VW as a group does own Audi, Bentley, Porsche and so on, some of these cars like the Audi A8 are always in the top 5 most luxury cars with the most modern and advanced equipment and features, with it’s rivals being Mercedes S-class and BMW 7 series.
However, VW as it’s own brand doesn’t have anything near that level, why? The most luxury car they have is the semi-failed Phaeton, which at most can be compared to a Mercedes E-class, so if VW can have expensive luxury vehicles in it’s sub-companies, why does it struggle to have anything with it’s own name?
Mercedes has Maybach, so I can understand having a luxury sub-brand, but Audi is not Maybach, it’s VW’s own rival that has an analogue for anything from Polo to a Golf and a Passat, but after that VW doesn’t have pretty much anything to offer.
Why should they? It would only dilute the image they have been building since the 50s of being autos that are cheap, reliable and all that. A “luxury VW” is an oxymoron and would only damage the brand.
You said it yourself. Bentley is VW’s answer to the Maybach. Audi is VW’s answer to Mercedes & BMW. Porsche is an iconic brand all on its own. As is Lamborghini,
which is owned by VW as well. They also own Ducati.
Seem to me, VW has the market pretty well covered.
Luxury car buyers don’t want a car with a VW badge on it. There’s no prestige associated with owning a VW. No one brags about owning a Volkswagen. That’s why the Phaeton sold poorly. That’s the same reason Chevy, Ford, Toyota*, and others don’t make luxury cars under those brands, but rather they or their parent company sells luxury cars under separate brands like Cadillac, Lincoln, and Lexus. And Volkswagen Group sells luxury cars under the Audi and Bentley brands as you already pointed out.
*Except for the Toyota Century, which is only sold in Japan.
Well, I actually had one old timer complain about the modern version of the VW Beetle, saying that it was “too fancy” for a VW. He went on to say that the VWs back in his day started to shake at 70 MPH and were loud as hell.
My understanding is that Honda, Toyota, and Nissan all sell higher-end models under their main badges/brand names in Japan, but when they wanted to enter that segment in the U.S. in the 1980s, they discovered that Americans associated their brand names strictly with the economical cars that they had focused on when they had entered the U.S. market. So, they launched new badges: Acura, Lexus, and Infiniti, respectively.
As other’s have said, it’s all about branding. And I don’t just mean that rich people don’t want a VW badge. It’s also that car brands spend decades and millions of pounds in establishing where their brand fits in the market - who their audiences are and what those audiences want. They develop cars that fit their brand.
A luxury car would totally muddle the VW brand. No one would understand what VW were for any more. Strong brand know their place in the market and work it hard. VW would no more make a luxury car than Gap would make couture clothing. What would be the point? The damage to the brand - and existing markets - isn’t worth the additional sales of the shiny new stuff.
In addition to what everyone else said, their dealerships, at least the ones around me, are not set up like luxury car dealers, nor do they have the same level of service. My local VW dealer is relatively small with a lot of cars in it. The service waiting area is utilitarian at best. It’s totally different from, say, the local Acura dealer, which has much less crowding in the showroom, much nicer service area, and much better service (in terms of loaners, responsiveness, etc.).
Well, Porsche is essentially a luxury/high performance VW, at least that is how it started. Both were started by Ferdinand Porsche, the VW first, and both started out with the air cooled boxer engines.
VAG is one company, if they decided to build a luxury car off on existing VW platform (which they do all the time) it wouldn’t make sense to brand it as a VW because then they would directly be competing with whatever version of the exact same car Audi is selling.
For instance, the same platform that underpins the VW Touareg mid-size SUV also underpins the Audi Q5, the Porsche Cayenne, the Bentley Bentayga, and the Lambo Urus. So they’ve done exactly what you’re suggesting – built luxury models off a VW chassis – they’re just not selling it under the VW name, because they have other brand images to support those models.
Also worth noting that fully optioned top spec VWs are expensive compared to their competitors - VWs in general command a higher resale value on the used car market, so althoguh they are not right at the high end, they certainly are nowhere near the lower end either.
I’ve owned two VWs in my life. A '68 Beetle, and a 2002 Passat.
The Passat is very nearly a luxury car (for 2002, anyway). Spacious intererior, nice leather seats, good sound system, excellent climate control, etc. Of course, all of these are pretty much standard on a Toyota Camry these days.
I don’t know what that means. That our standards for what constitutes a “luxury car” are getting ridiculous? Maybe. What does a Lexus do that my Passat doesn’t do? Other than let people know how much money the owner makes.
The Beetle was a lot of fun. As a car, it would be considered non-functional today.
WHAT? Hopefully whatever hallucinogenics you were taking when you wrote that have worn off, and you can see for yourself how insane it sounds. The Phaeton was VWs biggest, fattest swing at the luxury segment. It’s not an E-class equivalent, the damn thing was based on a freaking Bentley as a rival to the S-class, and shares features with the Bentley GT and Audi A8. The W12 version was $120k USD.
Ferdinand Piech has spent the last couple decades trying to come up with a project that puts his stamp on the family business. Ferdinand Porsche the founder gave us the 356 and its variants. Ferdinand “Butzi” Porsche gave us the 911. He wants a legacy car for another Ferdinand. His first try was the Bugatti Veyron and then with the VW Phaeton. The Veyron is a solid halo car, but it’s never made money (or sense, for that matter). It won’t be a legacy.
The concept for the Phaeton was a low-key, almost stealth luxury car. Something just as comfortable and high spec as the luxury brands, but discreet. The car succeeds in that aspect. But the market for something like that is small. As Honda, Toyota, Nissan, and more recently Hyundai have learned, most people, especially Americans, want a luxury badge for their luxury cars, to flaunt their wealth a bit. Something that looks like a big Passat won’t do.
There’s also the issue of cognitive dissonance. People expect luxury cars to be expensive to maintain, but despite knowing the Phaeton has the same components and the higher brands, they groused and balked and paying the same bills for a VW. Luxury cars depreciate a disproportionate amount, but the Phaeton’s used values are truly epic because of the maintenance. But that’s another rant/hobby horse of mine.