First real Hethel Yellow Emira

First yellow car in China

 

[prestonc]

No not having it. Its not an exclusive. Its just piss poor PR and CX again.
I will sleep on it til Jan but I'm about ready to cancel and just buy a Porsche

No!!

 

[TomE]

I think more than anything it's a simple matter of staffing. Having enough people to handle a tidal wave of inquiries like they've never seen or had to handle before. For a company that was used to making maybe 40 cars a week, how many people do you think they had in any of these non-production departments? Until recently, Lotus was a very small specialty car builder. Now they've got a mainstream hit on their hands and they're struggling under the load that kind of attention brings. I agree they need to improve. It's one of the reasons why I went to the trouble of creating and providing improved configuration renders. They're aware of it, which is why they released the video of Gavan driving the Emira around Hethel and talking about the suspension settings and performance that he himself helped create. The execs have been accompanying the car around on the tours, and they're paying attention to the feedback they're getting. We're supposed to be getting a lot more information starting next month. We'll see.

Lotus may have intended to publish photos of the yellow car, but probably in the final location where it's going to be featured. In the world we live in today where there are billions of cameras everywhere all the time, it's virtually impossible to keep anything a secret. No matter what, there's somebody with a cell phone that can take a picture and post it on the internet within minutes where it can instantly be viewed around the world. That's just the way it is now. That can actually be a good thing, as it generates a lot of attention that Lotus doesn't have to pay advertising dollars for. It was one of the things Apple was famous for (still is). If people think something is supposed to be a secret, they'll fall all over themselves exposing it and talking about it, which is far more effective than if the company paid an advertising agency to create an ad, then pay to have it broadcast/published.

All of these non-official insider photos are generating a lot of awareness which is good. It may be frustrating right now because we're all eager to get all the info and images, but it's good in the long run that Lotus has a product that is generating this much interest and attention.

I don’t agree with the demand/staffing point. Lotus have their own staff and access to Geely and sister staff like Volvo. Customer Care has non-Lotus staff. They could add more staff but haven’t.

One core approach for call centres (I used to run one) is to analyse volumes every day and work out what you need to do to (a) reduce volumes by publishing better info on common questions so people don’t call in, and (b) updating agent scripts to reflect new questions raised. Lotus could EASILY have reduced call volumes by publishing better info.

They actually also did things that increased volumes unnecessarily, by mis-communicating. One of those resulted in me publishing info on social media (with unofficial support) to stop them being overwhelmed with calls.

I’ve cut Lotus a lot of slack because I know a lot of the people. I know their hearts are in the right place and I want them to succeed. The car is brilliant.

But there’s no evidence they are making progress on improving the customer experience, even on really simple stuff. And I fear a similar lack of progress on the post delivery ownership experience.

There’s more to growing a global car business than building a brilliant car.

 

[Eagle7]

The thing is, loyal Lotus folks like me are also very disappointed. Because the handling of this has been WORSE than how Lotus handled this kind of thing in the past. Despite them saying this is a new dawn and they realise they need to improve the customer experience to win over new customers. In places it is utterly shambolic. Mixed and contradictory messages are a big part.

A huge factor is Hethel completely cutting the information flow to dealers, to the extent that many now have given up trying to keep customers up to date and answer their questions. Instead they just tell them to call Customer Care at Hethel. And although CC are helpful, they are working from scripts that are not kept up to date. And they’ve been told NOT to provide some information.

Volume of demand isn’t a valid excuse for poor comms.. It’s really not hard for ONE person at Lotus to put themselves in the customers shoes and think about what we might appreciate in terms of info and interaction. Technology can help ask and deliver with very little effort. I offered to write FAQs - declined.

Lotus say repeatedly they will publish pictures of cars before we have to commit final spec. I know they’ve built those cars. Where are the pics? Instead we get phone pics leaked of one car. And customers being told changes may now result in delays, contrary to what we were told previously.

I’m not asking for a heavily personalised experience, to be treated like a prince or anything labour-intensive. Simple things like honest updates, consistent information.

It would be nice as a pre-reveal depositer to have that early commitment acknowledged in even the tiniest way. Instead I’ve had to repeatedly push my dealer, Customer Care and senior Lotus staff to even be treated equally to the 6-11 July depositers. Because they can’t sort their systems and records out.

