The mists are clearing around Yeti sales (or lack thereof)

[RSwag]

I wonder if Matt Wiesner is reading this forum at all. If they would like to establish a "prestige" image on Skoda by pricing them too high, then they should emphasize its association with VW and Audi more. Even VW Aus should train their sales person in Audi/VW to refer customers who are interested in Audi/VW, but can't quite afford it (Audi), or needs higher equipment level at the same price (VW). I thought these are the people they are targeting for. Otherwise these people will go Japanese or Korean.

This will sound a little bitter but from past experience Wiesner is so far up his own a@#e he would struggle to read the forum through his own rib cage. He has a genuine belief when it comes to launching the brand and his way is the right way.

Throw in the fact he was, and to a very large extent still is, a VW Australia employee then his ability and even desire to grow the brand maybe limited but not knowing him personally i couldnt say for sure. What i mean is anyone in a CEO role would be more inclined to achieve great things if they were a sole entity, think of what KIA have achieved in Australia and what we know they will go onto achieve.

They did this as they either succeeded or disappeared, they didn't have a parent company to hang off, which is positive and negative. The negative being they didn't have the luxury of burning millions of dollars on poorly planned advertising and on the positive side it put them in a position where they were forced to make better strategical decisions which in turn has made them quite successful especially when the better product started to meet the market.

I will remain a keen observer from the sidelines but i fear i am forming an attitude of "don't care" when it comes to the Skoda brand, i'm not really fussed whether they succeed or whether they don't. Not because i dont believe in the product but because the chance to influence the way the brand is handled here in OZ is non existent. Some brands actively seek enthusiasts feed back, Renault for one are excellent and will act on this feedback. Skoda is a closed book and opinions outside the organisation are not acknowledged and are certainly not welcomed.

On face value, in its current form, it is more likely to stagnate or perish than it is to grow consistently in the coming years. All we can do is hope that what is clear and distinguishable flaws in their approach to this market becomes clear and distinguishable to those who can make the changes required for success.

[K1W1]

Many dealers advertise a car, demo or brand new in stock, at ridiculously low price just to attract customers to come to the car yard. So they sell one car at a loss, then when people turn up, they would say the car was sold, and use the opportunity to sell them another stock car.

It's called a loss leader and is a standard sales technique. Do you think that people go into Woolworths and ONLY buy the Cornflakes that are on special this week?
When I worked for a large Ford dealer in Melbourne in the 1980's we always used to have a very cheap used Falcon at the top of our used car ad in the Age every Saturday. I'm talking something like a 2 or 3 year old car at $3995! The car was always real but what it always was was a ex fleet car or ex Taxi that had been traded on Wednesday or Thursday and had 250,000+ km on the odometer and generally dents on every panel and had not been detailed or even cleaned. In the whole time I was there I doubt that we ever sold the advertised car once but we sold a hell of a lot of cars off it. In case you are wondering, on Monday morning the advertised car went off to the auctions or the "bomb" yard dealers which it was always destined to do and after than any phone inquiries were met with "I'm sorry that car is sold it was a great buy and it's a shame you didn't ring earlier but we have plenty of other similar cars......"