Archive for May, 2011

Car companies are known to spend significant budgets on advertising campaigns. Numerous ads keep their brand top of your mind when you’re ready to buy the next car. Volkswagen is no different. In fact, Volkswagen recently came up with an original micro-site called “True Life Costs”.

What is “True Life Costs”?

True Life Costs is a depiction of how much value is built into various items we use everyday. Surprise, surprise – the site also talks about the value of Volkswagen vehicles and how the value of the car is higher than the original pricetag. The site is targeting English-speaking consumers in the UK.

Curious to learn more? See for yourself at http://www.truelifecosts.com/

Volkswagen announced on May 13th that it sold 2.66 million vehicles worldwide between January and April. 2.66 million vehicles marks almost ~14% increase over 2010. This is BIG news for Volkswagen.

Car sales are known to follow the general economic trend: the lower the unemployment rate, the more cars are sold. Volkswagen sales are certainly on the upswing.. whether they last is whole different story.

Monthly Car Sales vs. Unemployment Rate

Source:  AutoObserver.com

Volkswagen announced a pilot launch of a car sharing program called Quicar in the city of Hannover. The idea behind the program is very simple:

• Residents of Hannover will get access to short-term rental vehicles
• There will be 50 locations in the city (up to 100 in the near future)
• Volkswagen will fork up VW Golf, VW Caddy and VS Beetle for the program

Are car sharing programs popular?

Europeans have embraced car sharing programs long before the crowd in the US. In fact, it is estimated that some time this year Europe will reach an estimated 77,000 shared vehicles across Europe.

Volkswagen is actually a bit late to the European party. Daimer already runs car2go in Hamburg, Germany and Peugeot already offers MU in Britain, France and Germany. And BMW recently announced a launch of DriveNow in Munich.

What are the US counterparts?

There are some car sharing companies operating in the US too. Although Volkswagen’s Quicar is not expected to launch in the US just yet. Some of the more popular names include:

• ZipCar
• Car2Go
• RelayRides
• i-go-cars
• CarShare
• U Car Share
• Connect by Hertz