Jaguar used to be a very stiff-upper-lip kind of company. Rightly proud of their past, their heritage, but quite often a bit backwards in moving forwards. They would do things a certain way. The Jaguar way.
And it was fine. Jaguars sold pretty well, because they were pretty good. And the “R” models were pretty formidable. But they didn’t exactly have their fingers on the pulse. Jaguars were nice enough cars, but would they have been better if the brand values were stretched a little?
Well, TATA thought so, and on the basis of the Jaguar Land-Rover stand, they’ve proven that they judged what Jaguar should stand for absolutely perfectly.


For a start, this is the new XE class. The Jaguar Three-series, if you will. This is exactly what I always thought a smaller Jaguar should look like.
It actually looks like a Jaguar I would want to drive. In fact, all Jaguars do. I used to want to drive a Jag because I knew they were good. I never minded the way they looked, but to appreciate their styling you had to have a fondness for Jaguars of old. You had to know a bit of the back story. I mean, the basic outline of the XJ series was broadly unchanged for forty years, and the (good but dogged by its relationship with the plebian Mondeo) was just a scaled down version of that.
Now Jags are much easier to like. There is no longer “a Jaguar Shape” which probably displeases some, but it makes for a far more accessible, less divisive product. And, crucially, if it perhaps varies from old Jag fundamentals, at least it doesn’t slavishly copy somebody else’s success story. There is no longer whiff of The Establishment about them. They can be bought by people with youthful outlooks. And yet Jaguar has managed to hang onto  slightly raffish, caddish reputation. They’ve done well.

They’ve also realised that Hooliganism Sells. AKA Hoons Buy Cars.
At Goodwood 2015 the colossal Jaguar Land Rover complex is complete with its own mini drift-circuit, all unspoilt blacktop. The perfect place to show potential Jaguar customers just exactly what kind of mischievous exploits you could get up to if you went for the leaping cat.
A team of drivers, who looked like they knew what they were doing, were on hand to do the actual driver. That left the passenger to concentrate on grinning wildly and feeling nauseous. Watch the video for sight and sound of a Jaguar going round and round.

Now I think that’s a pretty effective way to sell Jags.
In this post Top-Gear world, increasingly, burning rubber sells wheels. Nice one Jaguar. Good luck to you.
(All images and video copyright Hooniverse / Chris Haining 2015)