What’s happening with Jaguar?

Jaguar plans to be EV only by 2025 so they are letting all current gas powered vehicles coast along with almost zero improvement until they pull the plug on them. They had a next generation electric XJ pretty much finished development to be introduced in 2022 but cancelled it in 2021 when they realized they couldn't build it after MY 2024 because it was a different platform than all the other electrics they plan to introduce in 2025 so they had no factory to build it in.  So sales are constantly sliding towards zero as the cars become less competitive and more forgettable every day.

Will they actually introduce an all new lineup of EVs for 2025? Will people realize these new cars actually exist? Will people care? I hope the answer is yes but I really doubt Jaguar exists in 5 years.

Jaguars are no longer cars that young, or even upper-middle-aged, people aspire to own.

My experience with Ford purchasing the franchise you sell was mixed.  At first they came in with boat loads of cash, and created some really interesting product.  Then they began to plunder the intellectual assets of the company.  Ever wonder why your Ford had a cruise control that you can increment one mile per hour, turn signals that flash 3 times when you bump the stalk, and the infamous switchblade keys?  Ever look at an early 2000 Volvo?  After a few years, the upper management team that was so hyped to buy the new franchise has moved on, and the new team has no job investment in the brand, and the fun begins.  Endless meetings, pre-meeting meetings, and post-meeting meetings.  Inch thick sales bulletins that get changed by 2 words 3 days later, and you have to find the changes, they're not noted.  Clueless management who couldn't make the grade at Ford, but are too expensive to let go.  Sales drop off 75%, the dealer body bails, and the wreckage is sold to some other company.

I came here to say:

This is totally Ford's fault...................if they'd not bought Jaguar, the company would have gone under and would have been lionized forevermore.

Now it's being slowly limped along towards it's inevitable grave.....thanks Ford.

alfadriver said:

In reply to frenchyd :

Sorry, but my first hand experience is very different from the one you perceive.  

[gomerpylevoice] Surprise, surprise! [/gomerpylevoice]

I wanted to look at Jaguars in 2019, but stayed out of the Jag dealership for the same reasons I avoided driving a Giulia.  Jag even offered a genuine wagon / estate car.  I might have found that harder to resist.

93EXCivic said:

In reply to frenchyd :

Except that buyer doesn't exist anymore. You have to offer incredible performance with good reliability now or you have to offer insane performance that comes at an extreme price as a play thing for the very well off.

 

Buyers now have more information regarding reliability, reviews, etc then they did back then. There is less brand loyalty and less loyalty to buying a car from your country which helped Jag massively in Britian. You can't offer something with subpar reliability any more and expect it to sale. I mean look at the Alfa Guila. It is a beautiful car and it doesn't sell for E36 M3 cause it's reliability is not good enough.

Well look at Ferrari. It's the very definition of sub par reliability. Yet people wait with money in their hand to buy something they know is going to cost a fortune to own, insure, and repair.  

Tom1200 said:

I came here to say:

This is totally Ford's fault...................if they'd not bought Jaguar, the company would have gone under and would have been lionized forevermore.

Now it's being slowly limped along towards it's inevitable grave.....thanks Ford.

Jaguar was well managed and sales were increasing when Ford bought them. The problem was too many companies wanted Jaguar.    
   The whole reason Jaguar was sold was British politicians  had what was called a Golden share. To keep Jaguar British owned. 
     It's a sad chapter of Englands dealing with  their most famous businesses.   I'm sure there is a great deal hidden under the rug but without a lot of inside knowledge we'll never know.  

mblommel said:

Other than the F type they don't seem to have anything available that's very exciting. 

The F pace was somewhat interesting with the surge in EV's but the price and performance doesn't seem to match a Tesla Model X or Y. 

TATA started out strong but Jag looks like it's withering on the vine (again). After the Japanese brands proved you can have performance and styling without reliability hassles and build "quirks" few buyers suffered the old euro brand ways. 

The F type simply lacked the timeless styling earlier  classic cars  had.  It wasn't the new style trends that bother people. It's that they just seem pasted on without any cohesion.  
     If you open the bonnet on those earlier cars  there was polish and flair.  Your eyes moved from the polished valve covers to the polished carbs to the polish on the timing cover etc.   The F type simply put tacky plastic over things that should have been featured.   Proudly displayed. 
     Plus nothing on those engines or about those engines said Special  or rare,  exotic.     Horsepower and Torque while very decent wasn't worlds better than others.  Nor was top speed exciting or  new territory. 
      So it was another V8!   Yawn!!! 

car39 said:

My experience with Ford purchasing the franchise you sell was mixed.  At first they came in with boat loads of cash, and created some really interesting product.  Then they began to plunder the intellectual assets of the company.  Ever wonder why your Ford had a cruise control that you can increment one mile per hour, turn signals that flash 3 times when you bump the stalk, and the infamous switchblade keys?  Ever look at an early 2000 Volvo?  After a few years, the upper management team that was so hyped to buy the new franchise has moved on, and the new team has no job investment in the brand, and the fun begins.  Endless meetings, pre-meeting meetings, and post-meeting meetings.  Inch thick sales bulletins that get changed by 2 words 3 days later, and you have to find the changes, they're not noted.  Clueless management who couldn't make the grade at Ford, but are too expensive to let go.  Sales drop off 75%, the dealer body bails, and the wreckage is sold to some other company.

