Betting on the Big Cat: Gerry McGovern on Jaguar’s big gamble

In this episode of the Luxury Society Podcast, hosts Robin Swithinbank and David Sadigh speak with Gerry McGovern, Chief Creative Officer at Jaguar Land Rover, about Jaguar’s dramatic reinvention. With car sales paused and a controversial brand overhaul underway, McGovern explains why the future of Jaguar depends on embracing change—even if it means dividing opinion.

They discuss:

• The global reaction to the Type 00 concept and rebrand
• The backlash on social media
• The creative vision behind transforming Jaguar from a struggling carmaker into a modern luxury brand.

Gerry shares insights on branding, polarising design and why emotional connection matters more than mass appeal.

Benedicte Soteras, Partner and International Client Director at DLG provides data insights, revealing record online engagement, spikes in search interest, and Jaguar’s emerging relevance in the wider luxury space.

Brought to you by https://digitalluxurygroup.com/

Follow us @digitalluxurygroup & @robin_swithinbank on Instagram

Produced by Juliet Fallowfield, 2025 www.fallowfieldmason.com

Transcript

Betting on the Big Cat: Gerry McGovern on Jaguar’s big gamble

Robin Swithinbank: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Luxury Society Podcast, brought to you by Digital Luxury Group. I'm your host, Robin Swithinbank, 

David Sadigh: And I am your cohost, David Sadigh. 

Robin Swithinbank: In this podcast, David and I attempt to peek behind Luxury's velvet curtain and to try and work out what makes the luxury industry work. Luxury continues to fascinate, but while there's little evidence to suggest consumers want luxury goods any less than they ever did, the landscape is in a state of flux.

Existential questions of value, purpose, and even survival have come to the fore. So what makes today's luxury buyers tick? How are brands responding and what will the luxury sector of tomorrow look like? In this episode, we'll be addressing all of this through the lens of one of the most controversial stories in contemporary luxury. 

And through an interview with the creative director who authored it, Gerry McGovern's vision for Jaguar prompted a social media pylon with many arguing that by throwing the baby out with the bath water, [00:01:00] he could only drive the big cat into extinction.

But quieter voices have been slower to criticise, noting that Jaguar Land Rover's profits are up and suggesting that McGovern's proposed overhaul was exactly what a fading giant of the automotive world needed if it were ever to purr again. So will the gamble pay off? As McGovern will explain, there's only one thing worse than being talked about.

So, David, let's get to it. 

David Sadigh: Let's do it.

Robin Swithinbank: 

All guests: when people think of Jaguar, they tend to think of Jaguar through roast tinted glasses

 I could argue we were very lucky because nearly a billion people saw this. 

 If you become preoccupied with everybody wanting to love you, you'll fail massively.

All guests: if you look at the luxury market in general, it's bulletproof. the reality is Jaguar has to change or die.

 [00:02:00] And now I must say it's with no small amount of excitement and intrigue that David and I welcome onto the pod professor Gerry McGovern, OBE, Jaguar Land Rover's Chief Creative Officer is widely recognized as one of the greatest living car designers and creatives.

He oversaw the design and brand development of some of the 21st century's most iconic cars, transforming the Range Rover into one of the first names in luxury. And more recently reintroducing the much loved defender to widespread critical acclaim. Today he curates what Jaguar Land Rover or JLR calls a house of brands, one of which is of course Jaguar.

The storied British automotive Mark that brought us eternal designs such as the XK one 20, the E type, and the XJS. After years of dwindling performance, five years ago, Jaguar was put under Gerry's creative control, and in December last year, he announced a total root and branch overhaul of the brand at an event in Miami.

The event proved seismic sending shockwaves all over the world and well [00:03:00] beyond the car industry. Now with Jaguar sales currently on hiatus, as this transition sets in anticipation for what comes next for the company among current enthusiasts and luxury industry observers is revving up. So Gerry Limp pun outta the way, it's fair to say we're very much looking forward to our conversation.

Welcome to the Luxury Society Podcast, and thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. So look at the moment, no cars on sale. and yet everyone is talking about Jaguar following the release of the new branding and the new type zero zero concept. I guess the dust has settled a little bit, but thinking back and looking back over the past six months or so, were you surprised by the reaction to the new branding and the car design?

probably surprised with the scale of, The reaction and the interest. we knew there would be a level of interest. 'cause when people think of Jaguar, they tend to think of Jaguar through roast tinted glasses in a past tense, and that actually came out and a lot of the commentary, they tend to think of Jaguar [00:04:00] Z types, D types and, these very elegant sedans, et cetera, et cetera.

they don't really think of it at all in the current sense over the last 20 years because if they did, the brand would've been a lot more successful than it is. and the reality is we had to completely reimagine the brand if we wanted it to be, first of all, relevant in a modern context and also successful now.

I think in terms of, when we first started talking about it, I said when we first launched New Jag, it has to be brand first, then it has to be the products. 'cause we wanna operate in what we, loosely term a modern luxury positioning. And our modern luxury is just a term. There are lots of different forms of modern luxury, but we have our own version of whatever that is for each of our brands.

