So those first cars ended up being sold at discounts, anathema to Porsche.Normally, Porsche holds no stock of cars and will cut production back by means of “overtime adjustments”, as has happened with the 911 and the Boxster, rather than resort to discounting. Its experience of the US market is that the companies which offer the biggest discounts get into the biggest trouble: profit margins, customer satisfaction, brand image and the dealer chain itself will all crumble.And already Porsche has put its Cayenne back-up plan into action. And unlike buyers of 911s who are prepared to wait for the car of their choice to be built, SUV buyers want their prestige consumer durable now. Cayenne sales rates are already matching those of the 911 and Boxster combined, and the original factory at Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen could never have coped with the demand.But the solution has not been perfect. Porsche miscalculated its first sales moves into the cut-throat culture of the US SUV; initial stocks of 13 cars per dealer were not to the colour and equipment specifications buyers wanted. It did retain seats on the supervisory board.This time, the Volkswagen connection is that the Cayenne’s understructure and many of its mechanical parts are shared with Volkswagen’s Touareg.
Sharing development costs has benefited both companies, and has helped pay for a new Porsche factory in Leipzig. That is why the Cayenne was created, a pragmatic pandering to Porsche’s biggest market, the US, where SUVs are lifestyle must-haves whether or not there is any off-roading to be done.Independent as Porsche may be, it has always been able to call on its friends in the Volkswagen-Audi group There used to be family connections, too. The former VAG chairman, Ferdinand P? is the nephew of Ferry Porsche (son of company founder and Beetle designer Ferdinand Porsche), but the family ceased to own the Porsche company in 1972. Here the sales drop is 14 per cent, attributable mainly to an overall economic downturn; there is no danger that the 911 will fall out of fashion. But these two cars, 911 and Boxster, were Porsche’s mainstay for too long, and the company knew it. And partly it is because the Boxster, never a design masterpiece not least because it is far from obvious which end is the front, is just not enough of a pulse-raiser in today’s high-style car market.The 911, whose design concept goes back to 1963 with roots even further back in Porsche’s first, VW Beetle-related sporty cars, has suffered less because there is always a demand for this rear-engined, idiosyn- cratic icon. Partly this is a reaction to the new wave of exciting and desirable coup?such as Nissan’s 350Z (itself soon to be available as a roadster).
Total sales so far in 2003 are well up on the similar period in 2002, but that is thanks to the new Cayenne 4×4, the conspicuous-excess SUV (sports utility vehicle) that has caused Porsche purists to weep.Worst hit is the Boxster sports car, launched in 1996 as a low(ish)-cost gateway to the Porsche experience and whose sales are down by a massive 40 per cent as the year ends. Indeed, in terms of margins per vehicle sold it is the most profitable car maker in the world. Why, then, this latest dilemma?Because the bottom is falling out of Porsche’s traditional market. The difference is that this time, it can resolve it from a position of strength rather than of crisis, because Porsche is highly profitable. And what happens to the exclusivity then?
The Stuttgart company is not new to such a dilemma. On the one hand, it revels in its role as supplier of relatively exclusive, high-end cars for the well-heeled appreciator of fine automotive objects.
On the other, it knows it can survive as an independent carmaker, in control of its own destiny, only if it sells more cars to generate more profit. And what happens to the exclusivity then?
Porsche is playing a delicate balancing act. When you serve, break the dough seal and use the lid as chapatis for scooping up the biryani.. This risotto appears in different guises. Saffron is the key ingredient along with bone marrow, though that appears less often now because of beef scares.