I was a similarly early pre-reveal depositer for an Evora. The customer experience was ten times better than this.

I hear ya. We don't know what's going on behind the scenes, but I suspect it's "utterly shambolic" in places internally as well. They were simply unprepared for this kind of response, and it shows. There's no denying that. Whatever business volume they thought they were preparing for, it most certainly wasn't what they've got now. It may just be the fact that the information that was going out was in fact contradictory, that Matt clamped down on it and they're working to get that under control. The information may also be in a state of flux, so they don't want to say anything yet until they've got it finalized. They definitely need a Director of Information and Customer Experience who can oversee, coordinate and organize all of that. I believe they just advertised to hire one didn't they? That indicates they DIDN'T have one before, which would also explain the disorganization we've been seeing in that regard.

Things need to improve and you know they know that. I know it would be nice to be acknowledged and given preferential treatment for ordering before reveal, but these aren't those days anymore where you're one of a few. You're now one of thousands who all want preferential treatment too. The old Lotus is gone; officially gone now. Maybe the passing of Hazel was both a sign and symbolic as well. If 40 people order a car, you can be personal with them because there's time and it's doable. If 4,000 people order, that's no longer possible unless you have a staff big enough to keep the personal touch. Lotus doesn't have that; yet. Whoever the person(s) they have handling that was undoubtedly completely buried by the volume of response. And it's not stopping. No matter how many they're handling, the number keeps growing every day. I feel for the people in that department, I really do.

Hopefully next month we'll start to see what we want to see. We just have to get past the holidays.

 

[TXEMIRA]

Back to the main thing though - that yellow amiright? Very attractive!

 

[Eagle7]

I don’t agree with the demand/staffing point. Lotus have their own staff and access to Geely and sister staff like Volvo. Customer Care has non-Lotus staff. They could add more staff but haven’t.

One core approach for call centres (I used to run one) is to analyse volumes every day and work out what you need to do to (a) reduce volumes by publishing better info on common questions so people don’t call in, and (b) updating agent scripts to reflect new questions raised. Lotus could EASILY have reduced call volumes by publishing better info.

They actually also did things that increased volumes unnecessarily, by mis-communicating. One of those resulted in me publishing info on social media (with unofficial support) to stop them being overwhelmed with calls.

I’ve cut Lotus a lot of slack because I know a lot of the people. I know their hearts are in the right place and I want them to succeed. The car is brilliant.

But there’s no evidence they are making progress on improving the customer experience, even on really simple stuff. And I fear a similar lack of progress on the post delivery ownership experience.

There’s more to growing a global car business than building a brilliant car.

It doesn't look like they were prepared for this. Everything you describe fits a department that's suited for the task, experienced, and with someone in charge who keeps it all running smoothly. I know if you and I were there, this would certainly be the case. I have the experience, and I gather you do as well, but we're not there. They simply need an MD of this department, and until they get one who gets it under control, it's not going to improve by much.

If anyone from Lotus is reading this, get somebody in charge. They need to go to each of the heads of the areas they need information from, get the accurate information from the people who have it, gather it all together, get Matt or whoever he's designated to sign off on releasing that information, then make it available to the staff responding to the inquiries. Publish it on the official website, and issue statements to promote it. If certain information is NOT available or available to reveal, acknowledge that so people don't think you're clueless, and make a statement with regards to how soon that information will become available. If you don't even know that, simply say so. People are much better at dealing with truth and honesty than vagueness or a lack of communication.

If I'm told something is going to take 3 hours, then that sets my expectation. If I'm sitting there waiting, and I'm not being told anything, then my expectation is I'm being ignored. That may not be the case, but I don't know that because nobody is telling me anything, so to me, I'm being ignored. Simple communication fixes this.

This system needs to be set up and organized right now. It's not going to be any easier than now to do this. It's vital for the quality of the customer experience both at this stage, and for the experience after purchase. Remember that your dealers are also customers and they need to be treated the same way.

This is all fixable, they just need to get on it and get it done. And on that I agree with you Tom; that's a one-person-in-charge kind of task.

