I'm sure it will be relief to you all when I say that I'm getting out of here. I've been an MG fan all my motoring life of 60 years, but with electric only, Chinese SUV MGs, I think the time has come to vote with my feet. We'll keep our 7 year warranty MG3 until the said guarantee has more or less run out, and I will probably keep my one owner TF135 until I peg out, but I'm even wondering about that.
Cheerio all.
Well. I must say that when Gary Hagen suggested at the launch of the LE 500 that there might one day be a range of four or even five MGs I never expected two SUVs; an estate more like a Vauxhall Victor FD than a Rover 420 Tourer; and the oldest one, a brilliant supermini very similar to an Escort XR3, though slightly less fast with far better equipment levels and much, much cheaper. Which is not the successful one and may not even be replaced!
Nor that three out of four models come in variants which today are as popular as diesels but need charging off the mains - with one electric only, and an even bigger third SUV and the first MG sportscar in a decade likely or possible in electric form! Or that continental sales would just be taking off.
Nor that MGs would be fully constructed in China, Thailand and India only with assembly in Pakistan.
Mind you, even in 2015 I would not have predicted Brexit and in mid-March 2020 I would not have expected the Covid pandemonium.
I cannot understand politicians confusing "virtue-signalling because they won't be in charge when it all goes wrong" with "actually having a political strategy" in suddenly banning new petrol and diesel engines, But they have done so.
In the new world, MG has moved from mid-80s Hyundai ("Wish you could have another old-fashioned Cortina but don't really want a jelly mould? Get a Stellar from a country you would never think would ever make cars!") to something like a late-70s Toyota ("Fed up of ordinary cars? Ours are quirky and come from a country well known for making cheap tat which you might well say you actually dislike - but things have changed, ours work really well and they are quite cheap to buy, though parts and servicing may be a different matter".)
And in this fantastic MB of the Noughties we will have underestimated how hard it has been to sell MG to the masses in the UK, not because they expected Zeds, but because most people thought Longbridge had closed in 2000 when B*W left and remembered Longbridge as a place where thousands of noisy men demonstrated against ordinary British people in general and foolish buyers of British cars in particular, and thought of MGs as pretty, but pretty old-fashioned, sportscars in an outdated way. Today, selling a product as "British brand heritage" (true or not - and SAIC MG took over a great deal from the wreckage of MG Rover, including designers from the Issigonis team and its successors) is much harder than selling "Czech brand heritage" so MG have arguably had a worse job than Škoda c. 1990.
Just as there was once resistance to having monocoque MGs, I think the latest "not a proper MG" is a huge hit, and while I might look at "what two years ago a Fabia Estate was" for my next car because a Marvel R is not for me, I can see the market for small and even medium petrol cars is drying up (Citigo, C1 have gone, Polo keeps getting bigger) and I'll probably get an MG, because I love the brand!
Meanwhile, April's game can start in about a week!
www.zipcar.com
