WHY JAGUAR WILL WIN - DESPITE ITS MARKETERS
Jaguar's marketers did their best to kill their brand in 2024. This is what their engineers and designers have done to save it
Most modern cars are a bit hateful
Modern cars – and modern EVs in particular are a metaphor for modern life.
They are as relentlessly naggy and nudgy as a European government. Endlessly intervening because they think they know better, and think you are about to do something stupid. Fun is irresponsibility, and driving so inherently anti-social that the vehicle itself must ensure you want to do as little of it, and drive the least distance possible. This why I drive a 4-litre, 6 cylinder, 5 year old ICE car. . .
As I get older and listen to any disputed subject – whether in politics or marketing, I have slowly realised that 90% of the reason someone is ‘wrong’ is because they don’t understand something properly. They don’t have sufficient facts and/or insights. But comment nevertheless. The Internet of course has turbocharged this.
The most important ‘P’ in marketing is Product
I felt that way when the great Jaguar debate exploded onto the Internet in October 2024 with the release of teaser shots and a confusingly irrelevant video. Leading the vociferous critique were many marketers. But what I saw were strong marketing-versed opinions not remotely informed by knowledge of cars. Few seemed to realise that Jaguar had painted itself into a corner – it couldn’t simply continue an unbroken line of brand heritage – because it had broken it.
Underestimate JLR at your peril
Most also had no idea of the engineering and design prowess at JLR. The prowess that had managed to outflank pretender INEOS Grenadier who sought to out Land Rover Land Rover by creating a more ‘faithful’ and rugged replacement for the Land Rover Defender than Land Rover had. You can be the judge of which one looks more appealing. But the market chose the acclaimed Land Rover which sold 115k units in 2025 vs. c 8k for the Grenadier.
(This isn’t a criticism of the Grenadier, just an example of how JLR’s ability to re-develop the archaic but much-loved original Defender was generally underestimated)
These were the key points of my November 2024 Jaguar article
- Firstly – it’s really too early to judge. We haven’t seen the product yet.
- Yes folks, as a marketer – I have to admit to it - the most important ‘P’ of marketing is product.
- Jaguar had no choice - they ran out of road – so had to reinvent themselves
- Jaguar should have been a British Porsche – but missed the chance
- I predicted the removal of the ICE ban (UK now stands alone in Europe with one)
- Utter madness of the teaser video
The key reality of Jaguar’s predicament is that most ‘driver’s cars’ are not electric
Supercar, luxury and sportscar brands are proving a kind of last bastion of the ICE. This is because of two key factors. Firstly, their buyers prefer the feel of an ICE, and its sound - the howl of a flat-six or the wail of a V12 is music to their ears. Secondly, their buyers who will naturally tend to be more affluent, are older and more conservative.
But this will change. Younger generations have grown up with EVs - like they were ‘born digital’.
In automotive - engineers trump marketers
(There are probably exceptions. Apple’s Steve jobs couldn’t really be defined as either a conventional marketer or a designer. He was the kind of visionary that also exists - or used to - in the automotive industry.)
So product engineers and designers are arguably more important than marketers. In automotive that isn’t really arguable in my view. Let me say it – they are more important.
How do I know? Well the brand marketing leadership at Jaguar 18 months ago could not have tried harder to destroy the brand – but didn’t. The brand’s survival is – and always was - actually dependent on the world class engineers and designers at JLR. Then it’s down to the brand marketers not to F**k it up.
I think they (engineers and designers) may have done it. That is - pulled the brand back from the brink - not f**ked it up.
Creating the actual P
The working prototype is now out there. Press coverage has been limited to passenger rides on Jaguar’s test track in the UK, and actual drives on a frozen lake near the Arctic Circle in Sweden.
From the reports on Pistonheads those engineers have done a very fine job. The key things that shine through are that the new Jaguar (now apparently known as the GT rather than the Type 00) has been built with a relentless pursuit of great driving feel and balance. The JLR engineers have set out to create what I would say is a fairly unique proposition: A driver’s EV. It is very notable that the writer of that Pistonheads article uses the ‘feel’ word 10 times in that article, and it is probably used 20 times in the accompanying video.
Jaguar is I think likely to take advantage of two important factors that some critics have overlooked:
- EV-sceptics (Hands-up – why? Because I think that EVs have been dishonestly pushed by net zero agenda-driven governments as more environmentally friendly than their ICE counterparts) are sceptical about the eventual take-over of EVs. Even I have to concede that despite my personal dislike for EVs, this will happen. Why? Just go to China. . . Porsche made a serious mis-step, because they committed more strongly to EVs than their brand users were prepared for – but unlike Jaguar who had nothing to lose, Porsche had everything to lose.
