I first came across this post just over a week ago. I then managed to lose the URL (I have all the history stuff turned off on my browser) and then this morning I managed to dig it up again.
I wanted to run it up the flagpole here and see if anyone salutes. I love special edition cars and more than that, I think the idea has some genuine merit.
The idea appears on a site called Detective Marketing, written buy a guy named Stefan Engeseth.
In a nutshell:
Here is my solution: start selling one of the SAAB cars customized into a special edition. Sell it for a higher price, lets say 50.000 Euros. Give buyers half of the money back after 2 years if they in that time have managed to sell 10 cars to others.
By buying one of the unique SAAB cars the buyer automatically becomes an owner of SAAB…….that will make fans go from being ambassadors to Kings and Queens (everyone will recognize this special edition of SAAB and see what they stand for – a hero and owner of the SAAB brand).
Include a free trip to the SAAB [factory] in Trollhättan for every partner that owns a SAAB car. Give each car a unique number, so more fans can expand the fantribe…..
Numbers: Sell 200,000 cars before they are made to consumers, employees etc. 200.000 x 50.000 Euros = 10 Billion Euros.
10 billion Euros will make a difference.
There’s more at Stefan’s site.
Now, first things first. Saab have never sold 200,000 cars in a year, let alone 200,000 cars at 50,000Euro. A plan like this would have to start small and grow from there, but I think the idea has merit.
Make the car special in terms of powertrain and specification and people are more likely to pay a premium. Include a stake in the company and you’ve got some serious ambassadors, people with an incentive to actively promote the brand.
I’m not sure what the numbers would look like on a plan like this, but if they were manageable then perhaps its something that a company like Saab could look at in the future.
It’s the kind of out-of-the-box thinking that Saab will need to use in the future.
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