Just want to point out some things there- the tap up-tap down feature for cruise control was actually developed in Ford- that happened in the early 90s.  I knew the people who worked on it.   At the time, Jaguar was buying all of their powertrain controls from Nippondenso, so they would not have developed it anyway.   We were "jointly" developing electronic throttle, although we did more of the work before they did it... 

Not sure about the other ones, but I would personally not put to much credit to the idea that it was taken from Jag, or that it was some kind of massive value in technology.

And in terms of the important technology- engines, transmissions and controls- that all was Ford sourced.   

I'm not going to defend Ford management, but I will defend the engineers who developed what you think was taken.  But our meetings were short and sweet, even though Jag really didn't believe what we were telling them.  Until they finally got to the exact same point, and expected some praise for getting there after we told them the exact same thing.  Yes, I am still pretty bitter about it, even though I've not worked with Jag for at least 25 years and I'm not even working for Ford anymore.

MotorsportsGordon said:

alfadriver said:

It's interesting that people think Ford was badge engineering.   There was ONE car that was basically shoved into the Jag market line that could actually be thought of that, and that's the Mondeo twin.  And the reason it was done is that Jag didn't have a 3 series size car to really compete with- which is a pretty large market.  The time and money it would take to make a brand new chassis didn't make sense, so the odd car was made.

The S type did share a chassis and motor with Lincoln, but Jag really limited what Lincoln could do, not the other way around.  And that chassis was good enough to share a lot of features up market to Aston Martin, and nobody minded that.  Heck, even the V8 was upsized and used at Aston.

Jag never understood how Mercedes could spend a lot of stuff and get value from it- they just spent a lot of money on stuff and never got anything out of it.

In terms of not figuring out who they were- that theme was exactly the same (and continues to be so) for Lincoln.  So I'm not really sure where that originated from.  In the early 2000's, we were promised that Lincoln/Jag/LR/Volvo would provide 40% of our profits for a fraction of the sales.  Never happened, and I attribute a lot of that on what Adrian said about lack of identity.

In terms of F1, that was Ford and Ford only.  The Jag name was just a name- there was no Jaguar attention shifted to that program at all, and the money would not have gone to Jag anyway- it was really a very expensive ad campaign for Jag that was a failure.  And I do see how the Ford management system doomed it.  But I will contend if Jag managed it, it would have been worse.

BTW, funny side story about Jaguar and Ford, the only reason that came true was that Ford was not able to buy Alfa Romeo.  Ford did a massive amount of homework and offered a really good and honest bid to the Italian government for Alfa, but Fiat came in and made a fake bid- which somehow convinced the Italian government.  The backlash made them go out and get Jaguar and Aston Martin.

In fairness to jag and the x type what they did is no different then the Audi a4 which shares its  stuff with the vw Passat.

You are correct. What they did was right along the same corporate lines as not only Audi but nearly every car company.  
     Marketing doesn't create demand, it simply makes a car visible.   The British have become very particular about cars.   Because of their roads nimble  handling commands a premium.  Top speed is too limited to be exciting. Toyota does practical and reliable.  Mercedes does well engineered, Loyalty because of British?   But it's not. Not really. 

In reply to alfadriver :

I got the idea the reference was to things taken from Volvo, not Jaguar.

car39 said:

My experience with Ford purchasing the franchise you sell was mixed.  At first they came in with boat loads of cash, and created some really interesting product.  Then they began to plunder the intellectual assets of the company.  Ever wonder why your Ford had a cruise control that you can increment one mile per hour, turn signals that flash 3 times when you bump the stalk, and the infamous switchblade keys?  Ever look at an early 2000 Volvo?  After a few years, the upper management team that was so hyped to buy the new franchise has moved on, and the new team has no job investment in the brand, and the fun begins.  Endless meetings, pre-meeting meetings, and post-meeting meetings.  Inch thick sales bulletins that get changed by 2 words 3 days later, and you have to find the changes, they're not noted.  Clueless management who couldn't make the grade at Ford, but are too expensive to let go.  Sales drop off 75%, the dealer body bails, and the wreckage is sold to some other company.

Well said.  John Egan  ( CEO Jaguar) was warned that  Ford would do well if it owned the company for a decade.  
     Using the Jaguar name to engage in Formula 1 rather than puttting Ford's name even though it was all Ford's money and direction is exactly what you do if you really don't care and think somehow it will be easy.  

matthewmcl said:

In reply to alfadriver :

I got the idea the reference was to things taken from Volvo, not Jaguar.

It's the same way Ford treated all its acquisitions.    

matthewmcl said:

In reply to alfadriver :

I got the idea the reference was to things taken from Volvo, not Jaguar.

