XDevil666

ahhhh hope so

Good to see Subaru doing so well this time around

thenewgalaxy

The only reason "Subaru" have a presence here is because of a family-owned company that imports the cars to the UK. It's not actually Subaru themselves. In terms of overall numbers, the number of Subaru vehicles sold here is a small percentage of worldwide sales no matter which model you look at.

I've said on posts previously that the lukewarm reception for the previous generation hatch and saloon is a UK only thing. They sold like hot cakes in Australia and the USA, as well as the home territory of Japan.

The problem here was entirely down to poor marketing and a very poor handling of the (small or large depending on who you believe) number of claims of engine problems in the 2008 cars. The narrow minded approach by a few "enthusiasts" on sites such as this, combined with our government's obsession with heavy tax high performance cars and a poor exchange rate further compounded the issue.

The reason we're seeing the new saloon sold out here though, is not in my opinion down to anything other than stellar work by the enthusiastic dealers who have tried very hard to make the public aware of how good the new car is.

XDevil666

I can agree with this, they have done a stella job and lets be honest here, kind of what one would expect if they want to drive sales within there business.

would be interesting to see how many cars have shifted from which sales garages.

personally i have only seen Johns push with the excellent online presance, but im sure other garages will have been doing there own pushes, just not found there way on to Scoobynet

god dammit wish i was one of these with 30k sat ready to go on a new car.

i would be one of the ones putting my money down behind my mouth

Carnut

Subaru sold similar numbers in Europe in 2009/2010 (3/4 years in to the 2.5) as they did in 2004/2005 which includes the brilliant widetrack.
http://left-lane.com/european-car-sa...ubaru-impreza/

Subaru have never done well in the uk relative to the likes of Ford and the Germans but in what way does that detract from the car being what it is.

The people that may be described as "haters" of the 2.5/hatch seem to be divided. On one side they say that they want big power and to go back to the ways of old, this is simply not possible these day's and they would be thrashed by the Germans, especially when the price point would be the same. The other side say that they should be trying to compete with the likes of VW (golf r)and Mercedes etc but that is what there trying to do but it won't happen over night. The hole idea with the 2.5 was to achieve a better car for the road and better mpg, with less emphasis on the tuning.

If you want to run with the pack then Subaru have and probably never will be the car for you.

Mangoletsi Subaru

I wish it would, but sadly no.

Littleted

Have to Agree only John seems to be pushing like mad, Crossroads used to be the standard back since the 2008 onwards. But they seem a tad quiet this time round.

But local to me nothing, in fact there always very poor.

TonyBurns

iTrader: (3)

It isn't up to the dealers to push the product, its down to Subaru UK (or International Motors in this case) to do the advertising.
How many adverts have you actually seen for the new 2014 STI on UK tv so far? I personally have seen zero, nada, zilch, none, that on its own really doesn't help.

@ Chris, sales figures for Subaru in Europe have to take into account that the EU has expanded since 2005, if the figures are similar now to what they were in 2005 then that really isnt a good thing.
The US doesnt have the same emissions laws as we do (or road taxation), if they did then you would see a huge drop in "dirty" engined cars, but at least they advertise Subaru over there

bioforger

iTrader: (1)

Tony, I dont think we need to keep reiterating that Europe/UK is not Subaru's target audience for the STi anymore, I'm sure most of us on here realise that.

However the fact remains the UK allocation this year (although low) has sold like hot cakes so far and that is a good thing. It's just a shame that the allocation wasn't higher for the dealers to sell more of them imo. To be honest for me personally its a bonus as it makes the car a rare thing in my area, especially in the colour i have

btw ive seen 3 of your Pug in Swindon alone

Bad_HatHarry

iTrader: (1)

The only two car names not at Goodwood when i was down over the weekend were Subaru & Lexus oh and lambo. all other makes had displays

Littleted

I remember going to the top gear Motorshow when they had just released the Saloon, some of you may have also been.

The Subaru stand was as though it was an after thought a Scooby in a corner that was it, very poor.

But not their main market so why bother... sales must be enough to keep it ticking over .

XDevil666

i think your missing my point

of course its up to dealers to push the product, as they are the one's who reap the rewards of a sale, and if as now subaru are pushed as far as they can in UK orders, then why would they need to make a TV advert?


i dont ever remember seeing an advert on the "classic" shape, just the WRC which took that one in hand.

your missing the MASSIVE game changer from back then untill today... the internet !

and its bigger than you think, because the majority that will see the ads are because its in there "target" scope.

Did not see John's subaru launch day he did on facebook?

basically turned his dealer ship in to a impreza dealership for the day, the pictures looked amazing!! every car was there on display with mock price tags etc.

looked amazing

bioforger

iTrader: (1)

Yea very good point about the internet devil, i certainly wouldn't have been aware of Mangoletsi's deal without it anyway.

Carnut

The peak was in 1999 and went down year on year before we even got to the 2.5 engines. Subaru have never done well in sales in the UK and even when WRC was getting more air time and they threw money at advertising it still wasn't all that good.

A what point did you become a Subaru fan that brought you to this site? Subaru have always had problems one way or another.

Carnut

I think Subaru are trying to make there cars more for the EU every day.I am not saying that the EU is going to be there main market but the US is starting to demand the quality that we do in Europe. If you look at the market in the US these days you will see lots of German and British cars like BMW/Audi/RangeRover etc and soon the US will start to expect better quality. I think this reflects in the new car with the improved interior, more precise handling and an attempt at better MPG.

thenewgalaxy

The advertising campaign for the performance Subarus has always been low-key in this market. Even in the late 90s and early 00s it was mainly the odd advert in Autocar or a reference to the WRC. As far as I could see, anyway.

