Jalopnik: Return of the VW Phaeton 2018

edkwon

Forum Addict
Joined
Nov 21, 2006
Messages
6,801
Location
The OC
Car(s)
2020 Kia Telluride, Tesla Model Y
http://jalopnik.com/the-vw-phaeton-is-coming-back-in-2018-1564622424

m2ca2pjy7ogcmetak0gd.jpg


There's only one real reason I buy that the Phaeton failed in the United States, despite being one of the best engineered cars ever made: Price.

RELATED

[http://i]

Jalopnik Fantasy Garage: Volkswagen Phaeton W12

Yes, the Phaeton. Like everyone else, when I first heard Volkswagen would be producing a $100,000 car, I was aghast. Was this the same Volkswagen??Read?

The United States wasn't ready for a Volkswagen that could cost as much as $100,000, even if what you were getting was a Bentley at a crazy discount. No one explains the appealbetter than Jonny did.

Still, for all the effort they put into building it, they did a poor job selling it and it soldiered on in Europe while it retreated from the U.S. And yet, apparently, it's coming back. Michael Horn, CEO of VW group,?told?Bloomberg's?Matt Miller (half of crime-fighting duo Hardigree & Miller), that they were bringing it back:

"Yes we plan to bring it back somewhere in 2018, 2019"

WIN!
 
It didn't sell well due to the badge and horrid reliability. This is why used ones sell for peanuts.
 
Plus, it looked like a Passat...or heck, even a Jetta. I know there's a small percentage of buyers that want a "sleeper"...but I'd put money on the vast majority of buyers of cars in that price range wanting their car to LOOK like they are in that price range.
 
Plus you could get an A8 with the same engine (4.2 V8) for about $3k less (when new in 2006; although the W12 A8L cost almost $35k more than the W12 Phaeton...:blink:).
 
Last edited:
Plus, it looked like a Passat...or heck, even a Jetta. I know there's a small percentage of buyers that want a "sleeper"...but I'd put money on the vast majority of buyers of cars in that price range wanting their car to LOOK like they are in that price range.

Or at the very least not look *exactly* like the car that the pimply-faced college kid with terrible or non-existent credit just rolled up in with the double pepperoni you ordered 36 minutes ago.

Or worse, the car your peers' junior secretaries drive.

- - - Updated - - -

It didn't sell well due to the badge and horrid reliability. This is why used ones sell for peanuts.

Since they've changed neither of these things, expect a quick repeat of the last time it was here.
 
Last edited:
It didn't sell well due to the badge and horrid reliability. This is why used ones sell for peanuts.

Well, Audi introduced the "V8" in the 1980's. It took them about 25 years to get a foot into the door of the luxury market. Back in the 1970's and early 1980's, Audi was put in the same category as Opel/Vauxhall. Now our chancellor Angela Merkel is being driven around in an Audi A8...

So it can take decades to be recognized as a luxury/premium carmaker but when the company bosses are seriousy about it, it can pay off.

- - - Updated - - -

Since they've changed neither of these things, expect a quick repeat of the last time it was here.

Since when does the average American have a gusto for quality standards, as long as safety isn't concerned? :p
 
Well, Audi introduced the "V8" in the 1980's. It took them about 25 years to get a foot into the door of the luxury market. Back in the 1970's and early 1980's, Audi was put in the same category as Opel/Vauxhall. Now our chancellor Angela Merkel is being driven around in an Audi A8...

So it can take decades to be recognized as a luxury/premium carmaker but when the company bosses are seriousy about it, it can pay off.

That's why selling the Phaeton in the US is so strange. In Europe, it kinda makes sense, since VW has Skoda and SEAT to be the bargain brands, and VW proper can fit into a kind of "upper middle" slot closer to Audi. The Golf, for example, is on the high end, pricewise, compared to the rest of the hatches in that size class, right? In the US, though, VW has been positioning themselves as a "budget German" brand, which is why they've got stuff like the US-spec Jetta to meet their price points. I suppose this could be part of a long-term strategy to push VW models up in price in the US, though.
 
Plus, it looked like a Passat...or heck, even a Jetta. I know there's a small percentage of buyers that want a "sleeper"...but I'd put money on the vast majority of buyers of cars in that price range wanting their car to LOOK like they are in that price range.

Every time I see one I think "Why is this Passat so big?"

It's nice but still very confusing in a "where does this fit in the marketplace sense" and VW trying to bookend the marketplace with high end and low end cars is strange to me from a product placement perspective.
 