Well, given how much later Volvo was acquired, I would put even less credit to the ideas.  Especially since Volvo was buying most of their electronics from Bosch (IIRC).  The only *possible* tech transfer might have been turbo technology- but I think our guys learned that the hard way.  We could have gotten a great head start from Volvo, but, alas, didn't.  Then again, the problems they were trying to solve with turbo hardware we fixed with engine development.

frenchyd said:

matthewmcl said:

In reply to alfadriver :

I got the idea the reference was to things taken from Volvo, not Jaguar.

It's the same way Ford treated all its acquisitions.    

You mean like Ford Advanced Powertrain developed a V12 to just give to Aston Martin?  That kind of treatment?  

Otherwise, you really don't know what actually happened in the meeting rooms.

Let's look at the Leland years with the xj the engineers were so worried that they might get a rover v8 put in they designed the whole entire compartment to only allow for the jag inline 6. So after leyland tbe realized they had to spend of bunch of time and money to redesign it so the v12 would fit in it.

frenchyd said:

Tom1200 said:

I came here to say:

This is totally Ford's fault...................if they'd not bought Jaguar, the company would have gone under and would have been lionized forevermore.

Now it's being slowly limped along towards it's inevitable grave.....thanks Ford.

Jaguar was well managed and sales were increasing when Ford bought them. The problem was too many companies wanted Jaguar.    
   The whole reason Jaguar was sold was British politicians  had what was called a Golden share. To keep Jaguar British owned. 
     It's a sad chapter of Englands dealing with  their most famous businesses.   I'm sure there is a great deal hidden under the rug but without a lot of inside knowledge we'll never know.  

You do realize I was being facetious................. 

In reply to Schmidlap :

I had to go look this up. So the plan seems to be 3 different electric SUV's for 2025, and an entry level price of just over $100k. Lol, bye Jag, not so nice knowing you. 

They're the same as they've always been. Decent looking vehicles with poor reliability. There's nothing 'special' enough about them for average people to tolerate the lack of reliability, and they're not expensive/exclusive enough for wealthy people to covet. The company leadership seems to make dumb choices which are more difficult to overcome for a small company.

My one purely emotional automotive buying decision was the purchase of a used 2015 F-Type R. Never in a million years did I think that I'd own a Jag, a brand that only "old people" own (in which I now find myself), and a brand of questionable reliability. I bought it for a reason I though I was immune to - looks. To me it's art on wheels, and since that's purely subjective, no one can say otherwise. When I was looking at them, a UK buddy said that the F-type is very reliable, but admitted that the taint of earlier issues has unfortunately colored the brand. He said "if you want a high end sports car with painful reliability, get an Aston Martin."

Anyway, it'll be educational to see what happens to its value after production, and maybe the brand, go away. Hopefully there'll be enough aftermarket support to keep it looking nice. (As an aside, it's amusing to find the word "Ford" on various bits.)

Another contender at one time was the Alfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio, but it fell off the list after reading about their dismal dealership network in the US. If I lived in Europe, perhaps, but I'm off topic.

In reply to kb58 :

The Ftype R will be the only Jaguar I'll ever own from this point forward. 

yupididit said:

In reply to kb58 :

The F type R will be the only Jaguar I'll ever own from this point forward. 

Me three, it is just such a beautiful car! I've often lusted after one.
I have to admit I would probably be happy with an F Type coupe with manual transmission, even it weren't an R. I doubt I'd kick a V-6 coupe out of bed for eating crackers, provided it had a manual. 

ae86andkp61 (Forum Supporter) said:

yupididit said:

In reply to kb58 :

The F type R will be the only Jaguar I'll ever own from this point forward. 

Me three, it is just such a beautiful car! I've often lusted after one.
I have to admit I would probably be happy with an F Type coupe with manual transmission, even it weren't an R. I doubt I'd kick a V-6 coupe out of bed for eating crackers, provided it had a manual. 

Well, last year, the very first F-Type we looked at was a black 2017 400 Sport (400hp V6). Test drove it and I was sold; I actually liked its sound better than the V8 model. Here's the part that's nuts, it had only 3,000 miles on it, from new. Yup, turned out that the owner was a pilot and never home. I'd have bought it immediately, except that I was "informed" (told) that the black color was not allowed. Ugh, still kills me - someone out there got a fantastic deal.

Back on topic, for various reasons I wouldn't buy any other model, and yeah, I don't know how Jag can differentiate itself enough at this point to back out of their situation.

Jaguar was fine before Ford, with the ugly and slow rectangle-headlight xj and the 2 decade-old xjs being the only options. 

A few years after the purchase, in 1998, Jaguar sells the XJR, which briefly earned the honor for the world's fastest 4 door car. 

Steps in the wrong direction, for sure.

I remember a story (wish I could remember where from) that a Ford engineering exec went to tour the jag factory after the deal. The deal had been rushed and Ford couldn't get there before the sale. 

The exec came away disgusted, saying he had only seen one car factory in worse condition in the entire world - and that one was in eastern Europe. Claimed that Jaguar was painting brand new cars 2 and 3 times because they couldn't keep birds out of the factory and they were pooping on the paint jobs. 

I think if Jag could take a bunch of the Rivian party tricks and package them into a striking SUV and give it model S acceleration, they'd be relevant again.