logiclee

Autocar and AutoExpress have had photoshop lash ups in the magazines for the last few weeks of the supposed new look for the MG-Rover range.

The release for the first cars is not expected until the second quarter.

Well today MG-Rover ran adds in most of the national press advertising a 3year sevicing warranty deal and some numpty has put the pictures in of the new 75 and ZT instead of the existing model.

Someone on the MG-Rover bbs who works had Longbridge said the Directors are going mad and are performing a witch hunt and heads will roll.

PS the mods were done by Peter Stevens and the headlights do look a bit MY03 Scoobish.

Lee

what would scooby do

cue even bigger discounts on current models then

NACRO

Maybe it's just a cunning ploy to get more attention for the brand and it's forthcoming cars. If so it would be the first smart move I've seen MGR make. I mean look at city rover- it would be funny if it wasn't going to kill the company, hang on, that's why it is funny!

RichWalk

Bit like Jag then- they released their new estate 2 weeks ago; problem is there are no cars available and no brochures/ POS for any of their sales force.... DOH!

logiclee

I would think the 50000 families who depend on MG-Rover for their living may disagree with it being funny.

Lee

NACRO

Tought titty I think the expression goes- if you have a dead leg you cut it off.

logiclee

And that attitude is why this country is in the state it's in.

If it was your own leg that was dying I would expect you to want the Doctors to try everything to save it and make it healthy again.

[Edited by logiclee - 1/16/2004 7:42:42 PM]

NACRO

Indeed, in this case though the flesh seems to be dead.

NiceCupOfTea

"NACRO in 'Rubbishing MG-Rover' shocker"

NACRO

They don't need me to rubbish them, they are doing a pretty good job of it themselves. What I'm doing is putting the boot in.

logiclee

Well I'm not a MG-Rover fan, apart from the 75/ZT the range is pretty poor.

But..

MG Rover were 10th in the UK sales charts for 2003 beating the likes of BMW, Audi, Merc, Honda, Subaru, etc. They had a 3% drop in Market share but still did better than Ford and Peugeot

There losses were on target with the buissiness plan.

2004 will be a very important year for MGR, all models will receive a facelift which needs to be succesful and the foriegn tie up and RD60 rplacement for the 45 needs to be sorted.

The PR needs sorting out as well, all the bad press over the Pheonix directors fund and not a counter word from MGR.

I hope MGR can pull it off, we Brits are too quick to rubbish our own industry in all areas, we just accept that 1000's of jobs go to Indian call centres etc, that factories close down due to heavily Government subsidised foriegn industry's. It woldn't happen in France or Germany.

Lee

MooseRacer

I couldn't agree more Lee. Nacro, despite living abroad, still displays that, sadly all too common, British trait of rubbishing their own.

TurboBoost

I think the facelift is vital to lose the "grandad" front end, apart from that they've done a decent job of tarting up some dreadful cars to get them to appeal to the under 50s.

That Scooby spoiler on the 2.5 ZS (which is supposed to be the best one to drive) is still highly questionable, it can't make its mind up whether it wants to be a BMW 3 series or an Impreza.
Maybe it won't look so stupid if the front is changed to appear more in tune with the rear.

logiclee

TB,

This is a Photoshop but is the ZS with a SV front end.



Lee

mn_angrybeats

Doesnt look anything like that

logiclee

So Mr Angrybeats.

If you have seen the cars you either work at Longbridge or were one of the invited dealer network people.

Lee

MGJohn

Who is this 'Major Clanger' who's been dropped? Good eh..?

More seriously, the above illustration appears like an MGF-ZS hybrid! Front end TF ....

I wonder what those ads are really like..... anyone got a web site for the newspapers involved.....?

owbow

Have any of you lot EVER driven the MGZR????


Seemed to do a pretty good job of catching the Scoobies on the muppet camping trip... up the A4069 to Brynamman... or maybe they're ALL cr@p drivers? and that was in the basic 1.4 model...

now i'm not sl4gging off Scoobies, hell we all know how f*cking superior your cars are, but give the MG range a chance... and give a UK brand a chance. If you don't like them, don't buy them... but don't slag off the way they look... i mean the Subaru Impreza has never been a beautiful car, and not exactly a consistently well-built car either...

Owain

owbow

[rant over]


i'll get my coat...

owbow

...err i must admit i don't personally like the look of the ZS with the big spoiler... but i don't wish redundancy on the workforce because of it...

Owain

MGJohn

Like your style Owbow ... What a refreshing change...... and yes, I've driven several of the MG Zeds, including a ZS I purchased for the other half as a runaround....

Not driven the new ZT V8 yet though ..... 'Sounds' like my kind of car ..... quite literally ......

MGJohn

Yes indeed....... 'Sounds' like my kind of car ..... getting fed up with highly stressed turbocharged four bangers..... fancy a lot more relaxed torque spread wide (Oh Matron ...

MGJohn

Read more about the V8 MG ZT 260 here:

http://www.topgear.com/servlet/tg?DEST=/content/jsp/individualRoadTest.jsp&EVENT=1010&MAKE=MG:F4&MODEL =ZT%20260:A7&roadTestNumber=04.html

That's another refreshing change ...... a half decent write up about about a Longbridge product!! AND from Top Gear of all people .....

NACRO

Shame the ZT V8 isn't going to save the company though, it's an interesting car. City Rover is another nail in the coffin of MGR, can't come quickly enough for a company rebadging Indian "tat" in my opinion.

What I can't understand is the need some people feel to start talking about Subarus in a thread about MGR. We all already know that they are ugly jap crap. Start another thread about their foibles rather than trying to deflect well deserved criticism from MGR and their risible product lines.

logiclee

John,

Someone has scanned in the pictures HERE


Nacro,

I suppose most people have a range of cars they don't like, I can't stand Vauxhall's for instance, the old Vectra was worse than any current MGR product.
But most normal people don't jump on every thread about said motor company. Perhaps you have some personal issues you need to deal with?

Cheers
Lee

NACRO

I don't "jump on every thread"- I've stayed away from various MGR topics that don't interest me. I'd suggest that people who call for others to be silent are the ones with "issues" as you put it.

In my opinion MGR have made some major errors and as such don't deserve to be making cars any more. I found the idea of them leaking info on their much needed new product range an interesting ploy (if that's what it was) to get free publicity, thus why I commented here. Hope that's clear and easy enough for you to follow

MooseRacer

I'd be very interested to hear your workable, financially sensible solution for the situation the new bosses at MGR found themselves in when they took control from BMW Nacro.

Very easy to criticise, not so easy to come up with workable, and financially realistic, solutions.

NACRO

I don't think that's in any way relevant to this thread or their outdated product line is it? However this is how I would resolve the problem that is Rover.................

the best thing that could have happened would have been to asset strip what was left of Rover when BMW got rid rather than flogging a dead horse. That didn't happen and now the company carries on lurching like a drunk from disaster to disaster. I agree it is very easy to criticise, particularly a soft target like MGR, that is why I am doing it, put simply because they deserve it. The only solution to the problem is outlined above but I imagine some won't like it. Mainly the vested interests.

MooseRacer

Great 'solution' - needless to say, no surprising reading.

NACRO

I think the real question is why on earth anyone would want to save MGR, even if I had the power to wave a magic wand and solve all their problems I wouldn't be interested in doing it.
MGR doesn't deserve to exist because it produces outdated and in my opinion, overpriced and mostly crap cars. That being the case why would you want it to survive? To provide work for gormless midlanders? Not a good enough reason I'm afraid.