A bit of a rant....
I guess my Luddite tendencies may be somewhat irritated by a Chinese manufacturer using the MG identity, not that I blame the Chinese for recognising the value of a brand and how much a name can add to the perception of value in the marketplace...Just that it rubs me up the wrong way to some extent....
I am very fond of many of the convenience factors that my Chinese built American design (?) Tesla provides, I often make use of it`s squirtability from standstill, in traffic situations. The Tesla like most modern machines has far more functions available than I could even be bothered to delv into, and the idea of it sounding like a Ferrari is of no interest to me whatsoever, and worse still the idea of interrupting the otherwise smooth transition form standstill to whatever speed one wishes to attain, by creating minute pauses to simulate manual gear changing, would seem nonsensical and potentially adding some strain in the drive system over time..!
My choice of sports cars over the years has ever been competition related to the American marketing one liner, Win on Sunday, sell on Monday.... thus my first dream car was an old Lotus Elan.... which in time was followed by another couple of Lotus models. In time having read an article on the 911 and that it was the preferred personal transport of none other than the autojourno Jenks, to transport him from race meetings all around Europe based on performance and reliability... I was sold, the idea of reliability had been worn a tad thin in my Lotus exploits.
By my mid fifties I had owned, restored and run quite a few cars, and roads were becoming busier, thus I returned to m/cycling for B road enjoyment for a year or two...
Perhaps it was that .err..maturity had arrived, call it a growing degree of nostalgia felt if you will, and which vintage sports cars seemed to exude....As close as I could get to that kind of driver involvement, was thought to be a Morgan, the idea of a large engine, in a hand built wooden frame covered by hand formed panels created by craftsmen using time honoured skills, was more than vintage and heritage enough for me.. Today some 23 years into the custodianship of my mid 80`s +8 it still sits im my garage ready to GO, any time a mix of mood and weather combine to cause me to fire it up... What`s more to want...?
All that rambling to suggest that the name MG stuck on anything is of zero real world value to me in any way shape or form, unless attached to a British made sports car.
Like many here I suspect we have seen similar marketing ploys to attract those of us of a certain age and who have witnessed the use and abuse of badge engineering related to hard won historic reputation nailed onto something either very loosely related, or totally unrelated to that which went before..In this company I suspect I have no need to present examples..
I guess it is an age thing, and if the young think an EV that looks like a sports car is the business, then who am I to disagree....? (-:
