Volkswagen changing its name to VOLTSWAGEN? No, it’s German ‘Humour’ gone wrong

Volkswagen declared earlier this week that it was changing its name to Voltswagen in the US. But it’s not.

When we saw the ‘News’ that Volkswagen had posted, and removed, a press release saying they planned to change their name in the US to Voltswagen we figured it was just a cock-up by a VW IT bod posting a release planned as an April Fool a few days early.

The fact the press release was taken down as soon as the ‘news’ started to dribble round the interwebs confirmed our suspicion it was a ‘no news here’ story. But then VW changed its name on its US site, opened a ‘Voltswagen’ Twitter account and declared the story true, with Scott Keogh, CEO of VW USA, saying:

We might be changing out our ‘K’ for a ‘T’, but what we aren’t changing is this brand’s commitment to making best-in-class vehicles for drivers and people everywhere.

This name change signifies a nod to our past as the peoples’ car and our firm belief that our future is in being the peoples’ electric car.

We confess at this point we did wonder if we were wrong to dismiss this as an April Fool gone wrong, because we found it hard to believe that VW would confirm an untruth outside of the April Fool safety net. But we found it harder still to see the VW name change – and only in the US – as remotely credible.

In the end the ‘Voltswagen’ story is just what we expected, a planned April Fool released too early by accident (or on purpose to garner headlines) which should never have been confirmed as true by VW.

Especially as VW try to convince the world they can be trusted after the Dieselgate scandal.