I guess in terms of the reaction, what we didn't expect we almost got caught in this [00:05:00] wave of. particularly in America with Platform X, with Trump coming into power, and people being allowed to just say what they like. And I think it did stoke if, for want of a better description, this sort of underbelly of middle American sort of, cynicism, homophobic attitudes, racism for want of a better description.

And we got in the middle of that and we didn't see that coming. And I look back and think, why is that now? A lot of that is to do with that original film, which incidentally, some people in our business were accused of. being the architect of that, the architect of that was me working with our creative, director within our agency.

and maybe we were being naive, but my sort of remit to him and we worked on it together is we need to create, a film that leads this, that [00:06:00] creates that sort of story that, brand world. And we need characters that actually look like nothing else. we talk about Jaguar being a copy of nothing and those people will a copy of nothing in a lot of respects.

Now I didn't, we didn't select those people because they looked androgynous or they looked this, or they looked that we chose them because they looked different. They were unique. Now, the unfortunate thing is that world that we created. There was a continuing story with that in terms of, you know, you saw them sitting on this rock formation.

Now, originally the vehicle was gonna be revealed from that rock, the rock and the diamond within, which was the car, and there was lots of cameo, sort of actuations that built that story up. And unfortunately, we had to pull a lot of those out because the sentiment around that film became massive.

and I suppose just seeing the [00:07:00] film on its own without all that stuff that supported it, and eventually the vehicle, it didn't make a lot of sense to people. Do you think in that sense you were perhaps even a little bit unlucky? 

I could argue we were very lucky because nearly a billion people saw this. So we had a view that we needed to get, 250 million heads around this, views on this in terms of what we were looking for. And nearly a billion people, it's probably over that now have viewed that film and the reveal of the cast.

So, there's a writer that said the worst thing about Oscar Wilde, I think is probably where we're going. Isn't it Oscar Wild? There's only one thing that's worse than being talked about. It's not been talked about. Now, you might argue was a on sort talk, but 

 for me, the funny thing was when Elon Musk, tweeted that was music to my ears. 'cause when we revealed the brand for the first time, I wanted people thinking, what is this? This can't [00:08:00] be a car brand. This looks like a luxury brand.

and you build a story from that. And so yeah, we didn't want any cars near it to begin with, but when you built that brand world up in its various creative manifestations and then you saw eventually the car, then it all connected, the probably is, there's a big bunch in the middle of stuff that you didn't get to see, but it's still stoked.

An incredible amount of interest, an extraordinary amount of interest. I mean it it makes your, one of your original statements on stage in Miami all the more ironic really. You said Jaguar has no desire to be loved by everybody. I don't expect you had any expectation of just quite what that sentiment might end up meaning, but take away the reaction.

Be before that. When you were thinking of that, what did you mean? Well, I have a particular view and that has always been if you are trying to create something really special, unique. a brand that has got real emotional [00:09:00] resonance with consumers. If you become preoccupied with everybody wanting to love you, you'll fail massively.

because you'll just, you'll water everything down because you're worried about what everybody else thinks. And this brand is not, it's be, it's been reimagined and tailored to a specific type of customer. It's not gonna be massive volume, it's gonna be luxury, it's gonna be all electric.

It will be at a reasonably high price point. so we don't need everybody. and the point that I was trying to make in that speech was if you look at British creators, invariably when they first came along, they stirred it up a bit. You think Vivian Westwood, David Bowie, you can think of, the film that was made about Bowie in America when he was walking around all this androgynous character.

What's, what is this? 'cause people don't understand it. originally I said I don't want to turn up like a typical automotive brand.

In [00:10:00] fact, gone are the days where we're gonna get a motor shows and the execs get up, then they talk ad nauseum about the vehicle, about the engineering, we don't want to do that anymore. Certainly not with our luxury brands and what we were going to do was, When all the films were shown and all connected, then you saw the car.

I was gonna walk out and bring some of the other creatives on the stage. We had give a bow and walk off, but we needed to explain, you know, my colleagues and we need to explain this, a bit better. And interestingly, I think we did something like 32 versions of that speech. And in the end, I'll put it back to what I wanted it to be, was just telling the truth about what we're trying to do with this brand.

And that bit about we have no desire to be loved by everybody was true. Mm-hmm.Because when I briefed the design teams, I said, forget about the past. Forget about wanting to be loved by everybody. Great design is polarizing. Great brands are [00:11:00] polarizing. What does this brand need to be?

Not who is the target customer. What does the brand wanna be to turn up and take it back to the essence of what it was originally about and what it was originally about. And so William Lyons, he said it in one comment that I found in a document where he said a Jaguar is a copy of nothing. And, but what we've been trying to do for so long is just keep repeating that retrospective view.

and there comes a point where you have to reinvent yourself and we, Jaguar it needed to be reinvented. So it was about saying, look, we don't need you, all of us, the irony is that once we show the vehicle, the sentiment did start to change. There's still look, there's still people that don't like it.

They don't like the fact that we've been. controversial that we've been radical. There's people looking at it from the, you know, oh, it's nothing like an e type of, but it was never meant [00:12:00] to be like that. But nobody in my view can turn around and say, that car is badly proportioned or a bad piece of design.

