Megan Geuss
DURHAM, NC—On a crisp morning in October, Audi hosted a coterie of journalists at an unassuming brick building near Durham’s downtown. The building was a “culinary incubator”—essentially a temporary restaurant space for concept dining startups and events. Speaking over coffee and various breakfast foods, Audi executives tried to tie the building’s startup ethos into an overview of Audi’s own strategy for the coming year. Part of that strategy involves the new Audi S3, a premium sedan in the A3 family that we journalists were about to drive for the first time.
Make new customers, but keep the old
The 2017 S3 is little changed from its earlier version, but it’s still an important car for Audi. Audi is VW Group’s most profitable brand, and it’s a critical part of the German automaker’s strategy to retain VW owners who are ready to “graduate” to a luxury brand. And, after a bruising year of dealing with the legal fallout from VW Group’s “dieselgate” scandal, Audi is no doubt hoping to capture even more of those former VW owners. Audi hopes this despite its involvement in the scandal, on the assumption that the Audi brand is not associated with the scandal as strongly (although Audi allegedly played a key part in VW’s diesel scandal and the brand may be facing its own legal issues with recent revelations of falsified CO2 numbers).
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Source: Ars Technica – First drive in the 2017 Audi S3: VW Group’s gateway drug to luxury vehicles