Since when does the average American have a gusto for quality standards, as long as safety isn't concerned? :p

Um, since pretty much forever. Mind, the standard they work to is rather low, but we do actually have them. Americans *really* don't like getting stuck with four figure regular maintenance bills and frequent unscheduled shop visits for a 'mainstream' brand car either. The Phaeton in US service was extremely unreliable for most people that bought it, had enormous running costs and it was backed up by VW USA's typical crap customer service who did not (and still does not) care about their customers.

If you don't think this is the case, why don't you ask all the car companies that have been booted off USDM island because their low quality drove off all their customers? Such as Suzuki, Isuzu, the French and Italian makers, etc., etc.

As for the whole 'may take decades' - sorry, but in the US they've made zero progress because they've made little effort. They've had the one luxury car under the marque, but they haven't improved any of the rest of their product or dealt with their quality and customer service issues. They've pretty much given up on trying to sell cars based on some sort of 'more luxurious Corolla/Civic or Camry/Accord class alternative' and are now trying to sell cars based on being *cheaper* than the Civic or Camry, etc., etc.
 
Last edited:
When my branch had a Phaeton customer...she was a regular. For the entire time she owned the Phaeton, I'm pretty certain she was in our rentals for far longer than anytime she actually used her car. The good news for her, VW paid for every rental. The bad news for her...it seemed like she spent $80,000 to drive a Chevrolet Impala(a $26,000 car) and occasionally drive a VW Phaeton.
 
Would be interesting to know, if that is really representative or just a subjective perception. For instance, how is the Bentley Continental doing in the USA? Since beneath the different shape it's basically a Phaeton, too.
 
From my understanding the Bentley Continental isn't a shining example of reliability either, but it has a premium badge. If you badged a Ferrari as a FIAT there be much of the same issues.
 
If anything, the Bentleys actually have a worse record for reliability than the Phaeton does. There are several mitigating factors that Bentley has that VW doesn't and can't use, but more on that in a minute.

Bentley doesn't break down their sales by model, but their sales haven't been all that great of recent either. Some recent signs of revival, but time will tell if they can sustain it.

Bentley brand sales, USA:
Year Number
2004 2394
2005 3654
2006 3856
2007 3990
2008 2693
2009 1367
2010 1430
2011 1877
2012 2315
2013 2872

At least in my part of the US, the new Conti doesn't seem to be very popular. If you see a Conti, it's usually a first-gen one. That said... their sales aren't a whole lot better than the Phaeton's second year in the US, which was labeled a 'disappointment' even by VW.

2003 343
2004 1939
2005 820
2006 235
2007 17

The Phaeton's even closer sibling, the A8, has much, much better sales - despite nearly as bad reliability - for many of the same reasons as the Bentley. Again - more on that in a minute.

2004 5943
2005 5430
2006 5038
2007 3826
2008 2825
2009 1463
2010 1521
2011 5700
2012 6002
2013 6300


One of the funny things about sales in the US is that you can easily offload even the worst new pile of crap for between 18-36 months. A certain percentage of people are willing to try anything new and different, then there's the rabid fanboys; between them you can usually unload some respectable numbers of cars.

It's what happens to sales after that period, when word of mouth has had time to circulate about what the thing actually is and how it is to live with that indicate whether it was actually a decent car. In this case, the Phaeton was released, a few people bought it, found out it was shit, told their friends (or had others observe it was shit and tell their friends, and that was the end of it.

So, how do Bentley and Audi get away with it where VW doesn't? Simple.

1. Positioning of the brand. Bentley is positioned as very high dollar high-strung exotic and has never been much of anything else in the post-war era. Nobody expects a high dollar exotic to be reliable (and the Conti does not disappoint in this respect) so unreliability is not necessarily a big problem for them. Audi is also considered to be a higher end car, though not an exotic. Their excuse is their brand identity - extremely advanced tech laden luxury cars (which is why the A3 was an utter failure in the US). Advanced tech breaks, as everyone knows, so this is accepted to a great degree. What's VW? 'We make cheap German mainstream cars!" That means their vehicles are going to be held to a higher reliability standard by the market than the other two. The expected cost of maintenance is going to be different in the same way. There's more to be said here, but I have other points to touch on. Which leads us to...

2. Customer relations. Let's start with what happens when the cars inevitably break. When your Conti breaks down under warranty, usually a man comes out to where you are with another Bentley and hands you the keys. The broken Bentley is whisked away to be repaired while you continue on your way. Your new Audi A8 died? A tow truck is dispatched quickly and you are given a loaner Audi right away to minimize the disruption to your day. Phaeton died? "Ey, lady, we might be able to get a tow truck to you in about four hours. Our shop will be open when you get here but the loaner car people went home so I hope you can get someone to give ya a ride back!" Even if by some miracle you do get a loaner car, it's not even going to be a VW but whatever Enterprise Rent-A-Car happens to have in inventory that day. Around here, if it's late in the day, often that's going to be a small Kia or even a Chevy Spark.