 

[TXEMIRA]

It doesn't look like they were prepared for this. Everything you describe fits a department that's suited for the task, experienced, and with someone in charge who keeps it all running smoothly. I know if you and I were there, this would certainly be the case. I have the experience, and I gather you do as well, but we're not there. They simply need an MD of this department, and until they get one who gets it under control, it's not going to improve by much.

If anyone from Lotus is reading this, get somebody in charge. They need to go to each of the heads of the areas they need information from, get the accurate information from the people who have it, gather it all together, get Matt or whoever he's designated to sign off on releasing that information, then make it available to the staff responding to the inquiries. Publish it on the official website, and issue statements to promote it. If certain information is NOT available or available to reveal, acknowledge that so people don't think you're clueless, and make a statement with regards to how soon that information will become available. If you don't even know that, simply say so. People are much better at dealing with truth and honesty than vagueness or a lack of communication.

If I'm told something is going to take 3 hours, then that sets my expectation. If I'm sitting there waiting, and I'm not being told anything, then my expectation is I'm being ignored. That may not be the case, but I don't know that because nobody is telling me anything, so to me, I'm being ignored. Simple communication fixes this.

This system needs to be set up and organized right now. It's not going to be any easier than now to do this. It's vital for the quality of the customer experience both at this stage, and for the experience after purchase. Remember that your dealers are also customers and they need to be treated the same way.

This is all fixable, they just need to get on it and get it done. And on that I agree with you Tom; that's a one-person-in-charge kind of task.

But that yellow is pretty sick right?

 

[Eagle7]

The yellow looks great. It's good to see the forged wheels in gloss black too. I can't wait to see the car under the lights in a showroom, or outside in the daytime.

I have a feeling all the colors are going to look good. It's interesting that Lotus chose Shadow Gray for the running demo car, as I think that's probably the least appealing color. If the car can look great in that color (which it does), then it's going to look fantastic in the brighter more dramatic colors.

 

[Eagle7]

I really don't want to get drawn into this. But I work for a multi national that has been growing 20% a year for the last 10 years and has just spiked almost 100% in the last 12 months, so know exactly what's it's like. Part of me has some empathy for what they must be going through. But we are talking absolute basics here in communication. At the very least give consistency of information. At best listen to your customer base and answer their questions..
How do I know they aren't trying? Errr because they have just shown a Hethel yellow Emira in China that must have been available for a few weeks. And if they can paint that and ship to China then they can do all the colours and have them available for review to June delivery buyers for consideration (along with everyone else)

A few things here. I worked for a very large international corporation too, and I know it takes more than a few people to do certain things, and there's a chain of approval that has to be adhered to. Unless Lotus has someone in charge who is responsible for the information being accurate, collected and compiled in a form for release that gets signed off on by their marcom department, then what happens is this. Individuals start to piece-meal things on their own and start saying things to customers that may or may not be accurate or entirely accurate, and that makes it on a website, then customer service starts getting calls about it, and it just snowballs into a bigger and bigger issue, until marcom brings down the hammer on releasing ANY information that hasn't directly come from them. So the information flow stops while everybody waits for the 'official' info. Customers who were used to chat about things, are now finding employees are suddenly tight-lipped and saying nothing, so clearly something happened. Then that gets reported, so the mess continues. If Matt had thought about this ahead of time, he probably would not have let it get like this, but it doesn't appear he did. He obviously was focused on the car itself and getting all of that side of things under control. This isn't unusual for either a new company, or a company that's just been reorganized.

Companies that produce products usually aren't focused on the information aspect, so it's all too often that the marcom department is the last in line for attention from the top, until things get out into the public. Then the pendulum swings too far the other way. It looks like Lotus is at that stage right now. Hopefully they're getting someone who will be in charge and bring things under control and back to the balance point at the center. Until they do, things are going to hodge podge along which would be unfortunate. Hopefully that won't be the case.

As far as the yellow car in China, Lotus did NOT show that car. Somebody who was there took some photos and posted them on the internet. Lotus hasn't said a word about that; yet. You do know there's big issues with shipping anything right now, and it's also the holidays when shipping traffic is the highest for the year? So the focus was getting the car on board and shipped rather than showing anything to anybody? They've said they're going to be showing things in January, so maybe they wanted to wait until they had all the cars ready to show before showing them, but somebody got a few shots of the car in China and now that's out on the internet. We don't know, and I'm not willing to automatically assume something negative about the company unless they prove otherwise. What I see is they ARE running the other colors through the production line, and that lends credence to the statement that cars will be shown next month.

