RE: Evora GTE 'Proves Lotus Is A £100k Brand'

[Mr Whippy]

Shotgun Rider said:

frosted said:

At the end if the day they should just keep the Elise , make it cheaper and sell the same car for another 5 years when they can do a facelift . Let's be honest everyone would buy a 15k brand new Elise

So easy isn't it!

Yup. No really.

Too many manufacturers don't realise how many people might actually want a cheap no frills sports car.

I'd happily buy a VX220 Turbo now, for what they were new when they first came out... more than happily.

But who makes that kinda car now? No one.

Ginetta might, maybe...

Hmmm

Dave

[andyps]

Even if it is true that they have sold 114 Evora GTEs (it says 150 in Autocar) at whatever price is claimed it doesn't prove that they can sell the 6-7000 cars per year which are planned, a decent percentage of which will be at the top end of the price range they are aiming for.

Mercedes sold a few CLKs for £100k but I don't see them saying that because people bought the black edition at that price it proves the C class is a £100k car.

I wish Lotus well, but don't think Bahar understands reality. Hope I'm wrong.

[Shotgun Rider]

Mr Whippy said:

Yup. No really.

Too many manufacturers don't realise how many people might actually want a cheap no frills sports car.

I'd happily buy a VX220 Turbo now, for what they were new when they first came out... more than happily.

But who makes that kinda car now? No one.

Ginetta might, maybe...

Hmmm

Dave

I'm not saying that there isn't a market for a cheap sports car, look how well the MX5 sells, but how are Lotus meant to be able to knock £12,000 off the price of a new Elise? There's no doubt that they'd sell more of them but that doesn't mean they'd make a profit. A quick google showed me that the cost of a VX220 Turbo in 2003 was £24,000 odd, nowhere near £15,000. HP sold vast amounts of their PC table for £115/£89 recently comapred to £450 odd, they didn't make a profit though as when one was reversed engineered it cost over £200 in parts.

I could be completely wrong though as I don't know how much an Elise costs to manufacture! I know that standard cars cost a fraction of their list price but how much does an elise chassis cost to make?

[parvs]

I for one really hope they succeed. I think there is a market, but they do have to be careful how they handle it. I've had two lotuses, one was a brand new exige s, for almost five years I ran a lotus as a daily drive with no problems at all. The only issues I had was that I ordered the evora as soon as it was announced, and was within the first ten orders. I eventually cancelled it as it emerged that I had no choice on spec, and rather than 45-50k I had been told, my 'launch edition' car would be 62k. Bit of a leap to say the least.

Again when the esprit was announce, down my name went. The car has gone from est 85k to 100k already. My point is if they are going to have a plan, they should stick to it. A lot of potential customers dream of their cars but can't just pop out and buy them. Realistic cost projections can help people plan their finances and this will hopefully materialise into orders. But if they just keep jacking up the cost people will cancel their orders, I just felt a bit lied to.

Mind you I also tried to get a limited edition scura exige with no joy. They sold out on the first day. I since went out and bought a TVR sagaris which I ran as a daily for the last year and a half (now sold ). The new esprit, or indeed any car is going to have to be bloody good to make me smile more than that did!