Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Automotive Meridian for chavs

Please tell me it's not an M80 in classic Burberry cloth !!!

Only on the inside of the case.

Here we go: The Range Rover "Evoque". Nice name, not.

Interior design by Posh Spice, audio by Meridian. Glad to see this fits in with Meridian's luxury image.

Vulgar.

http://www.Meridian-audio.com/news/...h-end-sound-systems-for-range-rover.aspx

Meridian doing DTS Neo6 and Audyssey ??????

What a waste of resources!

Aha! That is why they do not have time to fix the Trifield width bug and deliver us the long promised apodizing firmwares ... pretty sad.

As no doubt Jeremy Clarkson will soon be saying

"The Evoque is for Coques"

I don't mind this Car AUdio business if it gives them the Cash to continue to invest in their more Traditional Home Audio business..................I can see some of the business sense in the approach

But if it becomes THE business (with Home Audio just a sideline) then............Exit Stage Left.........

But presumably they'd already done the basic work for / with McLaren and this is "leveraging that invested sweat" as I'm sure the new owners like to describe it.

I wonder if width works in this setup

Regards,
Carl

Worth bearing in mind that McLaren hope to sell 1,000 units per year of their new �150,000 car

Range Rover hope to sell between 12,000 to 15,000 units per year of this one, which will sell at between �30-�45k each

If even half that number go for the Meridian Audio Pack, then the numbers begin to add up..........

If one adds that the increased number of Meridian "users", who might think "let's get one for the house", then the "attraction" to Meridian's management becomes clearer

Of course, their existing users (like those on HH) should be given Priority Suport and of course you should fix all the leaking holes before setting sail on the high seas...................but I get the attraction

I thought I'd expand on my obviously impulsive and negative reaction to this.

• First, I understand the accounting sense of leveraging the R&D done for the ICE system for the McLaren series of road cars. If you can sell more units for a marginal increase in R&D costs, there is a logical and purely financial business case there.
• Second, if this will aid in providing job security for the long standing and hard working employees of Meridian, who am I to argue against it?
• Third, this will undoubtedly increase exposure of the Meridian brand.

But that's the point. It's about the brand and, for me, the most important aspect of a brand is its integrity. Just because you can do something, or because something seems right on one measure (i.e. the ROI numbers of a business case), that doesn't mean to say that it's the right thing to do.

Under the encumbent management, Meridian has eschewed its historic positioning (hifi) to position Meridian as *the* luxury audio brand (and it has lost and/or alienated itself from loyal customers in the process). ICE for the McLaren range of cars fits very well within the idea of luxury branding, but, in my opinion, the Range Rover Evoque most certainly does not. I am not a career marketeer, but even I know the difference between the Evoque customer and the luxury segment: one buys on image alone; the other buys what he perceives to be the best possible product, irrespective of price.

My impression is that the Evoque fills a cheaper price point in the same "aspirational" category as the Range Rover Sport and therein lies the problem. I confess to having a personal gripe against the Sport as my next door neighbour has bought two brand new Sports in three years (which he parks in the narrowest part of our lane). For him, it's all about image and nothing else, and please believe me when I say he wouldn't recognize quality if it stared him in the face. He's vulgar and his "car" is vulgar. I don't like him.

Oddly enough, on the Topgear website, there are already two relevant comments about the Evoque with regard to the Land Rover brand:
For what it's worth, a Meridian employee recently told me of
Brands take years to build, but can be destroyed very easily. I think that the Meridian brand is losing integrity and that the Meridian company is losing its soul; and I find that very sad; and I blame that on the new owners, the new MD, and most importantly the new Marketing Director. I wonder what Bob really thinks now?

Agreed all round...................

Absolute Priority should be given to existing users........

One of the Oldest Adages is "Look after your Customers and they will then Look After You"...........

The only hope I have is that it gives the business the Cash it needs to spin off this Car Audio Business into One Core Revenue Stream and let the Bob's, RHonda's, Des's etc free time and reign to focus back on the core Home Audio business

The old business model wasn't working (�xx million lost over several years). The current one is obviously not working.

So MAYBE, maybe, this is a necessary evil to get to the promised land...............A thin hope, but just about one of the few that's left IMHO