Mini Dream Team

I visited the Mini dealership in Leicester today - Sunday 2nd December to have a look around and compare to the one I've seen in Nottingham and the couple that Sarah has been to. I walked in amazed just as I did with the Nottingham one. It looked brand new and shiny, clean and crisp. The right, contemporary music was playing and the colourful decor on the black backdrop, although familiar to me now was still impressive. Unlike the Nottingham branch, they had a reception desk and Laura who was sat at the desk was my first port of call. After explaining my reason for visiting she was really helpful, running to grab the 2012/13 lifestyle booklet. It was good to see that this dealership actually had the up to date catalogue/booklet. I was allowed to look around and took the photos below. (Unfortunately had to use my phone)

I asked her who the main consumer was as she sees them first on reception and she said 

"Mainly female, early twenties, although now we've got the new range the 'Countryman' (it's a lot bigger and a bit like a 4x4) I'm seeing more families with young children being interested"

The lifestyle range (to no surprise of mine) was tucked away in the far left corner of the dealership. When I asked Laura if anybody ever browsed through it she said:

"I've not been here a great amount of time but I've never seen anybody go over and have a look at it"

She mentioned that the layout stays the same in that area.

But people do come in and ask what accessories they can buy as a gift for somebody who owns a Mini but she normally sends them over to the "Parts" department as that is where everything is stocked. She mentioned key rings quite a lot, it seems that lots of people are interested in those! This made me think of the merchandise vs. fashion range ideas that we've had. 

I talked Laura through the brief and she said that she used to work for Lexus and they focus a lot more on their lifestyle range and suggested that maybe it's because it suits their consumer more. This suggests that the Mini lifestyle range doesn't suit its consumer. Which is I think a valid point and should be taken into account. This also adds something that we can further research and use as a case study. 

This was their coffee table with reading material for the consumer. This shows perfectly the range of people that come into the dealership. Having worked for the middle two magazines I can confirm that their target audiences are completely different. Dluxe magazine is for LeicesterSHIRE readers over the age of around 35, and 69degrees is 20+ city loving youngsters. 

She mentioned the word "fun" a lot also and said it is obviously a very fun brand and well established as a car; just not in the fashion world.

This was outside across the road where I guess they store the Minis! The street that the dealership is located on is exactly like the Nottingham branch, in an industrial looking area and is about 30 mins away from the town centre, bringing up accessibility issues (when looking at the fashion range - I wouldn't want to drive all that way just for one store, I would do it if the range was truly worth it)