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NEWS
Renault Captur stalking Trax
But French softroader falls foul of ISOFIX pitfallThe local launch of Renault's tiny Captur SUV has been delayed by our unique safety regulations for child restraint.
As we reported back in May, Foton's Tunland was recalled for failure to comply with unique local legislation concerning ISOFIX child safety restraints. The Captur has been blocked from entering the market for basically the same reason, as local Renault MD Justin Hocevar explained to motoring.com.au earlier this week.
"One of the unique things for the Australian market is top tethers for child [safety seats]. And because of the modular rear bench seat of that vehicle – it slides, it's a sliding rear bench and it's also split-fold – it presented a number of homologation challenges. That's what really slowed us down..." Hocevar said.
The ISOFIX anchorage was the major reason for the Captur still being some months away from reaching Aussie showrooms. Renault trusts it will receive widespread acceptance once here, despite its ANCAP rating of four stars.
If the Captur had arrived in Australia prior to the end of last year, as we reported previously, it would have achieved a five-star crash safety rating from the local testing authority. But the ADR fail hindered pre-emptive launch.
While the delay for the introduction of the Captur began with the ADR 'please explain', according to the Renault exec, the SUV's release date in Australia was pushed back further once our planned allocation was redirected to other markets.
"We had expected it to arrive much earlier in 2014 – I think we'd always communicated: in the first half of the year. It then sort of got pushed out to the third quarter... and now, our 'drop dead' on this is to launch it before year end," Hocevar explained.
"We're quite confident that that will now be the result.
"Initially we had some trouble with ADR development of the vehicle for Australia. That really pushed us outside of our production allocation and all the planning. And then secondly, the worldwide demand for it kicked in.
"Demand has far exceeded the production capability, and a number of new markets [were] opened up with the vehicle. A good example would be [South] Korea, you know – a market that traditionally is pretty much all domestic product. If it's anything imported it's at the premium end of the market.
"Captur was launched as an online sales model there, and their first 7000-unit allocation was sold... within hours. I don't know the exact time on it, but it was an incredibly short period of time.
"All of that demand just kept on making it more and more difficult for us to get back into our production cycle.
"Anyway, that has now happened, and that should see us launch the vehicle before the end of the year."
Hocevar denied that the delay launching Captur in Australia was in any way due to Renault reconsidering the model name for the local market. In some quarters it had been speculated the Captur would not be marketed by that name in Australia. Hocevar flatly denied that.
"No, no, as far as I am aware, it's going to be 'Captur' in Australia..."
Asked whether the name had been researched in the Australian market or there had been any specific sign of consumer resistance to the name, Hocevar shook his head and answered: "No, there's no problem with 'Captur'...
Hocevar had previously heard this rumour and had checked with the head office in France, but the response to that was clearly and unequivocally in the negative.
"We also heard that feedback – and it came from a journalist, questioning us on the name. That was the first we'd heard of it. I think at the time I asked... legal and head office. We had no issues arise out of it. And a name [change] wouldn't slow us down anyway.
"A technical issue like the ADRs would have always been a greater hurdle than a name change."
Would Renault consider a name change for the local market?
"Ideally we'd like to keep the names aligned globally," Hocevar replied.
If it's understood in the local, English-speaking market to mean one taken prisoner, would the name work against the car?
"Captur, Captiva... all those sorts of outdoor-oriented, lifestyle-oriented names... are pretty well understood by the market.
When put to him that Captur, with the same three leading letters in its name as the mid-sized Holden SUV, could be subjected to the same modification – adding an 'R' for faecal effect – Hocevar expressed surprise, claiming to be unaware of the Holden's unsavoury epithet.
"As we know, there's a number of ways to manipulate an automotive product name; if that was the case, Mitsubishi wouldn't have been calling the Pajero 'Pajero'," he responded, after due reflection.
At that point, Hocevar's PR manager, Emily Fadeyev, offered her observation that the Captur name has been placed in the proper context in France, by means of a TV commercial.
"There was quite a good campaign as well that Renault France did about Captur, which was about 'capturing life' – so being a lifestyle vehicle. That was the line they used to bring that name to life," she said.
For that to be effective in Australia too, the Captur would need a full TV advertising campaign to support it – but do Renault's projected sales volumes for the small SUV justify that kind of expense?
"More than likely, yeah," Hocevar answered. "With most new model launches... we tend to do a bit of a big bang at first..."
Renault certainly advertised the Koleos on TV when it was first launched here. The Captur's sales are no less likely to warrant the same promotion and advertising. That in itself makes a telling point: Captur should sell in respectably large volumes – possibly making it the top-selling model in the range.
Hocevar has an eye on the "500 or 700 units a month" that the Holden Trax is selling. Ford's EcoSport is doing around 300 a month, he says, and "there's not many other players."
"If we can rival anywhere near the volumes of those brands, it would be a significant, incremental adjustment to our total."
Earlier, he had allayed any concerns that the Captur's late arrival in the market would hand the Holden an unassailable lead in the segment niche both cars occupy.
"We're very confident in the vehicle's commercial potential here in Australia. That segment is still very small, but it is growing – and there's not many players in it at the moment, so we think we've got good opportunity within it.
Hocevar wouldn't offer a sales forecast for the Captur, but said: "we'd be pretty pleased" if the Captur can achieve the Ford's numbers, let alone those of the Trax.
"There could be limitations on production," he indicated, letting Renault off the hook if it can't match the Trax (or even the EcoSport). And Renault's dealer network is a fraction the size of Ford's, for instance.
"We'll finish out this year at about 45 [dealers]," Hocevar said, after noting that Ford's national dealer network is approaching 300.
Renault Australia is forecasting around 2000 Megane sales by the end of the year – with 844 sold for the year to date. Clio has sold 1097 in 2014 so far. Captur thus offers the potential to be the top-selling Renault in Australia if it consistently gets anywhere near the EcoSport in sales.
The difficulty for Renault Australia is establishing just how the whole market niche for small SUVs like the Captur will grow. Will it bloom, boom – or fizzle?
"It is still an emerging segment, you know," Hocevar observed. "Overall that segment is small, [but] there's some early indicators of where people are migrating out of other segments into that small/light SUV segment. So it's hard to pinpoint... what the volume will be. But it's certainly growing rapidly – and we hope to capitalise on that."
Capitalising will be contingent on offering the right specification at the right price, but Renault is keeping its powder dry on that score.
"We haven't revealed pricing; it's fair to say that... we'll be in the mix with those other brands [Ford and Holden]."
Asked whether the Captur would likely match the entry-level 2008 in Peugeot's range, Hocevar replied that "from a price and specification point of view, the Holden is the benchmark."
"I think [Captur] will stack up very well – and that's exactly what it has done in markets where it's already present."
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Written byKen Gratton
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