The NY Times had an article a few days back about BMW's new experience in Munich. I've put some highlights here, but you should take a look at the whole story. And for all of the conversation about the value of experience, here's some quick math from this project:
They expect 45,000 to be picked up here at $630 upcharge/each. That's $28 million in additional revenue from this experience. That's a pretty good reason to create a better experience! I've put some key points in bold below, but you really have to look at the language they're using here. This is big, bold talk about a big, bold place.
And maybe it's time that we at BEL, try our own experiement, like Joseph Jaffe did on his blog (see Jaffe Juice: iPhone for an episode - fair trade!). Anyone out there want to sponsor me to visit all of these great experiences around the world and video blog about them? I'll give the sponsor(s) lots of coverage. Drop me a note if you're interested and we can talk details.
Strolling through BMW Welt, with its cyclone-shaped entrance and billowing, cloudlike facade, it is easy to forget why the carmaker built this more than $250 million palace: to hand over cars to customers.Starting in October, about 170 vehicles a day will be delivered to the cathedral-like showroom at BMW Welt (BMW World, in English). Rather than picking up a new car at a local dealership, drivers who pay a little extra for the privilege come here to receive delivery of their vehicles, finding them bathed in a spotlight and rotating on a turntable.
Even in a country famous for its worship of the automobile, rarely has so elegant a form been harnessed to so mundane a function. “Our dealers are like local churches, while BMW Welt is St. Peter’s Cathedral,” said Michael Ganal, BMW’s director of marketing.
BMW’s new service will be similar to that of Mercedes. German customers will buy their cars through a dealer and, for an extra charge of 457 euros ($630), will be able to pick them up at BMW Welt. (Americans can also pick up cars here; the price for European delivery will increase somewhat.)
The owners will get a tour of BMW’s Munich assembly plant — its oldest, which produces the 3 Series compact — as well as vouchers to eat at restaurants in the delivery center.
But BMW Welt has grander ambitions. Its architect, Wolf D. Prix of the Vienna firm Coop Himmelb(l)au, said his model was not Volkswagen’s Autostadt but the Acropolis in Athens. “It’s a kind of covered plaza, where things can happen which are not necessarily connected with buying a car,” Mr. Prix said.
The building includes a vast public gallery, where BMW will display its complete model range, a conference center that can rented out and a center for children, ages 7 to 13, to learn about mobility.
Other German carmakers apparently feel the same pressure. Last year, Mercedes opened a sparkling, futuristic Mercedes-Benz museum in its home city, Stuttgart. Across town, Porsche is constructing its own ultramodern museum, whose construction makes it appear to hover above the ground. The granddaddy of such facilities is the Autostadt, a seven-year-old complex adjacent to Volkswagen’s factory in Wolfsburg, which features a museum and visitors center where customers can choose new cars that are then fetched from the factory and parked in a pair of circular glass towers.
About two million people a year visit the 62-acre complex, which looks a bit like a World’s Fair exposition. It is one of Germany’s top tourist attractions.
BMW expects 800,000 visitors a year, many more than those taking delivery of new cars. Of the 45,000 cars expected to be picked up each year, about 80 percent will go to Germans, the rest to other Europeans and Americans.
In Germany, Mr. Prix said, carmakers are taking over the role once played by the church or local princes: constructing landmark buildings. BMW recently hired Zaha Hadid, the British-based, Iraqi-born architect, to design the administration building for its assembly plant in Leipzig.
Link: BMW’s Shrine to Horsepower - New York Times.
BMW Welt
Volkwagen Autostadt
Mercedes-Benz museum
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