'cause it's not. and just, let's go back a bit,Gerry, to some of the original thinking behind this new branding and product strategy. we know it was called the Project Renaissance. what was the original brief and what motivated it? Well, you know, the, the Project Renaissance was based on, we have a view that Jaguar is probably the closest brand in our out of brands to basically a work of art.

in its heyday, William Lyons, he was an engineer, but he was an artist and, he had a great eye. And they, those, some of those early vehicles, they were work of art. They were sculptural forms on wheels. So the art link was very important. Also, the fact that, in the luxury space, art and luxury have been in inextricably length since the beginning of time.

And in fact, one of the visuals that I had, very early on that [00:13:00] inspired me was, a painted by Pierre Seage, the French painter, who was the first painter to ever have an exhibition at the Louv while he was still alive. And for me it was that thing about, he was a copy of nothing.

He was a trailblazer. but the Renaissance bit came from the link with the art renaissance. So we, when we set up three teams, we named them Michelangelo, da Vinci, and Raphael. Yeah. and then when we got to the final results, we set up three design teams. We built something like 17 models, and the brief was we want three different families of vehicles.

One of them totally separated from each other. And the night before the review, I renamed them to her and Corfield and Passmore, three British modernist painters. So there was, the connection in the word was were just, was the sort of the art, but it's intrinsic to [00:14:00] what we want this brand to become.

That's something that's highly desirable. It's not following the norm. It represents the uniqueness of what Jaguar was in its heyday, but not looking anything like it was back then. 'cause that's not relevant now. It's a really interesting, approach and clearly brand first and product second, but nonetheless, it is still a brand that is going to need to sell cars at some point, as you've already mentioned it, it'll be an electric car.

The best way to sell cars is by making them incredibly desirable. let's face it, people don't need luxury cars. People buy luxury vehicles because they have an emotional connection with them, that ultimately enriches their lives and that's why they're buying into it.

And invariably in the luxury space, they'll have several vehicles. Probably not using it every day. Of course we need to make money as well, but if you get the brand right, you create the desire and you build the equity.

if I look at somebody like [00:15:00] Hermes, with a market cap of over 300 billion, their whole brand is based on creativity, based on a legacy that was created a long time ago, but always kept themselves modern and contemporary. So I might argue it's a parallel to that in the automotive world.

'cause in my view, nobody's done that yet. 

 we're talking about an electric car here, of course, which is another paradigm shift for Jaguar. And one of the criticisms of electric cars over the past few years, really since they were first introduced, particularly from petrol heads, is they don't pack the same emotional punch as an internal combustion engine.

There they're white goods, as some would have it. And a couple of years ago, I had the extremely good fortune to spend two days of my life in the Pyrenees of the wheel of the F type R 75 Cupe. Which is the last Jaguar sports car with an internal combustion engine 75 years after the first. My goodness, that was a beautiful experience and I can't honestly say I've yet been moved in the same way by an electric car, [00:16:00] so 

the question becomes, are the new Jaguar branding and the Type zero zero somehow intended to act as, I dunno, maybe a substitute for what we're losing from the experience of driving throaty multisensory sports cars?

Listen, this is a brilliant question. It's one that's been on my mind for a long time and I get that. I totally understand that. When I grew up, one of my first cars was a TR six, it had the long bonnet, it had the six cylinder, it had a, fuel injecting.

You got in it and it was raw. It was really gruy. When you drove through a tunnel, it was like Jesus, you couldn't hear anything. It, and it got that visceral power. I suppose if you were to draw a parallel, it'd be just like, you know why people in the luxury world of watches, they prefer mechanical watches to digital ones.

But in a future context, electric vehicles will be everywhere. That's the reality. I think what we've seen thus far, with the exception of one or two brands, is that the [00:17:00] focus is, and you said it has been on almost creating electric vehicle as a commodity.

'cause they talk about, range an anxiety. They talk about, range capacity. We talk about the power pack, they even talk about it as if it's a commodity. The reality is, however, and I've driven the prototypes of these jaguars, they're gonna drive brilliantly beautifully.

'cause actually electric vehicles can give you, in terms of performance, refinement, handling and all those things, great things to drive. The thing that is missing is the sound. But I could argue that people growing up now or in generations to come will never have known the ice engine. So they won't, it won't mean anything to them.

I think the trick is that a great band has to be more than its powertrain. [00:18:00] And one of the reasons on the design of that vehicle is that we deliberately didn't follow, what has become the electric vehicle design book, short bonnet, long cabin, tall cabin, deep seal, that is never gonna give you an emotionally compelling design.

So start with the design. One of the values of new Jaguar is exuberance. give it the longest bonnet you can. That's exuberant. You don't need one. You want one because if you look at that car inside you, it is almost like a classical sort of copay proportion. But then when you move around it, that's where the classic bit stops in terms of the way it's surfaced, it's intersections, it is varied featured.

so the brand and the way that the brand is presented and how it manifests in the product is gonna have to overcome this [00:19:00] thing on not having an I send you and there'll be some people that will never get over that, but particularly the type of customers that we're targeting or we think will appeal to this vehicle, they're not necessarily petrol heads.

