Hooniverse Asks: What the hell is happening at BMW?

Kamil Kaluski

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BMW has been on a weird marketing streak lately. Let’s ignore the new 4-series and M4 and say that it all started with some tweets that bit them in the ass. Now here is this this rather weird video/commercial thing. It shows a new BMW iX electric vehicle, an odd name as the iX was a symbolism for a fuel-injected engine with all-wheel-drive, talking to the forgettable E65 7-series. It gets weird…

I don’t get what’s going on here. The brand made my beloved E28s, E34s, E36s, and E46s is now peddling interior mood lighting and screens. Cars that would once communicate the road to their drivers, now just communicate bizarrely. Jack Baruth has a good piece on this video and he’s equally confused.

BMW, what is going on there? Flash your high-beams twice if you need help.

About

Kamil Kaluski

Kamil Kaluski

East Coast Editor. Races crappy cars and has an unhealthy obsession with Eastern Bloc cars. Current fleet: 4Runner, Integra, Regal, Lada

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8 responses to “Hooniverse Asks: What the hell is happening at BMW?”

  1. Lokki Avatar
    Lokki

    Caution: “Old Man Shouts At Clouds” rant below:

    Sweet Jeezes on a cracker. I watched that video and now I need a couple drinks. It’s clear that BMW doesn’t want an old fogey like me as a customer any more. Actually I was at the BMW dealer yesterday and was already kind of thinking that. No, I didn’t go because I needed any repairs; I was just having a new key cut for the wife’s 1998 328i because the old old one is well, old looking. (Hey you find excuses to get out of the house during the pandemic too, don’t you? Okay then.)

    Anyhow first I stopped at the ‘Genius’ (sic) Desk to ask them to help me turn on the RSS feed for the news in my car. Yeah, the car has nav, of course, and CarPlay and Sirius, and weather, and traffic, and Yelp, and a searchable internet connection for finding, well, anything, and I can fly all that stuff, but the news feed out witted me. The old version just selected a news feed for you but now: it don’t. Well, the genius couldn’t figure it out either. He will have to research it. We got into a discussion as he sat in my car fiddling, and he told me the 2021’s don’t have CD players… or the 200 Gig hard drive to store music. It’s iTunes or Amazon Music or satellite.. (I guess they still have a radio, who knows?

    Well… sh darn. But now from I see that all the unnecessary tech stuff on my “old” car is well, too old fashioned apparently. Oh, but tech bullshit marketing aside that big new grill on the new cars is not even a grill at all. It is just a totally functionless piece of ugly adornment. It is totally just aimed for the tasteless Chinese market gaudy crap.

    WTF BMW?

    Quite seriously, after 20 plus years I am going to drop by the Lexus dealer…. they won’t mind selling a car to an old crank like me….

    Reply
    1. outback_ute Avatar
      outback_ute

      Bet they still have CD players…

      Reply
  2. Maymar Avatar
    Maymar

    If BMW isn’t the Ultimate Driving Machine anymore (which, yes, I know that hasn’t been their line for years), I’m not sure what exactly they are besides expensive. I’m not sure they know either, but they’re doing a pretty good job of modern spin, by making you seem absurd for pointing out they’re pointless.

    Reply
  3. Zentropy Avatar
    Zentropy

    I pretty much gave up on BMW after the E39. Nothing newer has interested me much.

    My ultimate BMW would be made of 20-year old parts. I would want to merge a short-wheelbase E38 with the S54 and transmission from an E46 M3. No, it wouldn’t be a fire-breather, but it would be exactly what I want.

    Reply
  4. MoparMan Avatar
    MoparMan

    After having read Baruth’s article, and the comments of Lokki, I’m not even going to watch this video!!

    Reply
  5. Slow Joe Crow Avatar
    Slow Joe Crow

    I’m not sure what they want or who they want anymore especially since the recent social media stuff seems determined to piss of potential buyers.
    I know I’m not the one they want because I’ve only cared about BMW motorcycles for the last 20 years. I’m also one of those curmudgeons who believes real BMWs have a flat twin and shaft drive but I’m accepting of these newfangled transverse engines and chain drive. (actually the old G450X dirt bike was a blast)

    Reply
  6. Sjalabais Avatar
    Sjalabais

    How bizarre. One thing is trying to target new audiences – even if they are unidentifiable based on this drug-fuelled brain fart – another is to break with their existing base.

    When Volvo went upmarket for real after y2k, their dealers just quietly pointed to the Subaru and Honda shops in the neighbourhood. No ridicule here. Škoda going from bought-cheap-never-maintained-discarded-early to the-best-VW happened targetted and smoothly, even carrying along a few cheapskates.

    This? Dunno what kind of information this is based on. Do they want to shed the enthusiast-stamp entirely, because enthusiasts are not capable of modernizing…? That’s an assumption based on way too rough clichés to make it to production. I understand Baruth takes it personally!

    Reply
  7. Quibblr Avatar
    Quibblr

    They’re already stuck in gen-z thinking. Hyundai will totally broadside them in the coming holographic-interior wars

    Reply