The name is Bond, Jane Bond

03 March 2015 - 02:01 By Alan Tovey, ©The Daily Telegraph
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EJECTED: Sean Connery as James Bond with the Aston Martin DB5 made famous in 1964's 'Goldfinger'. Fifty years on, the car maker is struggling and believes broadening the marque's appeal to women will turn turn things around
EJECTED: Sean Connery as James Bond with the Aston Martin DB5 made famous in 1964's 'Goldfinger'. Fifty years on, the car maker is struggling and believes broadening the marque's appeal to women will turn turn things around
Image: GALLERYHIP

What would 007 say? Aston Martin, the car maker of choice for the spy who famously drove a DB5 equipped with an ejector seat, is to abandon its focus on testosterone-driven sports cars and try to appeal to female buyers.

Andy Palmer, the recently installed chief executive of the marque, is looking to broaden the company's appeal by targeting a wider range of potential buyers.

Palmer is adapting to modern buying trends that, he says, put women in the driving seat when it comes to choosing a car.

In an interview with the UK's Financial Times the former Nissan executive, who joined Aston Martin in October, said: "Without being patronising about it, women today around the world make between 60% and 80% of the buying decisions on a new car."

But car makers are bad at providing what women want from a car, something he believes has to be corrected.

"As an industry, we're pretty poor at ticking the boxes that satisfy a woman customer.

"We tend to view selling cars to women as 'pink it and shrink it' - add a place to hold your handbag, add a place to put your shoes - which I think is quite cynical."

But the marque has ruled out following other luxury car makers - most recently Rolls-Royce - into the fast-growing sports utility vehicle sector.

Aston Martin has already revealed plans to make its new Lagonda Taraf saloon more widely available, having originally planned to offer the car only in the Middle East following its launch in Dubai last year.

Palmer said: "Opening up the Lagonda Taraf to an increased number of customers around the world was a high priority for me as soon as I joined Aston Martin late last year.

"I wanted to be able to offer this exceptional saloon to people around the globe who have been inquiring about it, and I'm very happy that we have been able to expand the Lagonda proposition."

Aston Martin has failed to match the sales success that other ultra-premium car makers have enjoyed over the past few years.

Its annual sales have dwindled to about 4000 from a peak of more than 7000.

Palmer was taken on by the company, which was founded in 1913, with a remit to reverse its recent poor sales performance.

In its most recent annual results, Aston Martin posted sales of £461.2-million (R8.325-billion), but made a pre-tax loss of £24.6-million.

The all-new Aston Martin DB10 has a starring role in the latest James Bond movie, Spectre, currently being filmed with Daniel Craig in the lead role.

The new Bond car is silver-grey - just like the Aston Martin DB5 that featured in the Bond hits of 50 years ago. The DB5 in 1964's Goldfinger has gone down in marketing history as the most successful movie product placement of all time. That Bond vehicle was fitted with various ingenious weapons and became the world's favourite car in the popular imagination.

The DB5 also appeared in the follow-up James Bond movie, Thunderball.

Only one of the two cars wickedly adapted by Bond colleague "Q" has survived. It was sold on auction in 2010 for more than $6-million.

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