- Modern cars are generally a dire driving experience. This is especially true of EVs. This is again because of government interference. (European) Governments (in particular) have interfered with driving in two ways: Firstly, they decided you must drive an electric rather than an ICE car. Why? The net zero scam. Secondly, safety-orientated legislation mean that your car thinks it knows better than you. It thinks you are falling asleep or misbehaving if you intentionally cross a white line, take your eye off the road, exceed the speed limit, park too close, drive too close and intervenes - you know the drill. If it is electric it will decide how much it is going to use regen to charge the battery when you brake, so that you are always in an argument with it about how much brake pressure you need in a given circumstance.
The implication for the first means that although ICEs will probably be in demand as ‘driver’s cars’ for quite a while, momentum is still with EVs. Jaguar made the 100% EV decision. That might have been fatal for an established mass market auto manufacturer. But not if you are starting over for Jaguar. And your ambition is quite niche and not mass market. The only question that remains is – is there demand for an electric ‘driver’s car’?
“That some customers might still prefer to hear the lusty rustle of a V8 amid the tranquillity is a point that Glover later concedes with a practised shrug. Jaguar has moved on; if it cannot convince those people of the validity of “the most powerful Jaguar we’ve ever produced… the fastest Jaguar ever produced… the quietest Jaguar ever produced” then so be it.”
Positioning - finding a sweet-spot in the market
This is where I think Jaguar’s engineers and designers have been better intuitive marketers than their marketers. The car was built with a relentless drive to make it a very rewarding drive. That meant the driving position, steering, braking system, weight distribution, were all tuned to put the driver back in charge. Hence the many comments about the fine balance and feel. They also deliberately dialled back the ferocious delivery that bedevils more powerful EVs, and their ability to keep their composure at full whack (yes even Porsche has this problem with their EVs). It is no coincidence that Tesla call their full power drag-car mode ‘ludicrous’. That’s because it is. Most buyers of those sort of cars don’t really have the skills to make the most of the mode, and you can drain the battery by 60% in just a handful of starts using it. Instead the Jaguar mimics the delivery of a mighty ICE by “always giving the impression of massive power in reserve”, rather than unleashing it all at once.
“It’s intended to be effortlessly quick but not scarily fast.”
Jaguar have given the car the feel of a high performance, but civilised GT. Like say a Bentley. But at half the price. That makes it potentially some kind of bargain.
And there are drivers who want an analogue car in the digital age. An analogue-feel EV with a rewarding drive will sell.
Jaguar’s marketing department deliberately erased the brand’s entire heritage. Now their engineers are using it.
This shows that the act of brand vandalism Jaguar’s marketers committed in the form of the clickbait pursuit of attention, and the resulting shock and awe was just wrong. It was wrong because the brand wasn’t simply starting over. it was actually still pursuing the brand’s true values of ‘thinking differently’ and balancing a sporty drive with a luxury ride.
They apparently drove every fine-handling car in Jaguar’s history to isolate that Jaguar-ness that defined the brand. This especially of course included the E-type – a car born 65 years ago now. It was notably beautiful and its handling race-derived.
So much for discarding your legacy. To me this proves Jaguar went too far with the Ctrl-Alt-Delete. Yes you can have a failure-induced break in your brand’s history – Triumph didn’t make a motorcycle for more than 10 years, but it was re-born with modern engineering and manufacturing, and increasingly paid homage to its legendary past. Triumph has been relentlessly successful – and profitable – since then.
Maybe Jaguar’s engineers were more calculating than I think and deliberately positioned the brand as below? My feeling is that their marketing department didn’t do this though. I think those developing the product intuitively saw the opportunity to differentiate their brand (sorry Byron Sharp) as the only one that owned an empty space – the EV which is rewarding to drive. This is not to say that there are no other auto brands with cars in that space. Porsche’s Taycan is the obvious example. But it looks like the Jaguar will be a more rewarding and luxurious drive than the Taycan, and as a brand – Porsche have stated that their strategy will be to straddle ICE-Hybrid-EV. That might be a bit complicated for some luxury car buyers.
There will be those who think a modern car should be electric, visually distinct and rewarding to drive. Jaguar can own that space.
Why Jaguar deserve to succeed
- Their marketing department messed-up. The people responsible have gone.
- Their engineers are very talented - perhaps enough to re-birth a luxury brand in the face of a China-based onslaught of dull, cheap, lookalike white-goods style EVs in particular.
- This may be contentious - but I have it on good authority that it wasn’t the Russians (always the Russians) that were responsible for the devastating cyber-attack on JLR - but the CCP (Chinese Communist Party). If western nations want to have a surviving auto industry they need to wise up. China can’t make luxury brands (yet - luxury brands need a storied past. China has erased its past). So when it can, it devalues luxury brands and buys them, steals them, or tries to destroy them. Be en garde those brands!
Posted 17 February 2026 by Chris Bullick