Symbol of change – or controversy?
Jaguar, the luxury car manufacturer has certainly divided opinion with its new concept electric car. Some have deemed the new Type OO vehicle as ‘absolutely stunning’ while others have simply called it ‘rubbish’. We asked the creative directors of two Tunbridge Wells agencies, Southpaw and Catch A Fire for their thoughts on what’s arguably been one of the most contentious rebrands in a very long time…
A controversial teaser video to unveil Jaguar’s new electric car on social media recently opened the floodgates on the manufacturer, which has been making cars since 1935, when it was aired in October.
It revealed that the globally recognised ‘leaper’ Jaguar logo has been dropped in favour of ‘reimagined’ jaGUar branding – oh and the new Type OO didn’t actually appear in the video. Instead, the carmaker, whose sales have been dwindling for a number of years, let a group of models do the talking.
Following the mixed reaction to October’s teaser video, Jaguar urged people to “trust and reserve judgement” before it unveiled its concept model at a Miami art fair at the start of December. That too has, it’s fair to say, courted mixed opinions.
So marketing disaster – or clever coup? Here Southpaw’s Glenn Smith and Rich Fuller from Catch A Fire share their thoughts…
Glenn Smith, Creative Director, Southpaw
The new Jaguar rebrand.
I love it: because I instantly hated it.
It jarred with what I believed about the brand. It felt unfamiliar. I didn’t quite understand it. And that all means one thing: Thank f*** someone is trying to do something different!
This rebrand is totally the right thing for Jaguar to do. Car brands are in deep trouble, they all look the same and sound the same, which is largely a result of the globalisation of marketing and short-term consumer research creating homogonous products that please everyone. Take electric cars; due to their engine construction there is no need for them to look like regular cars, and yet they still do. But, hey, the shareholders don’t like risk or change, so the evolution of car brands has almost slowed to a stop.
Cars used to represent excitement: the future! And so, the clever thing Jaguar has done is considered what their audience in the next 20 years will find exciting. This means instead of playing the old tropes of masculine achievement, they’ve gone for themes of calmness, spirituality, gender neutrality and conscientious luxury. Call it ‘woke’ design if you like, but it’s the future current twenty-year-olds across the globe want to see. And I suspect Jaguar will become the car brand they aspire to own.
I must say, the teaser ad that accompanies this rebrand is a little try-hard for my liking but, at the end of the day, if Jaguar fail in this pursuit, at least they’ll fail forwards, not backwards.
Rich Fuller, Creative Director,
Catch A Fire
To borrow a quote from Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc in Knives Out: “It makes no damn sense. Compels me though.”
That’s how I felt when I first saw the new jaGUar rebrand. I’m not in love with it but it’s piqued my curiosity just enough to keep me interested.
There are some bold steps being taken – and not just with the colour palette – but I guess it’s something jaGUar feels they need to do. After all, with dwindling sales, you might argue they’ve nothing to lose.
Yes, there’s elements I don’t understand yet – I’m looking at you, capital G and U – and the launch film plays more like a mood film than an actual idea, banding around advertising jargon like ‘create exuberant’, ‘live vivid’ and ‘delete ordinary’ but at the same time I do like the nod to founder Sir William Lyon’s original mantra of “A jaGUar should be a copy of nothing.”
I also really like the big move they’re making toward becoming an electric-only brand. That’s huge. At Catch A Fire we pride ourselves on only working with brands that want to create a better future. Brands with real purpose. And to see jaGUar sticking their head above the parapet and taking that kind of stance is really exciting.
In advertising, we often talk about standing out in a sea of sameness and how you’d rather be talked about than not talked about at all.
So whatever people think about it, it’s got the world talking. And isn’t that the point?
