Saab GB’s marketing and PR director David Pugh, was recently interviewed by weekly business magazine ‘Marketing Week’. Whilst talking about the new owner, he also talks about his time with GM working on the Buick marque and then for Saab at Luton. Marketing describe Pugh as a man who is very talkative and it must have been extremly difficult for him to work on a brand that had very little to say. For several decades Saab was successfuly branded as a sensible premium alternative by carving a niche in the marketplace however, during the last few years due to a lack of new models and the eventual decision for GM to dispose or close the brand, this did very little for sales which dramatically declined. According to the Society for Motor Manufacturers and Traders, Saab sold a mere 7500 cars in UK last year. A 50% decline from the previous year with a decline of its market share by 0.75%. With GM’s decision to close Saab fleets sales starting dropping together with consumer confidence in the brand. Pugh, states with a budget of £20 Million per year in the UK alone, he was given a comparatively unrealistic and low budget to help to convince consumers that Saab was a going concern, however he is now optimistic about the future following Spykers acquisition of Saab. Since the acquisition Pugh, is one of the handful of managers who have decided to leave GM and join Saab. He states that they are still in the process of putting together a sales and marketing team, whilst they move into new premises in Cranfield. Pugh, is also pleased with the opportunity to reshape the brand. Pugh sees this as ‘Effectively it’s a chance to build a company, and within it my team, from scratch.’ He also sees it as ‘ a completely clean piece of paper. I’ll never get another chance to create a marketing team, and a way of working like this, as normally you inherit so much established structure. It’s been a bumpy road but it seems now were arriving through.’ That emotion was captured by all, in an advert that Saab released thanking everyone and using the tagline ‘To all of you who never stopped believing. Thank you.’ The challenge which Pugh will be facing is the his extended role to roll out the campaign for Saab’s new flagship model the 9-5. UK based McCann Erickson have been selected to carry out TV and print ads which have started playing the UK this month. This is likely to follow globally. He is also convinced that Spyker will not be looking into overhauling the Saab brand and he also believes that the brand is still Saab’s strongest asset. He also statest that brand has never had any problems but rather it was its portfolio. Neither does he believe it is necessary to reposition the brand but rather to return the company to where it was several years ago. Pugh also agrees with Victor Mullers desire to reduce break-even point and to win back customers who left Saab for other brands such as Audi, Mercedes. Marketing Week also state that Pugh can hardly contain himself with customers describing Saab as ‘intelligent’ and ‘very independently minded.’ Pugh is also pleased to say that he believes that we have a consistent type of consumers who are ‘very inquisitive, confident and comfortable with alternative solutions, who don’t need constant assurance of an accepted premium brand.’ Finally Pugh is confident that now Saab has no excess baggage, whilst it was tied to a large corporation such as GM, it can succeed with a 60 year old brand and models such as 9-5 Stationwagon, a 9-4 and a brand new 9-3 in 2011/2012. We can only agree with him, Saab has a strong brand with one of the most loyal customer base and new models it can only thrive from now.
One Response to “Saab marketing man reveals all.”
John Powell Says:
Excellent article, and I must say this site is excellent. I love the format and very professional and clear and it’s about time we had a British Saab blog.
