RE: Geneva: Aston Martin Cygnet Aims High
Wednesday 3rd March 2010
Contrary to expectations, the new Aston Martin Cygnet (nee Toyota iQ) won't be restricted to owners of Aston's 'proper' cars, although its high £30k price tag will put it way out of reach of most city car buyers.
The Cygnet will be built at Aston's Gaydon factory, and cars will be offered with the standard Toyota 1.3 litre engine with manual or auto options. Aside from the obvious external tweaks - including that Aston grille and rear light graphic - most of the £30k will go on covering every inch of plastic in the cabin with hand-stitched leather.
Geneva: Aston Martin Cygnet Aims High
Toyota-based city car to cost £30k; non-Aston owners may apply...
Aston is bullishly hoping to sell between 2,000 and 4,000 copies of the Cygnet every year, which apparently amounts to less than one percent of the city car market. If successful, it would mark a significant volume increase for a company that presently builds around 6,000 vehicles annually. More importantly, it would reduce Aston's average fuel economy rating at a stroke, thus helping to reduce the impact of punishing tax regimes around the world.
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Discussion
I think this is brilliant. How many will actually be sold? Not that many, but the rest of the Aston Range is safe, because this cuts the average emmissions across the entire range. And while it may be ugly, it's still better than that bat in the face the Cayenne, or the Panemera, or the Caymen. And they sold loads of those!!!
this and the non-critical reviews of "this" represents our new western economy/culture-lack-of.
The journalists and automakers new job is to offend no-one, never be critical and ALWAYS do stories and make cars that satisfy corporate interests that they themselves are.
Nice going PH and good story Autocar- I'm sure your Lord Hastle will find your very nice reporting on this "new" class of car and the "story" behind it to be fascinating.
Whats with all these Lords running things in the UK? I say put them in a pig pen with the wall-street-ers here in the US, and let the crusty "educated" royalty fight it out with our tasteless business school meat-heads in their suspend-ered polo (homage to royalty) suits.
Nice new world we've built and a nice little car for all us poor to aspire to. J
The journalists and automakers new job is to offend no-one, never be critical and ALWAYS do stories and make cars that satisfy corporate interests that they themselves are.
Nice going PH and good story Autocar- I'm sure your Lord Hastle will find your very nice reporting on this "new" class of car and the "story" behind it to be fascinating.
Whats with all these Lords running things in the UK? I say put them in a pig pen with the wall-street-ers here in the US, and let the crusty "educated" royalty fight it out with our tasteless business school meat-heads in their suspend-ered polo (homage to royalty) suits.
Nice new world we've built and a nice little car for all us poor to aspire to. J
DJC said:
I cant help but think, Aston would have scored a massive PR hit had they taken the basic concept of the idea, but put a small coupe'ish body on the car instead of the standard body.
And perhaps turned up the wick on the engine to give a slightly more Aston-ish power output?Actually, Aston-ish would have been a better name for the thing, as we're all frankly astonished they are actually going ahead with the thing...
Lots of people with decent cars will have a small run about, so I can see their thinking.
I have a 911, but I use a smart car to get to the office and back. If Porsche were to make a £30k small car I would still not buy it. The whole point of an £8k smart car is to not be bothered about the thing, just drive it and when I am done with it just throw it on e-bay.
I thought the idea behind this car was to sell it with an Aston as an extra - if you can just buy one of the shelf then I think it will de-value the concept tbh and with large numbers being produced I doubt it will have much of a re-sale value... happy to be proved wrong though!
I have a 911, but I use a smart car to get to the office and back. If Porsche were to make a £30k small car I would still not buy it. The whole point of an £8k smart car is to not be bothered about the thing, just drive it and when I am done with it just throw it on e-bay.
I thought the idea behind this car was to sell it with an Aston as an extra - if you can just buy one of the shelf then I think it will de-value the concept tbh and with large numbers being produced I doubt it will have much of a re-sale value... happy to be proved wrong though!
I still can't believe they have put the Aston badge on it and in a stroke de-valued what is considered by most marketing folk to be the 'coolest brand in the world'.
They should have branded it separate from Aston Martin, no longer is it the case that an Aston is always a brutish sports car, now it can also be a 1.3 litre city car, oh dear!
It will sell though as it will be bought by many aspiring London types.
Regards,
Supersonic
They should have branded it separate from Aston Martin, no longer is it the case that an Aston is always a brutish sports car, now it can also be a 1.3 litre city car, oh dear!
It will sell though as it will be bought by many aspiring London types.
Regards,
Supersonic
Thinking about it, it costs so much because they have to take someone away from making a DB9 (or whatever) to stitch a load of leather together (hey that rhymes!). There is no constant production line so they've got to specially make it. (that might not be accurate but that's not the point)
The actual cost to build this is probably much higher than an normal iQ and hence a huge cost. They probably don't really want to build one of these if they can help it, but if you really want one then they'll build it at huge profit.
And all this so the average CO2 produced by their cars drops significantly and they can be seen to be 'doing the right thing'.
Clever but still a shame... hopefully I'll never see one on the road.
The actual cost to build this is probably much higher than an normal iQ and hence a huge cost. They probably don't really want to build one of these if they can help it, but if you really want one then they'll build it at huge profit.
And all this so the average CO2 produced by their cars drops significantly and they can be seen to be 'doing the right thing'.
Clever but still a shame... hopefully I'll never see one on the road.
DJC said:
I cant help but think, Aston would have scored a massive PR hit had they taken the basic concept of the idea, but put a small coupe'ish body on the car instead of the standard body.
There was the 'Project Kimber' to build an MG model using the Smart Roadster tooling, for whatever reason it fell through. This could have been picked up by Aston and got the same effect on the range as using an iQ.Roberty said:
I know the clever reasoning behind Why they are doing it!
But please God no, don't let them get away with it!
If they do this how long before we see a Porsche based on a Lupo, Lamborghini A3, Ferrari Panda!!!
Dear God Noooooooooooooooo!
All of the above companies have put their logo on bicycles, hats, kettles,... I don't see what's wrong with them also putting it on a supermini. But please God no, don't let them get away with it!
If they do this how long before we see a Porsche based on a Lupo, Lamborghini A3, Ferrari Panda!!!
Dear God Noooooooooooooooo!
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