Last week’s post was about Mini cars, and how they had changed the perception of cars that we have today. Indeed, Mini introduced the new modern concept of “customized cars” which you are able to “decorate” according to your personality.
This week, I found an article about Mini and the sustainable competitive advantage that it has over other trendy cars on the car market (International Herald Tribune, 2006). Even though the article is from 2006, we can notice that Mini has been able to keep up with its sales that have actually continued to grow over the years, proving that it wasn’t just a “trend”.
Another aspect of Mini’s sustainable competitive advantage is that is limited it’s sales in the USA for example, to 20 000 a year, in order not to satisfy all the demands at once, making it somewhat unreachable to part of the target market, giving Mini cars a luxury connotation. And if the product is very trendy and hard to get, customers will want the product even more then they initially did, because once you are able to get this particular product, your are more than “cool” and you are able to tell all your friends, who are still waiting to get one, all about it. BMW strategy for Mini was proven to be very efficient, and combined with the launch of other types of Mini’s (convertible, clubman, Countryman) explains why sales have been growing over the years, and Mini’s popularity increasing.
Recently, Mini Canada is running “Be Mini”, a cheeky advertising campaign associating the brand with a mindset of openess, extroverted personality, extreme performance and fuel efficiency. Check it out :
