There are moments a company is made. For Facebook, it was pretty much being created. For Google changing from just a search engine. And for Jaguar the creation of the Jaguar Landrover Defender. Jaguar brings back the Landrover defender, and it has excited many off-road fans as this is perhaps one of the most powerful off-road vehicles.
What makes the Jaguar Landrover so attractive
The Landrover Defender was released in 1948, at this time it was more of a farm car doing its rounds on the field much like the tractor would. And much like the tractor, it had that intense power about it. So much power that when a Landrover Discovery got stuck in the wetland in 2016, they wheeled out the Landrover Defender to pull it out.
But it’s not just the power, Durability was one of its main strengths, working in such continued would lead any car to wear and tear after a wheel. First, it would be rust, and then the body would just crumble.
The car wasn’t built for speed, but it gear shifting was one of the smoothest at the time. For such heavy vehicles shifting the gear was a tedious process that required a few seconds to automate. But the Jaguar Landrover Defender did it almost seamlessly. At a time where gear shifting was a big part of driving, unlike today (look at autonomous cars) then driving this off-road car was much easier.
Why they stopped making the Landrover Defender
Clearly, the Landrover Defender was a beast of a car but why did Jaguar prevent its manufacture Before we understand why Jaguar to bring back the Landrover defender we need to know why they stop it in the first place.
The biggest problem was a safety measure. For all its brute strength the defender is not the most stable car. Far too often its high center of gravity would cause it to be shaky and hard to control. Its height is right for off-road movement where the roads are not good, but with such few of those anymore it was a broad decision at the time
Stopped manufacture of the Defender at record high sales
Jaguar brings back the Landrover defender looks more of a market fade than actually anything else. For starters, this retro vehicle had just experienced its best sales since 2011. With marketing experts estimating that this trend would continue in 2017, Jaguar quickly stopped manufacturing the Defender citing stability issues.
Too many these are the perfect marketing gimmick. The plan is simple to stop manufacturing the car when sales are high, and the car is on demand. Then tease the market with excuses. GO and revamp the vehicle and then Jaguar to bring back the Landrover defender in 2019 to the anticipation of the crowds.
Jaguar brings back the Landrover Defender: problems they will face
Peugeot is kings when it comes to revamping old models to fit in the tech-savvy society. Take the 405 Peugeot for instance, in its time it was a classic, but today the company flipped its design to be more modern.
With nostalgia the motivation, it quickly became a hit.
The first and most obvious problem will be to try and maintain that old retro design and still keep it modern. If you try and sell to the people a new version of the Defender, and it does not look like it, they will feel cheated.
The car should also be able to perfume both off-road and in the city. There is a reason why cars are specifically building for certain terrains, trying to create a car that works well all over often fails.
All we have to do now is waiting and see how Jaguar brings back the Landrover defender
