The USP for Alfa's SUVs

Alfa Romeo has surrendered to the inevitable. In the current economic climate car companies have to broaden their product focus to do more than just break even. For European prestige manufacturers that typically means developing SUVs to slot into the product range.

Alfa Romeo is now embarked on such a project -- two such projects actually. The century-old company with a long-standing motor racing heritage has committed to the development of what we would call compact and medium SUVs.

While Alfa Romeo is not a brand people associate with cross-country driving and family-hauling SUVs, it did once market the 33 Giardinetta (pictured) -- probably the closest Alfa Romeo has ever come to building a Subaru, even down to the flat-four engine. For the most part though, SUVs seem to be completely at odds with the marketing concept that Alfa Romeo has always espoused: driving satisfaction first.

The two new SUV models will tackle the most popular and lucrative market niches for prestige SUVs. One will be based on the newly-released Giulietta's platform and classified as a 'C segment' SUV. It's believed that the other, the 'D segment' SUV is to be built on the platform that will underpin the Giulia, the car that will succeed the current 159 model. Rumours suggest that development of the larger SUV has been pushed back from a 2012 release date to 2013.

Being smaller, the 'C' SUV will compete with cars such as Audi's Q5 (and likely Q3 also), plus BMW's X1 and X3 models. The 'D' SUV will go up against larger models such as the BMW X5, although the Alfa is not expected to be quite as large as the BMW.

While this is mostly old news, having been revealed by Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne in April of last year, the fall-out from the news is yet to be measured. For instance, how will local Alfa enthusiasts ('Alfisti') cope with their much lauded marque making the transition to marketing SUVs among its product range?

The Carsales Network put that question to Alfa Romeo's General Manager in Australia, Andrei Zaitzev during the media drive program for the new Giulietta. Zaitzev began by agreeing that the local Alfisti are as loyal to the brand as their counterparts anywhere in the world, "if not more so".

"You've only gotta look at what the guys did... orchestrating their own events to celebrate the 100th anniversary last year -- they did a phenomenal job, including shipping the Alfa 159 [grand prix car] out from the Alfa Museum to Australia together with two technicians from Italy to support it as well. They had it at track events celebrating the centenary in the early part of the year, as well as a number of events around the [Australian] Grand Prix..."

These are people who have a lot of emotional investment in the brand and what it represents. Surely they can be counted on to throw tantrums like two-year olds at the thought of Alfa Romeo offering offroad-going family trucksters?

"It's hard to say," Zaitzev answered. "I think they embrace just about anything with an Alfa Romeo badge on it -- and this is an SUV that will drive like an Alfa Romeo. I think it was probably tough for Porsche fans to accept the Cayenne and it was possibly even tough for BMW fans to accept the X5. You've got to recognise that the SUV segment is a massive growth segment. Just about any player that enters that segment creates volume for itself."

While Zaitzev didn't explicitly acknowledge that some fans will be disheartened by their favourite brand selling SUVs, he indicated that it's possible to keep them happy with product marketed in other segments.

" I think there will still be plenty we'll be able to offer to keep the traditional fans happy, but I think what we're talking about here is opening the doors to a far larger segment of the market that perhaps wouldn't even have considered Alfa Romeo in the past."

Enveloping the SUV models in the company's motorsport image might be one way to convert more traditional fans of the marque. Porsche contests the Trans-Siberian Rally in teams of Cayennes and BMW has entered the X5 in Dakar Rallies for years. Perhaps similar motorsport activities for the offroad Alfas would do the trick. At the very least, Zaitzev anticipates that the new models will have to appear up to the task when they come to market.

"Most people, if you were to ask them, would tell you two things about Alfa Romeo: they have to look good and they have to go hard," said Zaitzev. "If the SUV does both of those things, that's probably enough -- just in and of itself. If above that it's able to do anything else to appeal to people then I'm sure the powers that be... will do whatever they can to make that happen."

Hypothetically, we asked, would Zaitzev bring in a basic diesel mud-plugging model for the range, if market research showed a demand for it, even though it might damage the brand image?

"If the market research indicated we could get away with marketing that way, I'd probably consider it, but equally it may well be that the primary market for an SUV with an Alfa Romeo badge is completely dedicated to on-road use -- in which case that's probably a totally different set of priorities. It would be closer to an X1 than an X3."

Above even the short-term gain from strong sales, Zaitzev is very concerned that the Alfa Romeo brand image not be tarnished -- dictating an SUV that must live up to the image.

"There's no question that if we had an SUV it would have to be good. There's no sense in just putting out a four-wheel drive and hoping it will sell on the strength of being just a four-wheel drive. It absolutely has to link back to the brand and... people have got to be able to relate to it -- with the badge on the front."

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