They're people that are cultured. They love art, they love design, they want beautiful things. And the vehicle will be an extension of those values and their personality of which, performance is one part of it. But the car will have all those things. Now, what we could do, and it's quite easy to do, is we can, talked about that with our engineers.

We can make the car sound like an ice engine. We could give it that sound, we could give it that feel. But then that's not, that doesn't have integrity, does it? It's phone. It's a bit like I take this watch off. How do I know this is a mechanical watch? The only way I could tell is because it's got a crystal back, so I could see the mechanics, but there's a lot of these that will have a, steel back and somebody could produce that and look [00:20:00] exactly the same.

It would work exactly the same and it could have a battery in it and some weights in it, and I would never know the difference. So, you've answered my question. I was gonna ask whether or not you had an intention to fabricate the sound of an internal combustion engine, but it sounds as if you've ruled that out.

 something is there purely from an aesthetic standpoint, then that's fine. At least that's credible. But to make it sound like something when it's not, I don't think that is credible. But if I'll go back to the point when, and I have driven these things, just like when you actually look at the car, I've said to the designers, I want people to look at it and their jaws drop.

Wow. What's that? The same way when you drive it, it'll be like that, but it won't sound like an ice engine. 'cause it isn't. I think one very interesting, intriguing part is,Gerry, what you mentioned about the future and the fact that those younger generation will probably behave quite differently and that the emotional relationship that some of us had with [00:21:00] petrol cars will be probably radically different.

can you talk a bit more about the type of market and the type of consumers that you are targeting with Jaguar? Well, I think the difference is. in the sort of automotive world, traditionally a certain level, it's always been about the relationship with the car or the specific car.

We're trying to shift that to the experience with the brand. the emotional value of the brand that manifests in the way the car looks, the way a car handles the messages within it, the actual brand world itself. And it's a moving feast. It's an ecosystem. think about it as a movie rather than a picture.

It's a universe that keeps evolving And when you see the first one, second one, the third one, and how they relate to each other. but the customers that we are specifically looking at, that have responded [00:22:00] already to what we saw in Miami. They tend to be these people that want more than just a vehicle with a badge stamped on it.

how do you turn up on that in social media?

what does your website look like? How does that work? How do you bring the brand to life in that way? How do you then in the interface with the interior in terms of UX ui,create an experience that brings that whole brand world into play that's congruent with what that vehicle and that brand is about?

and even color is a big deal. and if you looked at some of the symbolism, we've done it reflects some of the stories in the car, like the strike through, at the back that's come out and presenting the vehicles in a way that they don't always just look like a photograph.

They look like a piece of art. They look like a painting. there's different levels of it. and for me, when you [00:23:00] describe this stuff, it doesn't mean anything in words. You have to see it in real life you know, how are we gonna turn up in the way we create a built environment?

we're gonna be opening two boutiques, one in London. You may have seen in Knightsbridge, there's a store that'll be a boutique. It won't be like going into a normal dealership, more like going into something that's more relevant, but people just wanna enjoy time being there and so can the total brand experience.

Same way we're opening a boutique in Paris in the luxury quarter. because that's the world that Jaguar lives in. the strategy we had for the last 20 years was one of mainstream sort of production vehicles where, you know, I. I had used to say to people, what do you think of Jaguar?

And by the way, those vehicles, nothing wrong with 'em, they're good vehicles. So there was nothing wrong with the design, but they weren't compelling. The brand [00:24:00] wasn't compelling. Yeah. it's really interesting this, because so much of the story is about positioning, obviously Jaguar moving your up market and away from the sort of the BMW and Volvo and fleet territory and towards luxury brands like Bentley and Porsche.

And as we understand the average selling prices are going to be deep into six figures, whether it's a hundred or 150,000 pounds, euros or dollars. The question becomes, are consumers ready for Jaguar to be a luxury brand?

Well, you know, that'sinteresting because, Jaguar originally was a luxury brand. It was considered a luxury brand. think of the early days, Jaguar was pted against Ferrari. it was okay. It was still maybe more affordable, but what, if you go back so many years ago, what did people do when they became successful in business?

They probably bought themselves a Rolex. They bought a Jag, but the game has moved on and that is why, and your question is very good. Are customers ready for it? I think there'll always be customers there in the luxury space for things that are truly compelling, have [00:25:00] integrity, and have a story that,that, resonates with them.

and you're not gonna do that by being ordinary and just sticking a, a badge on something. 

 you've gone on record as saying that, you really hate it when concept cars end up being heavily watered down when a production vehicle actually rolls off the line and that therefore what we see may actually look very similar to type zero zero. Is that something that you can comment on today?

It will. it might not be the same category of vehicle, but when you see it, it is that car in terms of its exuberance, it's length, its intersections. it's symbolism, it's strike through, it's playing down the word mark where it becomes more subtle and it's the interface you have within it in terms of the total experience when you're driving the car and how it makes you feel.

great brands aren't about what necessarily they look like it's as much about how they make you feel [00:26:00] now. You said a customer's ready for it. if we do this properly, yes, but we have gotta shift that perception, considerably

'cause we did some, market research earlier on, and I've always been a critic of market research because the reality is that I. You are asking consumers to look at something and they're looking in a, the context of today and not in a featured one. 

