief creative officer, he'd say, look, some people are going to get it straight away. Some people, it may never be for them. For others, it might take a bit more time. that's fine but what we shouldn't do is try and be loved by everybody because great design is not you'll end up with vanilla six seven out of ten and we also know this from our clinics we've we've done a lot of clinics for the vehicle as you expect as we went through as we went through the process and you know we see yeah we do see a number of people say that's just not for me but we see the highest proportion of people saying it's a nine or a ten yes people put it on a on a scale of one to ten and that's that's the right thing for us because we're not going to be a mass market vehicle we want to we're going to sell in relatively small numbers at elevated price points and yeah that sense around polarization is actually okay for us yeah it's funny actually because i did a bit of research last year that we released a can called the extraordinary cost of being dull and basically we're you know working on the hypothesis that the biggest risk you can take is to be ignored and it's based on some data that we system one where i work where the biggest emotional response to advertising today is nothing at all and actually that's who you're up against is you know so you know even if you polarize it's better to kind of get you know get a response than nothing at all um which brings me nicely on to your teaser teaser video because i think that's what got everyone's attention i was gonna say like i know exactly so apologies for asking the question that I'm sure you've been asked a gazillion times, but what was the thinking or the brief behind that, you know, behind the teaser video?

28:13And then did you expect the reaction? Okay, two-part question. So first part of the question, we had a very deliberate strategy. So if you go back to where we are, you know, what I said earlier is people have a view about what Jaguar stands for. And we needed to really challenge that. So the strategy was in a number of phases And the first phase of the strategy was to get people saying almost like, what is going on at Jaguar? If that was a reaction that we got, that's the bullseye reaction. Because we just wanted people to acknowledge that Jaguar was doing something that was different, that was not what I expect, and it was bold.

28:55If we achieve those three things, actually that's job done. Because what we then wanted to do, the whole purpose of that sort of two-week build-up was to get as many eyeballs as possible on the unveiling of the new design language. So, you know, think of that tease phase of we wanted to get people talking about Jaguar because, you know, part of the problem, people went. You know, and as you're researching, there's only one thing worse than being talked about. And it's not being talked about. And that's where we were. So the pre-phase was all about getting interest and awareness and the fact that it's a signpost.

29:32A teaser is saying that something is landing. Then on December 3rd when we unveiled the car in Miami, and then the phase after that was then around, OK, we now need to basically sort of peel back the layers of design and curation and the craftsmanship that's gone into it, which is really the sort of the imagery as we went through the next phase of the campaign. Then we went into, okay, we now need to see the vehicle on the road. So we took the car, you know, we didn't want to go in a very traditional sense. So we went to Paris, to Paris Fashion Week and arrived in style. And that sort of sense of, okay, this is a brand that should be woven into popular culture.

30:16And, you know, where better to be than somewhere like Paris Fashion Week. then on to a whole series of of activations in north america we were at the nba all-stars which again is for us is a great sort of sort of conversion of culture sport fashion it's probably kind of good a good area for us to be so we took the car there got great reaction we took the car to monaco which is the home of probably more traditional luxury uh you know in in europe we reactivated in in in in japan through with an artist collaboration in japan something similar in munich where we were you know a very very sort of prestigious but also accessible kind of you know art location for us so it's then about taking the car and showing up in places perhaps that you wouldn't expect a car brand to be at but a brand that places us in popular culture which is really an important part of the job that we need to do between now and actually I guess going on sale and taking our first orders.

31:22I'm chipping away, we're chipping away as a team at this sense of I know what Jaguar stands for because we've got to elevate people's perception about what a Jaguar stands for. Otherwise I guess the risk is yes they might like the car but the brand has got to carry that sense of the vehicle design as well. You can't just be, and that was, yeah, you know, I guess there's an important point there. That was a really important part of the marketing strategy is this is not a product launch. This is a brand relaunch. So, you know, you were talking before, you know, Elon Musk tweeting, where's the car?

31:56Well, actually, for me, that's great because a brand should be able to talk about itself without actually the physical manifestation of it. So that was, for me, proved positive that it's, you know, we were on the right track. And this whole period is about just trying to reset the brand before we unveil the first production car and then go into order taken and mass production. So, yeah, that's, yeah, I guess a series of very measured, very strategic kind of points in the campaign. I mean, it's pretty stunning to be able to get so many people in the world paying, you know, waiting in anticipation for your car launch.

32:34Because I think the campaign was a good couple of weeks, wasn't it? It was two weeks. Two weeks before Miami, wasn't it? and the amount of people talking about this is going to be special, right? And then you've still got, when's the actual car available to buy? There's a big gap between then and now. Yeah, we'll be on sale next year. So there is a long gap. But that was also considered. We could have waited much closer to when actually the vehicle will be on sale. But actually what we want to do is that sense around, well, we've got time as our friend. We need to spend this time to sort of tell people that actually Jaguar isn't perhaps what they perceive it to be and reposition the brand.