Motorsport bragging rights are about to become a major sales weapon for Ford in Australia, writes Paul Gover.
It plans to use V8 Supercar victories on the track, and the off-track carisma provided by former Holden (General Motors) hero Craig Lowndes, to put some youth and vigour into the sad sales performance of its flagship Falcon, the largest model in the Down Under range.
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“We’re going to re-invigorate the motorsport program,” says the president of Ford Australia, Geoff Polites.
Lowndes defected from Holden at the start of the New Year, after winning three touring car titles and Bathurst for the brand, in a motorsport coup that would rival Shane Warne turning out for Britain in a cricket test match against Australia.
His signing has cost Ford an estimated $A5-7 ($US3-4 million) in a deal that will almost certainly see him take on a similar role with the blue-oval brand to the one once performed by the Australian motorsport legend Peter Brock with Holden.
Ford welcomed him with full-page advertisements in all major Australian daily papers with the slogan: “Look who got a new car for Christmas”.
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By GlobalData |
The Ford Falcon XR8 |
But Lowdnes’ signing is only part of a motorsport commitment that Ford’s Polites believes is crucial to the future of the Falcon.
The Australian showroom front-runner has taken a pasting from the rival Holden Commodore for more than three years, despite Polites’ promise to end the domination.
The latest AUII version of the Falcon is an impressive car, but it is still missing the street credibility which built an eight-month waiting list for the V8-powered SS version of the Commodore, has powered Holden Special Vehicles through a string of record years, and helped bring a Commodore Coupe concept car to life as the 2001 Monaro V8.
Even secondhand sales have been tipped in favour of the Commodore, and Polites admits that he has seen a worrying trend in young buyers of used Holdens.
“They [Holden] get to their customers better. Commodore buyers are now much younger,” says Polites.
“It’s things like motorsport that they’ve used to do a lot better job in attracting new customers. You only have to look at the number of modified Commodores on the road today.”
Australians have always had a tribal attitude to the car sales contest between Holden and Ford, which is best reflected in the annual 1000-kilometre (600-mile) race at Bathurst in New South Wales.
Holden has won for the past two years, after an against-the-odds Falcon first in 1998, while the two other local carmakers – Mitsubishi and Toyota – don’t even take part.
Toyota looked closely at a V8 Supercar program during 2000, but eventually decided that its customers wouldn’t accept a V8-powered, rear-wheel drive Avalon – as required by the rules – when the production car is a front-wheel drive V6.
Those rules were written around the pushrod V8-powered dinosaurs from Holden and Ford which have turned V8 Supercar racing into a world-class contest that’s being exported to New Zealand in 2001 and will eventually spread to other Asian locations including Malaysia and Brunei.
The costs are relatively small, at least by Formula One and German Touring Car standards, but it’s still a $A200-million a year showcase that’s provided plenty of business for Holden and Ford.
But they aren’t the only companies using motorsport success to leverage showroom results in Australia.
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The Holden Commodore SS |
Subaru has used five straight rally championship victories to power its charge into the showroom top 10, even taking over sponsorship of Australia’s leg of the Asia-Pacific championship to protect its interest and the focus of an annual WRX pilgrimage that draws more than 500 owners.
Toyota has also used rallying for marketing for more than a decade, and has recently been joined by Proton, while Mitsubishi will use the following of its Ralliart division to begin selling Evolution Lancers during 2001 and also to put some real go into a sports version of its locally-made Lancer.
But, even so, the motorsport focus at the moment is on Ford and Lowndes – the driver who had been expected to become Holden’s new-age Peter Brock, complete with a dealership and long-term appearances in new-car commercials.
His deal is for five years and both he and Polites plan to work hard in that time.
“I think Craig is the most merchandisable feature in Australian motorsport right now. He sits with everything we are trying to do,” says Polites.
“With Ford, they are in an uphill battle. They want to get back to being number one, both in motor racing and cars sales,” says Lowndes.
“I’ll be trying to help them on both sides, if I can.”
Author Paul GOVER is national motoring editor of News Limited, Australia.