They're only thinking about what they know now. They don't think about what it could be. But interestingly, when we showed it was a, a family of this new Jaguar 

 we didn't badge them. They didn't know what brand they were from, and we asked them, what do you think of it?

And it was wow. God, what's that? Does it look expensive? Yeah. is it emotionally compelling? Yeah. What brand do you think it is? well it's [00:27:00] gonna be a luxury brand, but it couldn't be Rolls Royce Bentley 'cause it's far too modern. But it's, it's out there so when we actually said to them, okay, if we told you it's this brand and they gave us a price.

Yeah. Said 180,000, 200 whatever, thousand pounds. Wow. Okay. That's good. then we told 'em what brand it was and the surprise was, and the reaction to that price point, which answers your question. So we've gotta build that up. Yeah, it's, there's definitely consumer appetite for luxury brands that I think is never gonna be in question.

the Veblen theory will always persist, I'm sure. But at the same time, what we're seeing is a change in consumer sentiment, particularly when it comes to spending large amounts of money. Some brands are quite successful in this market and in the automotive world. We can think about Ferrari and we can think about Porsche that have been posting good numbers.

But then others, Aston Martin Bentley, British automotive luxury brands have been having a slightly tougher time of it recently. [00:28:00] What confidence do you have that you can go into that space at these price points and draw in a consumer who at the moment is, is a little bit nervous, a little bit more cautious than they were a couple of years ago?

Well, the first thing I would say is if you look at the luxury market in general, it's bulletproof. 

 so we're confident the market is there, the customers are there. But it's interesting you mentioned a couple of brands that, they're great brands, but they're brands that are very automotive and to me, they're very static.

I don't see them as being super modern and I don't see them as being, creating brands that are truly forward thinking in their sense of, being featured in a way where you create a complete experience, quite traditional. And I think that's what we're trying to shift is shift the perception of, with Jaguar is what is a look through brand In the automotive space, that's what it's traditionally is.

We don't wanna be that [00:29:00] now, only time will tell, but the reality is Jaguar has to change or die. And our view is, and you can alwa you, you have to calculate risk, but at the end of the day, there's an element of visceral feel for what is this gonna work or not, 

but the other thing for the total business is that we have brands within our business like Range Rover Defender particularly, that are incredibly strong and that, Have in the past paid for Jaguar in terms of allowing it to exist. Now what Jaguar asked to do now is pay for its own investment.

Gerry, you mentioned,land Rover and the defender and the discovery part also of the House of Brands.

basically how does Jaguar fit, within this equation? Well, the whole point of having, a house of brands is to create a high level of differentiation. And Jaguar is nothing like a defender or Range Rover. defender and Range [00:30:00] Rover are brands that derived from, what was Land Rover, as is Discovery.

And we are gonna, in the process now, reimagining discovery and there might be other brands, but what we're trying to do with them is trying to separate them apart.

our vision for the future, it has to start with what are these individual brands? What are their values? What do they represent? Who are their consumers? And how do we maximize the value of them by building their equity? 

 and the way we create our infrastructure around platforms and all those sorts of things back of house, we need to do that in a way that

maximizes economy of scales. However, when it comes to the products, they have to be totally different.

let's bring the conversation into the here and now, because the world is gonna have to get used to the new Jaguar one way or [00:31:00] another. And it's still roughly six months, as I understand it, before the first cars will be revealed in the first customer deliveries, I think on due until next year.

But,in the meantime, reports are that you've moved on from the agency that created the rebrand launch campaign. yeah, you've seen the headline as well, but what can we expect to see from Jaguar during this pregnant period before those cars are revealed? Well, before I answer the that question, That is the wrong narrative. I'm not saying you are wrong, but that's what's come out in some News reports, against, at the record stream. what is, what should the narrative be? Right?our agency, like in any agency relationships come up for a renewal every five to six years.

And we're at that stage with our agency, it's got nothing to do with the performance. 

I'm more than happy the work they've done, great work and they continue to do it. 

so we have a plan, because, we were the most talked about brand in the world for about two months. But to maintain that is pretty, difficult 

And the reality is [00:32:00] we don't need that amount of publicity to achieve our success in terms of financial success. Which will take time anyway. But you still need to keep the brand out there. and we have a plan for various events and rollouts that are gonna happen in the next, six months.

that will keep, Jaguar in, people's minds. But I think, well, we would, anyway, we have to be very considered how we do that. We're not changing our strategy as a consequence of what happened in Miami. 

that isn't the point here.

The point is the brand. The point is the brand, but the point is the world has boon, as well in the last six months. and how will Jaguar look to reflect that? Well, you're gonna have to wait and see on that. But one bit we haven't talked about very much,iswe did something very brave 

 And that was create an internal competition with three different design groups, put them in [00:33:00] competition with each of them.

Gave them a design rector for each one, gave them exactly the same brief. 

We saw in a three month period a level of creativity that was outstanding. We ended up with something like 17 full size models that we put in our design garden. three different families of vehicles. And and I remember when we went to do the review and we don't tend to vote with design 'cause you don't design anything good by committee.