Based on how close my render was to the actual yellow car, I believe my renders have at least given people a pretty good idea of what the colors are going to look like on the car, to help them make their choice with reasonable confidence. Is this something Lotus should have done? Yes, but they didn't. It's not stopping me from being enthusiastic about the car or wanting one. They're overwhelmed; I get it. I'm willing to work with them to help things along rather than against them. And I did it for you guys. I think the car is going to be worth it.

 

[digilotus]

OMG, how cool is this. It feels a bit like a Telsa showroom.

They have all the colour samples (including ice grey leather - that was not shared). They have all the forged rims on display and they have two cars, one of which is in a colour never before seen.

I hope this is a taste of where Lotus is going!

Please Lotus - quickly share a video of this place: the cars, rims and paint/leather samples in an official video. It will go a long way!

 

[Tonyshepp]

I'm sorry but it takes one person in Customer Service and one person in Marketing to put out ALL the information we could ever need.
As said previously you and Tom have given buyers on this forum and others a better experience than Lotus themselves.
Imagine what you could have both achieved if it was your full time job and you actually worked at Lotus, with all of the associated resources available to you

I’m of the opinion of you and Tome.

It’s clear across Facebook and these types of forums that the information being asked for is limited, I,e colour of cars and a bit more detail on some aspects of the car. Any business going into digital and direct is all over digital media looking for issues to address., checking Twitter and Facebook etc.
Lotus has access to what this direct route looks like through Polestar. It’s bad planning to say let’s go digital and direct and then not identify what that means and what staff is required and equally not informing the customer on key information.

I don’t believe that they are shocked with the amount of orders received, did they truly only expect a few hundred as that’s not what their business case for the car was based on. If indeed it was unforeseen you’d be employing a third party digital media company whilst you recruit or just employ them to take the strain and address these common issues. Lotus isn’t a couple of blokes and ladies tinkering in a shed it’s part of a billion dollar multinational company and all that expertise that parent company brings.

As stated by yourself and others TomE and Eagle have added more value to Lotus marketing team then Lotus have.

 

[NickR]

I’m of the opinion of you and Tome.

It’s clear across Facebook and these types of forums that the information being asked for is limited, I,e colour of cars and a bit more detail on some aspects of the car. Any business going into digital and direct is all over digital media looking for issues to address., checking Twitter and Facebook etc.
Lotus has access to what this direct route looks like through Polestar. It’s bad planning to say let’s go digital and direct and then not identify what that means and what staff is required and equally not informing the customer on key information.

I don’t believe that they are shocked with the amount of orders received, did they truly only expect a few hundred as that’s not what their business case for the car was based on. If indeed it was unforeseen you’d be employing a third party digital media company whilst you recruit or just employ them to take the strain and address these common issues. Lotus isn’t a couple of blokes and ladies tinkering in a shed it’s part of a billion dollar multinational company and all that expertise that parent company brings.

As stated by yourself and others TomE and Eagle have added more value to Lotus marketing team then Lotus have.

Ok my 10p worth. It seems to me that it's the structure at Lotus that needs looking at. It's like the design team and manufacturing all talk. Geely calls the shots. However the delivery and customer services department feels disconnected from the main business. Which is odd but anyone who made it to the road show knows there is passion at the company and tellingly you were talking to 'on the ground' people in development or manufacturing etc. NOT PR or customer relations.
In summary
This is a design and manufacturing studio led business more use to b2b communications
It currently doesn't have a integrated customer facing team with the same 'weight' as say the design team.
This obviously needs to change, but it feels like it's a structural and perhaps cultural shift that Lotus isn't used to.

 

[Matt]

Is it only a show car or LOTUS will intruduce the V6 version to China?

 

[Pav]

Looks good right

 

[Tonyshepp]

Ok my 10p worth. It seems to me that it's the structure at Lotus that needs looking at. It's like the design team and manufacturing all talk. Geely calls the shots. However the delivery and customer services department feels disconnected from the main business. Which is odd but anyone who made it to the road show knows there is passion at the company and tellingly you were talking to 'on the ground' people in development or manufacturing etc. NOT PR or customer relations.
In summary
This is a design and manufacturing studio lead business more use to b2b communications
It currently doesn't have a integrated customer facing team with the same 'weight' as say the design team.
This obviously needs to change, but it feels like it's a structural and perhaps cultural shift that Lotus isn't used to.

