Australia can do better, says global MINI boss

MINI’s global CEO insists a change in Australia’s motoring culture – partly driven by speed and environmental guilt – has lead to his Antipodean offshoot underperforming compared to its potential.

“There is still a lot of potential for us in Australia. That’s not based on numbers. It’s just my gut feeling,” Dr Kay Segler told motoring.com.au this week.

“When I go back… In the first years when I was overseeing BMW in Australia in the 1980s and 1990s the cars were liked because of performance and handling.

“I don’t know if that same feeling of the society towards the car is still there now. I have the feeling that, somehow, in Australia’s society that’s been lost.”

He explained this partly through an increasing love affair with gadgets, increasingly congested and heavily policed roads and economic circumstances, but was happy to point out that the situation was not irretrievable.

“Even a decade ago in Japan, cars were icons and that faded a lot but it’s coming back now, especially for MINI.

“I was in Argentina in 1991 when its economy completely collapsed and I mean everything collapsed and stopped.

“The first car brand to come back was MINI and that was the same in Mexico and Japan, too. People are revisiting what they were familiar with once they realise that life is more than having a new iPad or television.

“We have to make people remember that cars are not about the numbers in the specifications. Cars are the feelings they give the drivers and maybe that has changed slightly in Australia.”

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