But on that occasion, because it was so important to everybody, we let a certain number of people have a vote,you know?and interestingly before myself, the board, et cetera, went out to look at these models. I said, when you go out there, you'll see a group of models that are really catching.

But you might want to consider, are they too retrospective? You'll see another group of vehicles that when you see them for the first time, you'll think, you [00:34:00] know what, I really like that 'cause I'm comfortable with it. And I said, be careful of that. Comforter is not a good thing in the luxury space 

And then you'll see another group of vehicles out there that are gonna frighten you 'cause they're so radically different. 'cause they are a copy of nothing. I'm not gonna tell you which ones they are. You're gonna have to figure that out for yourself.

But you know what, we did this voting and the voting was absolutely unanimous everybody could see it, what it needed to be. I'm thinking about Jaguar now and about the partnership, collaboration and so on.

Is it something that,you guys envision? And what type of collaboration are you willing to potentially pursue? first of all, Jaguar has to live on its own. I don't want to be sharing Jaguar's platform with anybody. and that doesn't mean to say we'll never collaborate but for me, great brands don't need to do that.

However, if there are brands out there or partnerships that have a [00:35:00] credible reason for being that enriches your brand and their brand then we will consider that. But it has to come from a creative space. 

 I think what we've gotta do with Jaguar is we've gotta reestablish it first, build it, build its equity. And when you've got that sort of, positioning equity, then you can move on to that. But I think it would be wrong.

range Rover is at a stage that it can do that. So is defender. so at the beginning, We're not going anywhere near that.

 In a way it seems the day is cast. But, nonetheless, that still leaves us with the,question, which is to examine what success for the new Jaguar might look like and indeed what needs to happen for you to achieve it. Well, 

 ultimately it will be around how many vehicles are sold. But you'll see it, you'll see them in the streets. 

 What does good look [00:36:00] like? For me, it'll be when people, come to me and talk about Defender or Range Rover and they just want to talk about their vehicles and the brand 'cause they have a love affair with it.

you might argue in the world we live in now, you know these are vehicles, it's luxury. Do we really need it? But actually we do. It's that emotional connect.

So when I start seeing them and when I get people coming and talking about them in that emotionally engaging way, those are all the signals. But ultimately. It will be sales. There's no other measure of it. 

Well, gentlemen, look, it's been a thoroughly entertaining and engaging and really quite revelatory conversation.

it only rains for me to say to Professor Gerry McGovern. OBE, thank you so much for joining David and me on the Luxury Society Podcast, and we wish you well with the next chapter in Jaguar's extraordinary story. 

Watch this space. We will. Thanks Gerry. Thank you so much. Thank you. ​ 

David Sadigh: So Robin.

Robin Swithinbank: Yeah, [00:37:00] well, that was an incredible conversation. I didn't expect him to speak for an hour and I didn't expect him to be quite so candid. But some very interesting points that he raised throughout. 

 and very prepared to discuss, the process, the challenges, and indeed the response to, that video. last December, which as he rightly pointed out, ended up being, Well, an extraordinary success on the one hand, because as you said, they had over a billion views on it.

and indeed there is only one thing that is worse than being talked about and that's not being talked about at all. and the world for two,months, as you said, was talking about Jaguar more than any other brand. So I guess what I becomes intriguing is whether or not Jaguar will inevitably sell cars off the back of that. or whether the sort of response, which I think we can probably say was predominantly negative, will damage the brand and will prevent it from selling cars. As you said, time will tell, What did you think, David? Are

There is no doubt, in the fact that he's a visionary and that at some point, he mentioned it quite bluntly, like either this like brand is going to evolve or die. and [00:38:00] at some point having everyone around saying, oh, Jaguar used to be such a great brand, Jaguar was fantastic, but not buying it.

David Sadigh: I understand that this is like a major and significant issue, so I tend to like the fact that they are going against the grain. They're like trying to express like a new vision and convey,a new, let's say brand image that is like quite different and let's face it, like going against the grain.

and I think that's, that element is quite interesting, the fact that they target London and Paris. the fact that they are like assuming,their ideas about maybe like trying to offer. A more blended view of the world despite the Trump election, regarding some of the, people they have been using in the advertising and so on.

it seems to me that, it's a big bet. I don't know if it's going to succeed, but I'm quite convinced in the fact that it wouldn't have been possible for Jaguar to keep going as they were going. And I think at some point, being able to really take major risk, be bold,a bit [00:39:00] brave and.

Yeah, be able to really like challenge the status quo is probably the right direction.

Robin Swithinbank: Yeah, I agree. we didn't talk about the numbers, with him, the numbers of cars that Jaguar has been selling in recent years. Of course, this year, technically it's not selling any cars at all. The whole thing has been put into hibernation while the transition from what the brand was and what the cars were into, what the brand will be and what the cars will be is taking place but last year I figures suggest they sold just over 30,000 cars, which is fewer than a fifth of the number of cars they sold in 2019. So yes, this was a brand which was. very dramatically into the hinterland of, of automotive history. so I think it's quite clear that a brand reset is exactly what's needed, is the question is whether they can make the connection between this brand of more than 20 odd years ago.