If the general car-buying public had been more aware of a practical five door hatch capable of hitting 62mph in round five seconds they'd have sold in much greater numbers over here. Despite the high tax and poor exchange rate. It did in just about every other market it was available!

Somewhere, earlier in this thread is the US advert for the new STI. It's quite amusing but has plenty of action of the car being driven enthusiastically, explaining the kind of person they have in mind for buying the product, and also showing the guy driving it with some smoking hot blonde piece next to him.

In 'murrica these things are flying off the shelves and have been for the last five years...

rob84

iTrader: (5)

Every dog has it's day I'm afraid, it just takes a few bad reviews or something not as expected and that's it really a downhill spiral

TonyBurns

iTrader: (3)

The peak was around 2005 in the UK, the cars were still on restricted import in 1999 (it opened up in 2000 with quite a few importers bringing in EU cars) but that decision to restrict the cars was down to IM and the dealer network, hence a 3 year old Subaru Impreza went for only a few k less than a brand new car, they held their value extremely well because of that.
IM were also a terrible pain in the backside if you had purchased an EU import, you had to register the car with them for you to use the dealer network and the pan European warranty which is meant to be covered in the UK as well as Europe... lets just say that if you had an issue, they made it incredibly difficult for you to get your car fixed using a UK dealer (just to point out that the first Subaru dealer I used actually damaged my car and denied any wrong doing on the initial 1k service).

There were also many "grey" import dealers back in the early 00's, the likes of Warrender have gone now but you still have a couple knocking around from back then, these guys also imported EU (parallel imports) but did their own servicing etc, and you actually got adverts in magazines too

As for being a Subaru fan, probably since 1996/7 when I could actually follow the sport without being away for half a year though I didn't purchase my first (brand new) MY00 until May 2000 in sonic blue (74F).

Still, I am not going to touch another new UK Subaru until they sort that engine out, the DIT is the way forward but its not as good as it should be yet (though it is twin scroll ) and I enjoy a decent dealer network that can obtain parts with no issues(its an issue at the moment), and one that doesn't over charge for parts like I.M. do (see how much some of the parts shot up over the last 2 years, we are talking double easily) plus no way am I going to spend £400+ on road tax for a weekend car (my last Spec C was only £225 p.a.).
Subaru's have never been the cheapest to run (servicing mainly) but they have gotten better, that I never had an issue with, £600+ for a major service, meh, no problems, I kept my cars in good mechanical stead and the only reason I have changed from Subaru is they have nothing to offer me (for now though the BRZ was tempting but there are better coupe's out there so I bought one ) and its only taken me 16 years to go back to Peugeot because they had nothing decent to offer me since 1998.

Tony

Thehulkster699

What is the average price for 1st, 2nd and 3rd year servicing?

terzoscooby

On the MY11 I have been paying between £230 and £500 depending on fluids needing changing. Dealer wanted £580 for cam belt and I didn't ask a price for brakes as did it myself cos I knew the Brembos would need Helicoiling at 2 years old. Don't forget to get the body warranty stamped every year by a dealer.

Carnut

Do you feel that in some way the UK has not been treated the same as the rest of Europe, hence the European sales figures are not that relevant.

Littleted

Yeah I did my Brakes myself too after 28 months, Subaru dealer wanted 920 quid for front and rear Pads.

I was told to buy them for just over 100 for both and fit them

Took me 1 hr for all 4
easy

TonyBurns

iTrader: (3)

The Euro figures have changed because the size of the EU has changed so hence you get a larger proportion of cars in a larger amount of countries that were not in Europe before, so the figures for Europe are actually less than what they use to be, because there were less countries in there selling the same amount of cars.

Bio, I doubt you have seen many of my car on the road you may have seen the standard RCZ but the RCZ R is here in limited numbers and the 2nd batch doesn't arrive till August, overall 300 this year to be delivered, I think I have only seen 2 others on the road apart from mine and one of those was the demo I drove

Tony

TonyBurns

iTrader: (3)

Find me one advert on the internet advertising the 2014 UK STI (from Subaru UK)....

terzoscooby

Pads are dead easy. I am on my 4th set of pads but discs are big job if the bolts are seized in the calipers which most appear to be because of the crazy torque figure used by Subaru. I had to helicoil all 4 tapped holes on front calipers.

renny

iTrader: (2)

Unfortunately it's not just Subaru UK Tony.

I sent 15 (yes 15) emails to dealers enquiring about the new STi - I got 3 replies!

John was one of them.

Crossroads didn't answer either of the 3 emails and didn't return calls.

urban

iTrader: (1)

touche

Littleted

but I now know you don't actually care right cos you've ordered a proper car....

XDevil666

I don't need to Tony as that's the great thing about the Internet

1 advert fits sooo many different countries,

Type 2015 STI in YouTube, there is your marketing, look at how many hits every video has had that's how many targets have been hit

Your looking at marketing how it was before the accessibility of the Internet started

Ever heard of a game called minecraft? I'm guessing yes, and would you have seen an advert on TV before you heard of that? I doubt it

The Internet mate, powerful thing!

Littleted

can just see them in the factory now, right that's 10000 for USA, 2000 for AUS, 10000 for Japan,

oo wait we had better send UK some for the fans there, lets say 250.

Oi Akito we got any of them duff 2.5s in the back, send em to the UK they buy them.

Anyway where were we

As for adverts yeah not seen any, although I honestly didn't see any for the 2008 apart from the TT run, now take Honda im already seeing posters everywhere and seeing the advert, and in all honesty im really looking forward to this Type R, best car ive ownd.

Anyone know how much its supposed to retail at ?

XDevil666

Around £30k, but all should be confirmed including final look and engine specs at Geneva Motor Show 2015 in March

Hope it keeps the huge spoiler!

Will be good to see 2 japan cars running strong in 2015