Where Are We Going?

[kitcarman]

Hi Darren,
I’m barred from PistonHeads, but I’d love to enter into debate with you and I’m quite certain that your insight, as a manufacturer, will be welcome by others here.

I’ve taken the liberty of re-posting what you said in that ‘exclusive’ environment. I hope that’s OK with you and with John. Would you be prepared to enter into debate here - on how your views might improve the lot of this industry?

Den

Originally Posted by dozracing

As a kit car manufacturer i thought i would share my opinion on the industry.

The primary reason that its so small and everyone is having a hard time is that the industry is so insular. We have 3 industry magazines, and yet the circulation is tiny. They reckon Which Kit Car is lucky to sell 3,500 copies a month. Now even if you could consider the total readership as 3 times that amount, you are not reaching very many people. Bearing in mind a lot of these readers will already be owners or builders, you don't have many people to try and sell too.

The bickering between the magazines, hasn't helped the industry look very professional. Also if you read the magazines, there is very little technical content. If you read these forums, you'll notice that most of the builders are very interested in the technical details and merits of each kit. So perhaps they are not writing the magazines in an interesting way.

What i would like to see is an industry body, which is practically likely to come out from the magazines, that pushes the industry to a wider market.

When i'm in the workshop and let people walk in off the street i find that there are an awful lot of people who are really interested in the cars, and the idea of buying one. But they know nothing of how to go about it, and they have never bought a magazine etc. I think we should be trying to get to these people and tell them all about it, and how to get involved.

If the industry was mre professional, and bsiness like. I think it would start to thrive again. In my business we are on a marketing mission to go back to our roots and find out what our market wants, and to try and get the business across to these people. The market being the type of age, gender, status and technical competance that would be interested in the cars, not neccessarily the people currently buying the kit car magazines and visiting the shows. I believe its this approach that will make us successful, and could make the whole industry bigger and more successful if it were to do the same.

Darren George
GTS Tuning