Reliability Problems, Reliability Issues

The proverbial sink or swim moment had arrived for Volkswagen.

The company had some success with Passats, GTIs, and Cabrios imported from Germany, but reliability problems were rampant with the Golf and the Jetta-the entry point cars for VW’s customers. The company was down to “selling only to die hard VW fans, the ones who would buy the cars if they came in boxes and had to be assembled in their driveways.” Without a complete revival of its manufacturing, operations, and marketing, it couldn’t survive in the U.S. market.

Assuming it could fix these problems, the big question loomed-how to regain trust and revive the emotional connection with its lost or disheartened customers.

The make or break moment for Volkswagen in the U.S. market had arrived. After years of living as an endangered species, VW was reborn with the reintroduction of the Bug in 1997. To the delight of VW, the Bug had never really died in the hearts of its fans, many of whom had kept and restored their 1960s or 1970s models for nostalgic reasons.

The new Bug was VW’s “Walk This Way” remake-the car and the song were just the opening paragraphs of the rest of the story for each entity’s branding saga. Just as Aerosmith had to fix the addiction and relationship problems of the band’s members before releasing its next album and attracting new fans, so did VW have to fix its brand before unleashing a new advertising campaign and attracting new customers. Fixing the brand meant solving product quality and reliability issues that had alienated customers in the late 1970s and 1980s. If there is something wrong with the brand or the product, the worst thing a marketer can do is create a great advertising campaign that attracts customers. Why? Because their trust is tough to gain the first time, let alone the second time, after they’ve been disappointed.