jo_ker

.....

STG

Future looks very bright for McLaren. They will keep getting buyers from the other sports cars companies. Especially the ones that lose focus and take their buyers for granted.

If Porsche loses the NA engines, you'll have MANY more cross shoppers.

jo_ker

spot on!

and in GER they do it well. infiltrating Porsche Clubs. they catch "members of the board" from those Clubs with some cheap leasing offers; meeting + inviting random people on the Nordschleife for McL test drive events on race tracks - free of charge. and so on. they do it right and clever. and all this in times where every second Porsche customer do have just one pair of jeans left - because the other 5 pair are already worn through - on the knee sections.
they catched also me and a friend of mine like this.

STG

Very smart of them. Actually GO AFTER the enthusiasts rather than have come have to beg like Porsche does.

In the US, they still have many markets to enter with dealerships (CJ???), where Porsche will be lucky to even open any new dealerships in he next 5 years with a saturated presence already and sliding sports cars sales. McLaren is up and coming vs. more established Porcshe which sells more SUV's than anything else.

If McLaren can compete well in the $150K-$200K segment Porsche should be worried.

vantage

CJ, is there a big/noticeable dynamic difference between the S and GT for someone who will mostly drive this car on the road?

STG

In addition, I think McLaren appeals more to the up coming customer base of the next 10-20 years.

McLaren is the "poster on the wall" or "image on the mobile phone" of today's younger dreamers like Porsche was in the 80's.

Reality is, Porsche's sports car buyers are aging quickly and not sure about their success with the next wave of buyer? Porsche's sports car sales are totally flat pretty much while overall sales are increasing.

STG

While Porsche throws long time loyal customers under the bus and has no clue on who they actually are. Call customer service and they don't know the 20+ car buyer over Joe Blow.

jo_ker

i jump in as i drove both quite a bit:

no real difference.
you can decide by the look and the sense of space inside if wanted.

the stiffer suspension and "more noisy" cabin in the S is just a small - for normal drivers a not recognizable difference if not driven back to back.

MerlinRS

McLaren is definitely stepping up its game but I can assure you that among the younger folks there is still a huge enthusiam for Porsche! (at least over here in Europe.) I'm steadily converting my friends to Porsche fans as well

RSA_27149

That is very true. Of the younger enthusiasts that I'm in contact with, those who are into Porsches are really into the air-cooled models, but that's a very small niche. I don't necessarily see those guys going from air-cooled cars to anything other than GT models.
Most of these younger guys see newer 911 models as old people cars. McLaren, on the other hand, represent dream cars for a much larger segment. If they can continue to refine their Sport Series line, there seems to be a very large market share they can pull from Porsche / Ferrari and respective second-hand markets.

Chris3963

You guys in the USA seem to be so down on your Porsche dealers. Over here, in Europe, I could not praise my local dealer highly enough. Truly friendly and personable guys. They know all their customers and look after them.

On the other hand, the Mclaren dealers are so small, its very difficult to even get to see one. My nearest dealer is in Brussels over 50kms from my home. It is a small two car show room that is sometimes not even open. I have now made two visits trying to look at a 570S I'm an interested in without much success.

And thats the thing that holds me back from jumping into the brand. I know with Porsche that if I am half way across Europe somewhere and something happens, there is likely to be a Porsche dealer within 100kms max from me that will come and pick up my car. With Mclaren, you could be stranded 100s of kms away without any help which is a concern when I hear about the reliability issues.

So for me it's not a choice of a Pcar or an Mcar. If it was a choice of one car only, I would never choose an Mcar over a Pcar. Never.

MikeF_Vossen

My 2 year old loves cars. Ask him his favorite and he says McLaren...he holds his P1 toy car most of the time... Mind you he loves Porsche's too...

Sunday at a friends a 650 S was parked outside in a bright purple color... he points and says "McLaren"....

While super young, leads me to believe he will be a fan for life...

RSA_27149

I don't know if there are McLaren dealerships planned in the mid-west region. I have a contact who heads up one of the largest second hand exotic car dealership in the country...he basically said that used prices for McLaren's will firm up when they're able to establish a dealership network that covers that region. According to him, McLaren's are relative illiquid second hand due to the fact that cars can't be serviced in certain parts of the country. If they are able to do that, new cars will sell better as well.
I'd be interested to hear other's thoughts on this.

GrantG

We just got a new dealership in Denver this month (was a surprise to me). Not sure where else is next...

STG

Chicago has one. CJ is opening one there too. Not sure a second location or what the deal is?