As you said, you know that the brand of E types and D types next K one 20 is this brand that, that still has a huge amount of emotional equity, but it's locked away in the past. they unlock that and translate that into 20, 26 and beyond? That is a, that is, it's a, I don't think that anybody's ever [00:40:00] actually done it before.

I can't think of a comparative. and of course the market is so competitive at the moment. We mentioned a number of luxury automotive manufacturers during the conversation, some of which are doing well at the moment. Ferrari and Porsche both grown in, the last, few years, but others haven't, and particularly the British automotive marks.

and of course, as we know, luxury consumer sentiment at the moment is, not good. It's not strong. Yes, I agree with him that luxury is bulletproof, but luxury changes or what people perceive to be luxury and what people consume, can change and does change. And as we've discussed on this podcast many times already in a very short space of time. Is that the world of luxury brands is potentially migrating away from a European, center and perhaps towards a center in the far east. I'm not making any profound projections there at this point, I must say, but it is challenging for traditional European luxury brands to, in an environment where the competition from around the world is much greater than it ever has been. And Jaguar essentially is starting from [00:41:00] ground zero. Can it succeed? I dunno. We'll see.

David Sadigh: There is this idea that, to generate this amount of hate and let's use that word, right, if you look at the comments online and so on, like many folks were like expressing I. Extremely harsh criticism of the car, of the brand, saying you ruined the brand and so on. So I think at some point, by generating this amount of hate, I'm pretty sure that they are going to generate also some part of love because the difference of hate.

It's probably not indifference, it's probably love. So I guess that at some point, there will be like a positive reaction and some people who would like embrace, brand values that are like a bit different and that are probably allowing to differentiate themselves, from the different car makers.

So I think it was a really fascinating, conversation and I'm quite excited. I think the idea you shared about a follow up discussion with him maybe in one or two years would be, extremely insightful. [00:42:00] And I do believe that right now we don't have the crystal ball and that everyone is like, or at least people around that I'm like watching or reading.

Everyone has a lot of firm opinion, but until we see the car and we drive it, I think it's quite difficult to know what would be like the exact or at least the direction of the wind.

Robin Swithinbank: Yeah, I agree. It is interesting, you and I even back in December before we actually put this podcast together, we were exchanging messages saying that, well, first of all, we thought the response was. crazy, but also that when looking at the rebrand and looking at the design of this type zero zero concept, there was a lot actually to like about it. now whether that's, means that, we are the ultimate arbiters of taste and it can't possibly do anything but succeed. I wouldn't like to say however, I do think that there's some strength in being an underdog, and as you say, I dunno whether there'll be as much love as there is hate, but there will be people who love it.

There will be people who back it because it's the underdog now. and it will see some success because of that. Whether it's success in accordance with their targets, we don't yet know. but one thing I would [00:43:00] add, I guess at this point. Is that Gerry himself has an incredible track record over the past 20 years 

and only a few years ago, of course, with the return of the defender, there was a huge amount of nervousness ahead of the release of that car. It wouldn't be what it was. They would break the traditions, they would ruin the legacy, blah, blah, blah. And yet that thing has sold like hotcakes and people love it. it's become, a symbol, of luxury and a symbol of success. and so should we be backing Gerry alone in,in this particular endeavor, I would suggest that, you wouldn't be a fool to do so. Let's put it that way.

David Sadigh: And maybe, in the meantime, the PSG in Paris will have won the Champions League and some of the most famous soccer players of the PSG will start driving, around Paris and the cool neighborhoods, in their new,Jaguar. And, then it'll become a different story.

Yeah, it could happen. is it. I think it only takes a few examples like that in this very image led world, for a brand to be transformed in people's perceptions. [00:44:00] And goodness, I'm British, and in that respect, I'm slightly biased. Biased against DPSG, you mean?

Robin Swithinbank: Well, not, I'm no Arsenal fan, but, I was very disappointed to see Livable being knocked out, but that's another story for another day. but,I, oh, well, I wanted to succeed, let's put it that way. and I'd be delighted to see it do so. but I am full of anticipation full the car when it comes out very much looking forward to getting behind the wheel. And who knows, maybe we'll have this conversation again in six months or whenever that time comes.

And, we'll have some other reflections on what Jaguar has become and what its chances of success are.

David Sadigh: the Porsche interview we had, I think as we discussed last time, the podcast with, Porsche was a masterclass of like brand consistency and iteration and how do you further build a brand that own major market share. And I think now we are like more into something,much riskier approach, visionary approach.

And yeah. It'll be quite fascinating to follow this journey and look at the numbers as well in term of data. And I'm pretty sure that maybe Benedict on the download will be able to offer us a glimpse into some [00:45:00] of the early results.

Robin Swithinbank: she will. And before this becomes the longest podcast in history, we must, wrap it up there and move into on the download, David. Thank you. Good to see you. 

 And now I'm pleased to welcome back. Benedict Suter, d G's partner and international client director for this episodes on the download bene after that conversation with Gerry McGovern. There's probably only one place to go this week, I assume.

Benedicte: yes, of course. as you can expect, I'm going to comment on the Jaguar launch. And look at, what we saw on the data, side of it.

what does that data tell us? Gerry made some big claims about Jaguar being the world's most talked about brand Was that really the case?

