Is the Jaguar pile-on kneejerk or fair comment?

In many cases, in time, a new identity is given a chance to function and perceptions change; a bold new visual language is accepted and the brand thrives. It is a sign of good design when designers saw something in a brand that nobody else did.

In 1997, in the second Steve Jobs era, Apple’s ‘Think Different’ positioning raised eyebrows but worked in the long run due to it being tethered to innovation. In 2014, Airbnb was rebranded by Design Studio. It was a big change and came in for criticism at launch with its symbol of 'belonging', but has stood the test of time.

But at this point, only the most generously spirited observer would give the new Jaguar identity the benefit of the doubt. Having launched on Monday (November 18), detractors have been quick to point out the disconnect of models occupying a car-less hot pink world, to a modernist logo which caps up the G and U to read JaGUar. This looks particularly jarring typed out, and at first glance could easily be be mistaken for a collaboration with a certain dessert company.

On its own the wordmark – or mark/marque – as it’s often called in the car world, is a big departure from what it replaces and it could potentially work in the right context. “Modernism” and “simplicity” are mentioned by Jaguar and it does offer that to some degree.

Then there’s a new monogram of interlocking J’s which looks quite elegant and takes its cue from the logo but without further context appears a bit lost at this stage.

Flipping things from right to left, to left to right is an old trick to show directional travel, and here the Jaguar cat has done just that and now points to the right and is “always leaping forward” Jaguar tells us. It’s part of a “strikethrough” symbol, which is figuratively “striking through imitation and the ordinary.”

There is some loose association here as it chimes with perhaps the part that has really given people the ick — the copy. It's somehow platitudinal and declarative at the same time, through statements like ‘delete ordinary’, ‘copy nothing’, ‘create exuberant’ and ‘live vivid’.

As our editor-in-chief Gordon Young points out, wherever you stand on the work, it’s been a comms disaster, and the big tease approach lacks so much context that it’s baffled everyone.

This hasn’t gone unnoticed by Jaguar itself. On Tuesday it released a number of press images and then perhaps in response to the ‘where’s the car?’ comments, yesterday it dropped this teaser image of what appears to be one, (see image above). Note the similarity in visual language between the strikethrough symbol and what might be a rear grill.

Whatever this thing/car is, it will be unveiled in Miami on December 2 under the title Design Vision Concept, so it’s probably a concept car. There are signs that it will be as much a lifestyle brand as a car brand but we don’t really have that insight yet.

String back leather driving gloves

Given the look and feel of the new identity, coupled with Jaguar CEO Adrian Mardell's somewhat surprisingly recent announcement that models will be twice as expensive as they currently are, it’s fair to assume that the target demographic is neither old men wearing string-back leather driving gloves nor moderately wealthy, aspirational types.

The new direction may put Jaguar in a bracket which taps into a lifestyle product market. The likes of Rolls Royce has begun to do this and it set it apart from other car brands selling merch such as caps and keyrings.

The ubiquity of “glowing white” electrified car identities

It is notable that Jaguar’s U-turn away from its own brand also pushes it away from all the other car companies that have taken on new identities to show they’ve embraced an electric future. Light-up, glowing white logos have become ubiquitous over the last five years. Look at Renault, Nissan and Volkswagen.

Branding expert, CEO and co-founder of Koto, James Greenfield, is puzzled by many of the design decisions taken in the making of the new Jaguar identity and the timing of its launch so far ahead of the December show, but his main gripe is the strategic dissonance of a brand, which he feels has no point of view – and that the root of this is an industry-wide problem.

Greenfield thinks that vehicle and personal transportation branding in general need to move away from “electrification as a power source being responsible for codes,” which currently rely on “the future being repackaged to us.”

He says that if you put the important environmental perspective to one side you can make an objective argument that what the car industry always did well was sell people a point of view, like comfort, luxury or motorsport.

“They successfully deployed those codes for years, like with SUVs – more space, a higher driving position, families doing outward bound things. With electrification, a lot of car companies are unable to think about these kinds of codes in a sensible way.”

With Tesla having disrupted the market, which Chinese brand BYD may be about to do again, it’s all about the tech, according to Greenfield who says the Tesla brand has built its success on a position that is divisive for many motorists.

“Some love it, but others soon realize it’s a piece of technology and is missing a lot of things they want, so the opportunity we find ourselves with today from a brand point of view is to stop talking about the fact that vehicles are electric like it’s a novelty,” he says.

The missed opportunity

For Greenfield, the new Jaguar identity represents a missed opportunity, and when he looks at the component parts, aside from the “awful” copy, “you can talk semantically about the logo; is it good or bad? The capital letters are a bit weird. That’s coupled with imagery, which looks a bit AI. But what are they trying to tell me here? All you’re left with is a bunch of clichés and intentionally or not, they’ve fired the existing Jaguar audience.”

“At a guess, I would say [the new direction] is down to someone’s personal taste,” he adds.

It is understood that the new identity was, designed in-house, led by design director Richard Stevens, who heads up the Jaguar Land Rover design team. Although that is not to say it was his personal vision.

Jaguar “doesn’t care what people think”

Steve Pearce, managing director at branding agency Love, worked on Jaguar in his previous role at Imagination as client services director. He believes that with its “deliberately un-automotive” approach, “I suspect Jaguar doesn’t care what people think. They’ll be glad of the debate and have deliberately created this conversation ahead of any global product reveals. They are not trying to appeal to old Jaguar buyers as that market was always to small, unprofitable and local.”

With Jaguar struggling to live up to its “glamourous heyday in the 60s, it’s been failing for decades despite some good products.” This is exactly the kind of backdrop that would prompt a repositioning, and for Pearce, “the proof will be in the product design.”

In a week of dramatic takes on the issue of the new Jaguar identity and positioning, it’s worth reflecting on the fact that this is the precursor to something else so we might all need to chill out a bit, at least for now. However, it is also worth recognizing the polarity of reactions with Reform leader Nigel Farage telling GB News that the “woke” identity will make Jaguar “go bust” while creative director Kate O’Connor had the following thoughts…