Yes agree but if you build a boat to cross the ocean you recognise you need a mast and sails. You build a direct business built on digital media you need a good marketing and Comms team. Lotus recognised 2 years ago this was to be a global car in a digitised world.

 

[Tonyshepp]

Yes agree but if you build a boat to cross the ocean you recognise you need a mast an sails. You build a direct business built on digital media you need a good marketing and Comms team. Lotus recognised 2 years ago this was to be a global car in a digitised world.

PS don't get me wrong I want Lotus to succeed and I'm soooper excited for me and them.

 

[darkling]

ok from what i'm kinda been putting together from interviews. Is after the fe cars are delivered then production cars from the overflow of the orders will get to menu the options they want in packages . i.e. drivers pack with data log seats etc and drivers aids like bumper beepers lane departure etc .
Then you get a choice of colors and for extra cash you can have custom paint like the evjia choices . think that kinda how it's been put out imo

 

[Eagle7]

I’m of the opinion of you and Tome.

It’s clear across Facebook and these types of forums that the information being asked for is limited, I,e colour of cars and a bit more detail on some aspects of the car. Any business going into digital and direct is all over digital media looking for issues to address., checking Twitter and Facebook etc.
Lotus has access to what this direct route looks like through Polestar. It’s bad planning to say let’s go digital and direct and then not identify what that means and what staff is required and equally not informing the customer on key information.

I don’t believe that they are shocked with the amount of orders received, did they truly only expect a few hundred as that’s not what their business case for the car was based on. If indeed it was unforeseen you’d be employing a third party digital media company whilst you recruit or just employ them to take the strain and address these common issues. Lotus isn’t a couple of blokes and ladies tinkering in a shed it’s part of a billion dollar multinational company and all that expertise that parent company brings.

As stated by yourself and others TomE and Eagle have added more value to Lotus marketing team then Lotus have.

Well they've said they were not only shocked, but "overwhelmed" so clearly, for whatever reason, they didn't anticipate the demand. Remember all their plans were made before Goodwood, so they must have assumed they'd have the time to put things together based on the demand they've been used to traditionally. I know Matt said they want to be a serious global player, but my impression was they were thinking of the electric future, not the Emira, so the Emira was supposed to be the closing out of their past as they got ready for electric. That's the only thing I can think of that would explain the lack of preparation for other things besides the car and the production of it. Matt did say they've put everything they've had into the Emira for the last two years, but it seems that meant the design, engineering, and that sort of thing instead of internet, digital media, and PR which is the part we're all looking at. Looking back now, that's clearly an oversight, but it's always easy to see what you should have done when looking back. They need to get on it now though, and I'm sure Matt got that message as he's gone around with the show cars to the events.

I don't think they were as far along in the process as we thought they were at Goodwood, and they didn't anticipate the need to be ready much sooner than they expected. So that's where we're at right now. Now it's up to Matt and the team to put the rest of the package together.

 

[Andrea]

Do you guys know what's that front plastic square? Probably it is the radar or the license plate holder.... anyway it is horrible imho

 

[Eagle7]

Do you guys know what's that front plastic square? Probably it is the radar or the license plate holder.... anyway it is horrible imho

Looks like the mount location for the license plate. I sure hope that's just for China since that's the first time we've seen that.

 

[TomE]

Ok my 10p worth. It seems to me that it's the structure at Lotus that needs looking at. It's like the design team and manufacturing all talk. Geely calls the shots. However the delivery and customer services department feels disconnected from the main business. Which is odd but anyone who made it to the road show knows there is passion at the company and tellingly you were talking to 'on the ground' people in development or manufacturing etc. NOT PR or customer relations.
In summary
This is a design and manufacturing studio led business more use to b2b communications
It currently doesn't have a integrated customer facing team with the same 'weight' as say the design team.
This obviously needs to change, but it feels like it's a structural and perhaps cultural shift that Lotus isn't used to.

They did have that team - they were called "dealers"