The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders' latest set of UK sales data makes for depressing reading for many marques, with year-on-year sales dips of more than 10% for Renault, Land Rover and Citroen in the first six months of 2008. One of the worst-hit brands is Saab; its year-on-year sales fell by 22% over the period, leaving it clinging on perilously to a market share of just 1%.
Internationally, the situation is not much better for the brand, thanks to its poor performance in the US. Although Saab continues to sell well in its home country of Sweden, and is growing in emerging markets such as Russia, rumours persist that owner General Motors wants out.
Never the biggest spender when it comes to marketing, Saab seems to have virtually fallen off the radar in 2008 with some negligible activity. Last month, however, the brand rolled out a print and online campaign, featuring a four-part newspaper supplement on 'independent thinkers' in The Independent and activity on channel4.com. Saab also worked with boutique hotel directory Mr & Mrs Smith to publish a weekend getaway guide.
However, Lowe, which has held Saab's creative account since 2001, has been deprived of a major model launch to get its teeth into, having to make do with the occasional turbo upgrade.
Like many other car marques, Saab has attempted to jump on the green bandwagon, launching the 9-4X BioPower model at January's North American International Auto Show. It has also entered the ever-more crowded hybrid sector in the form of the 9-X BioHybrid.
In March, the brand's environmental stance took a knock when the Advertising Standards Authority took exception to a press ad for its BioPower range, which carried the misleading claim that bioethanol does not significantly increase the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. In the same month, the government announced that all fuel duty rebates for biofuels will expire in 2010.
Can Saab take on the luxury car sector's German giants, Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz? We asked Hurrell Moseley Dawson and Grimmer partner Greg Grimmer, who currently works with Auto Trader magazine and has previously worked with Chrysler and BMW, and Mark Lund, chief executive at Vauxhall's creative agency, DLKW, for their thoughts.
DIAGNOSIS 1 - GREG GRIMMER PARTNER, HURRELL MOSELEY DAWSON AND GRIMMER
As an agency planner, I have worked on many car accounts, including for German and French marques, and even briefly tried to persuade the UK public to take a Korean brand to their heart. Those were the, er ... Daewoos.
However, the automotive brand that I chose to own was Saab. So I was delighted when a few years ago I was given the chance to pitch for its business. But the tender turned out to be a bit like the current state of the brand: the owner's emphasis, and the bulk of its expenditure, seemed to be going on Vauxhall, and my ideas were ignored.
Now in a greener, less affluent market, where the new and used car markets are both under pressure, Saab is still suffering from parental neglect and, bizarrely, has been left labouring at an ad agency that has lost most of its big GM business to smaller, more nimble, competitors.
Meanwhile, those German brands have become stronger, and even Citroen, the most Gallic of marques, is morphing into an Aryan clone. To stay relevant in the UK, Saab needs investment, or to be sold.
REMEDY
- Pass up Germanic comparisons: people want to buy something different. BMW's success is Saab's opportunity.
- Provide distinctive retailing, as Fiat has done with its showroom behind Selfridges in London.
- Promote Swedish cabin comfort: best in class, no contest.
- Push convertible models: who doesn't want to drive around with the roof down on those elusive summer days?
DIAGNOSIS 2 - MARK LUND CHIEF EXECUTIVE, DLKW
I have to declare an interest here. I owned a Saab 9-5 after setting up DLKW. I needed sensible, premium-ish, family transport. The wife loved it. It was comfortable and safe, with good design and brilliant ergonomics. Moreover, the brand image was a revelation to one raised on a diet of BMWs.
People like Saabs, and as Jeremy Clarkson has remarked, Saab drivers don't cut you up, so you don't do it to them. The whole emotional temperature of driving lowers a degree or two and a soothing sense of calm prevails.
I no longer have the 9-5, but I still admire Saabs; the clean Scandinavian styling, the individuality and the growing sense that they are greener, more thoughtful and less rapacious.
So why isn't Saab doing better? A lot of the answer is contained in the fact that today's 9-5 is much the same car I bought nearly 10 years ago. At five years old, the 9-3 is less antique, but still getting on. Saab's range is just too old.
Also, where are its small cars, 4x4s, coupe saloons and people carriers?
REMEDY
- Widen the range, which it is doing as GM's investment finally starts to pay dividends. The 9-1 (small), 9-4 (4x4) and new 9-5 (high-tech and coupe-like) should all appear over the next couple of years.
- Exploit the still very powerful brand across a bigger audiences range. I think it will need to open up and articulate more clearly and powerfully its quirky Swedish personality to engage a world beyond the Saab faithful.