The 2012 Volkswagen Beetle to get an MTV launch
Volkswagen has chosen to launch the 2012 VW Beetle at Shanghai on MTV, followed by MTV Beetle launches in Berlin and New York.
It was always quite hard to take the revived VW Beetle seriously. Unlike other recreations of past icons that have worked successfully – the MINI and the Fiat 500 especially – the new VW Beetle always seemed nothing more than a pastiche.
And not just a pastiche, but a cynical marketing game by VW to sell an old Golf in even older clothes at inflated prices to people who don’t like to drive but like a flower in a vase on the dashboard. A narrow market.
We had hoped that Volkswagen might be more interested in the 2012 VW Beetle as a car rather than a statement of fashion. A statement of fashion only understood by Americans from both ends of that continent, admittedly. But it seems not.
Rather than make the 2012 Beetle dynamic and appealing and launching it properly, VW has chosen to orchestrate a launch by MTV in Shanghai, with MTV’s VJ guest hosting an exclusive MTV Sound System followed by World Stage events in New York and Berlin. Oh, joy.
Which seems to kick in to touch any chance of the 2012 Beetle being taken seriously as a car.
Which is something of a shame.
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