With Bentley, you are treated like an extremely valued patron who should not have any grounds to give complaint about their treatment. With Audi, you are treated like an important customer who has better things to do than spend all day dealing with a problem that should not exist. With VW you are treated exactly the same as the 18 year old 'pizza delivery artist' who bought a stripped Golf on closeout that they really don't want to talk to because he spent 8 hours trying to negotiate another penny off the bottom line. VW USA's customer service is legendarily horrible. They really do not care what the car's problem is and they could not care less about what problems their defective product is causing their owners. More to the point, they don't seem to care what their dealers are doing either. VW is the only brand in the US where dealers feel compelled to advertise that they are 'female friendly' due to the bad reputation of the brand's dealers. Yes, it's that bad.

Americans can and will put up with some truly horrible cars - but only if we feel that we're not being taken for a ride. You have to at least *look* like you're trying and offer decent customer service; how do you think Hyundai has managed to survive in the US marketplace to become the powerhouse it now is when it started off with such garbage as the Excel/Pony? It wasn't on the strength of the product or even on the low price (though that can forgive a lot of sins) - it was purely on the strength of their customer service. They did what they could to make things right; they did their best to repair problems quickly and correctly. If something went badly wrong with your car, they simply gave you another one without batting an eye instead of making you wait or worse fight them over it. They visibly were trying to improve and people here will reward that sort of thing. People here will *not* reward a poor product backed with poor or even abusive customer service and that's what the Phaeton was in the US.

3. Appearance. Neither the Bentley or Audi offering looks exactly like a car known to mostly be sold to credit-less college students or junior secretaries with a small salary. The VW does.
 
Last edited:
In other words: What you need are brand whores as customers and you can charge them almost any price :D
 
Last edited:
I find that to be an often used strategy in any kind of marketing, in any market.

just look at Apple and Alfa Romeo :p
 
In other words: What you need are brand whores as customers and you can charge them almost any price :D

Not quite. Jaguar is discovering this just now. They've produced a series of '18 month wonders' under Callum for the past few years, so they had some great initial sales. Now they've found out the other side of this - you eventually run out of rabid fanboys and those who are willing to try anything new after you burn them often enough. They sold more cars on their little home island in 2012 than they did in the entire vast market of the United States, formerly their biggest market. And they only sold 16,000 cars there.

The patience of such people is not completely unlimited. You alienate the core customers, you alienate the fanboys, you alienate the people who will try anything new once... and then you get kicked off USDM Island if it gets bad enough. Ask Rover how that works... if you can find anyone who will admit to having worked there. They got booted off not once but twice for doing that.

I find that to be an often used strategy in any kind of marketing, in any market.

just look at Apple and Alfa Romeo :p

Funny you should mention that. What happened to Alfa Romeo in the US market the last time they tried that, again?

Apple at least gives you pretty solid hardware for your money - per the PC review mags, the best Windows laptop you can buy, year after year, is a MacBook Pro.
 
Last edited:
Not quite. Jaguar is discovering this just now. They've produced a series of '18 month wonders' under Callum for the past few years, so they had some great initial sales. Now they've found out the other side of this - you eventually run out of rabid fanboys and those who are willing to try anything new after you burn them often enough. They sold more cars on their little home island in 2012 than they did in the entire vast market of the United States, formerly their biggest market. And they only sold 16,000 cars there.

The patience of such people is not completely unlimited. You alienate the core customers, you alienate the fanboys, you alienate the people who will try anything new once... and then you get kicked off USDM Island if it gets bad enough. Ask Rover how that works... if you can find anyone who will admit to having worked there. They got booted off not once but twice for doing that.

JLR is doing great (sales-wise) now though.

http://newsroom.jaguarlandrover.com/en-us/jlr-corp/news/2014/01/jlr_sales_january_2014/

http://newsroom.jaguarlandrover.com/en-us/jlr-corp/news/2014/03/jlr_sales_februray_2014/

http://newsroom.jaguarlandrover.com/en-us/jlr-corp/news/2014/04/jlr_sales_march_2014/
 
In other words: What you need are brand whores as customers and you can charge them almost any price :D

This is pretty much the only reason Audi, Bugatti, Bently, Lexus, Infiniti, etc. exist. Hell, the only reason they don't badge Lamborghinis as VWs is because names are important to people. And bringing the Phaeton back to the US is probably just an attempt to turn US VW customers into brand whores.
 

If you look carefully, you will find that it's Land Rover doing most of the carrying right now. Despite their carefully massaged press release, their sales of Jaguars aren't doing so well at current and a lot of those 'increases' are due to cannibalization. The XK is being canceled because nobody is buying it, for example.
 
Top