Jaguar’s new Internet ad campaign targeting younger buyers has Peter Abeysekera worried about alienating the automaker’s core market,men 40 and older.
“They’re venturing into a new market,” said Abeysekera, Internet manager at Bauer Jaguar in Santa Ana. “It’s a different audience.”
Jaguar Cars North America, part of Ford Motor Co.’s Irvine-based Premier Automotive Group, has created a Web site, www.x-ingover.com, that it hopes will spur word-of-mouth interest with short animated episodes.
The goal is to sell X-types, Jaguar’s entry-level car starting at $30,000.
But focusing on the newer, cheaper models doesn’t sit well with Jaguar loyalists, according to Abeysekera.
“Jag is kind of exclusive,” he said.
Purists “don’t like that we’ve got these other models,” Abeysekera said.
But Abeysekera said he understands Jaguar has to keep up with Mercedes-Benz and BMW.
He said he battles perceptions all the time at his dealership.
A woman shopper recently asked, “Am I going to look old” in a Jaguar, he said.
Abeysekera said he hopes the automaker’s marketing hypes luxury as much as price. Dealers, who usually are last to know about an automaker’s marketing plans, didn’t get word of the campaign until now, he said.
Hummer Bummer
Orange County’s Hummer dealers won’t be able to boast of tax breaks like they used to.
The recent “American Jobs Creation Act,” which includes an assortment of tax breaks for businesses, restricted the sports utility break (also dubbed the “Hummer tax break”) after pressure from environmental groups such as Sierra Club.
Now Hummer buyers only can write off up to $25,000 of the cost of a vehicle. Prior to the law, a loophole allowed owners of vehicles weighing 6,000 pounds or more to be able to write off up to $100,000.
Now the six-figure write-off applies only to vehicles weighing 14,000 pounds or more to better reflect business use.
In other Hummer news, the vehicle received another plug from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who recently unveiled the experimental hydrogen Hummer.
One of the governor’s campaign promises called for “hydrogen highways,” so that by 2010, motorists can fill up their vehicles with cleaner fuels.
TVs and Big Wheels
Jared Merrell said he was customizing upscale cars out of a warehouse in Orange long before dealers got into the game.
About three years ago, Merrell bought a piece of land and opened J Star Motors Inc. in La Habra. The dealership sells customized SUVs, lifted or lowered trucks, Porsches and others.
J Star adds goodies such as TVs and wheels.
“Everybody wants TVs,” Merrell said. “Wheels,the bigger the better.”
Some of the vehicles for sale at J Star include a $45,000 2003 Cadillac Escalade, an $85,000 1996 Ferrari F355, a $29,000 2002 Lexus ES 400 and a 2003 Chevy Silverado for $29,000.
Merrell said he sells a lot of trucks,the average price of a vehicle he sells is $35,000 to $45,000.
J Star also gets custom orders.
“Sometimes we fix it up the way we like it and people buy it that way,” he said.
“They just want a car that’s California,” he said.
J Star also sells vehicles to other dealers. Merrell buys autos at auctions and from people who are selling them. J Star sells about 75 autos a year and employs 15 people, Merrell said.
Merrell ended up in La Habra because that is where he found a good deal on land. He said he wanted to own, not lease. Being in North County is an advantage because he draws customers from Orange and Los Angeles counties.
“I don’t need a place that’s in a high-end area,” he said.
Raising the Roof
Laguna Drug has a little more headroom.
The store, part of the Strangeland family’s Quality Drug Corp., which also runs Lido Drug in Newport Beach, had its roof raised higher as part of a renovation of the 10,000-square-foot store.
Now the store has an open-ceiling warehouse look.
Keeping with Laguna’s artsy image, the construction company put in a large glass mosaic of a seascape by Mia Tavonatti.
The store also has parking for 50 cars in a rear lot.
Resource Builders Inc. of San Diego did the work.
Upscale In-Store
South Coast Plaza’s David Yurman jewelry store is hosting New Yorker cartoonist Leo Cullum on Thursday to promote the store’s latest watches.