Yeah, it sure was. basically following the Miami reveal, we've seen an extraordinary spike in engagement, both in search volume, like how many people like actually search for the brand on Google, but also across other platforms. Just to give you an idea, in November, 2024, the month of the launch, Jaguar generated over 15 million Google searches, which is almost like a 30% increase from the previous month [00:46:00] according to our tracking.

And then on the YouTube side of thing. So Gerry McGovern said that it had generated over 1 billion views, since, the big reveal. Basically what we can see on YouTube specifically, that it generated 4.1 million, which is just one platform. Of course, overall. And for comparison sake, if you look at what you know, the Porsche 2018, your Titan EV reveal, generated, it was like three times less.

Than this, and it's been live for like over seven years now. the Soul electrified film. So that's, a sense of scale there.

Robin Swithinbank: Yeah, I'm difficult to prove a billion views, obviously. and they will be working across, numerous platforms, I'm sure, and orders come up with that consolidated figure. But, very hard for any brand to occupy that space for a sustained period of time. assume that Jaguar's raw has somehow subsided since.

Benedicte: yeah, it actually, if you look at Google searches again, the brand average between nine to 10 million, like prior to the launch, and they've [00:47:00] now come back, in April, May, 2025 to that same level as pre-announcement. But what's quite interesting though, if we look at Instagram this time around is that since October, 2024, we keep, rankings of the most like engaged and commented.

Post on the platform. And since October, 2024, Jaguar has occupied and still occupies five of the 10 most commented posts across the entire lecture automotive industry on Instagram. as you can imagine, and as Gerry candidly acknowledged, the sentiment was an universally positive, but that align perfectly with this statement that, great design is polarizing and that they have no desire to be loved by everybody.

Robin Swithinbank: yeah, there was a lot of comment, wasn't there, which wasn't positive. and a lot of high profile people tweeted or posted,commented on the brand relaunch.

 what are we reading into that?

Benedicte: that genuinely helped as well, like the brand to make that much noise. there was Elon Musk, there was Marcus [00:48:00] Brownie, there was Nigel Farage and many other Basically high profile celebrity. That comment commented on the move back then. Many of them polarizing, in their own right.

But,that also allowed the brand to get so many eyeballs on their content.

Robin Swithinbank: Yeah, Gerry seems to suggest that a lot of these guys just don't get it. I think it's probably fair to say that a lot of those people

Benedicte: I.

Robin Swithinbank: mentioned would be some way right. Of center, and naturally inclined therefore to talk about the woke aspects of the campaign. But, what Gerry seems to be making clear is that this is about Jaguars shift from an automotive brand to a luxury brand. that in his words, I think he said, happens to make cars. So are you seeing evidence of that repositioning?

Benedicte: on the data side of things, it's a little bit too early to say,and of course it would be much more interesting to ask that, direct, current client base, what they think. But so far what we have access to, in terms of, I. Data is, we usually look at the composition of audiences and their affinities.

 so first of all, we noticed a slight, loss of followers [00:49:00] since the announcement between 200 and 300 K. the brand initially had like around 17 million followers, and now they're just below that. To date, Jaguar still has a lot of its follower base, like with strong affinities to other automotive brands.

as you would expect, Mercedes-Benz or BMW, above the 80% threshold, but,what's notable around on this is that you see that. Part of their audience is already, like following other, luxury and fashion brands such as Louis Vuitton or 32% of their audience already follows Louiston, a little bit less for, Dior and Versace.

It's more around the 23%. so while it's too early to say this is duplicate, something that we would be tracking, at DLG to understand whether, their audience is gonna grow more affinity towards, additional like luxury brands over time I.

I wonder if, looking ahead you can tell us what you're gonna be looking at most closely. I.

we'll be looking at like searches, online searches on Google, for the [00:50:00] brand. Is it going up? Is it going down following the relaunch. the challenge basically for them will be to convert, this like visibility, into sustained interest for context.

I'm sure you've seen that,JLR as actually reporting in their like Q1 report that about 32,000 people have already expressed interest in the forthcoming electric gt. Looking at searches is one thing because of course if volumes go up, it's a good indication, but at the same time, they're not targeting everyone at the same time.

As I said, I think the other element that we'll be looking at will be the composition of their audiences. across platforms do we see more affinities with high-end luxury brands? the likes of Hermes for instance, or Patek Philippe, which, are the people who buy those products are the ones who will be able to afford, those new products.

Robin Swithinbank: Yep. Yep. as Gerry said, Jaguar has to change or D the stakes are incredibly high at Benet. I am sure We'll keep tracking this one. Thank you so much for bringing those insights to us. We'll see you in the next episode. 

Benedicte: Thank you, Robin. 

Robin Swithinbank: Thank you for listening to the Luxury Society [00:51:00] Podcast. If you've enjoyed this episode and would like to hear more, don't forget to subscribe. And if you want to go deeper into any of these topics, check out luxury society.com where you'll find stories, insights, and profiles that unpack what's going on in the world of luxury right now.

I've been your host, Robin Swithinbank, and this has been the Luxury Society Podcast available on Apple, Spotify, and wherever you get your podcasts.