Kerri Martin pulls a rabbit out of her hat
April 13th, 2006VW isn’t afraid to hire away talent from other companies… When the wanted to make VW/Audis more invigorating to drive they went recruiting chassis engineers of the BMW 3 series and Ford Focus, and more recently they’ve switched to the same advertising agency MINI uses and hired away MINI’s head marketer, Kerri Martin.
At the Chicago auto show VW announced the Golf would once again be called the Rabbit in the North American market. Martin explains, “Volkswagen customers want a relationship with their cars. Names like The Thing, Beetle, Fox, and Rabbit support this.” (Given Mazda’s also dropped the Miata name and Audi the DSG descriptor, you have to wonder if marketers simply like to gamble).
Whatever you call it, those former BMW and Ford engineers have done a solid job with the chassis. The new GTI is being called an icon but even the most basic car has more fahrvegneugen than you’d expect from a modern VW.
Best of all, VW’s priced it at a few dollars under $15K despite standard ABS, traction control, active front head restraints and front side airbags (Electronic Stabilization Program is an option).