Infiniti takes on German car brands

Japanese luxury car marque Infiniti is launching its first multi-channel brand campaign in a bid to raise its profile in Europe and take on German marques Mercedes, Audi and BMW.

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Infiniti hopes to “change the face of performance luxury motoring across Europe” and position itself as a credible alternative to the three leading German luxury car marques.

The campaign uses the strapline: “Since now, everything you know about performance motoring, is in the past. Since now, the perfect line is a curve” in what it calls a “provocative” message to tell the more established brands that “heritage means nothing and straight lines are boring”.

The brand campaign will support the launch of the high-performance Infiniti M Hybrid model and include its the Red Bull Racing F1 partnership and association with F1 world champion Sebastian Vettel.

Infiniti, which first launched 20 years ago into the US market, says it is still a “fresh” brand compared to rivals such as Mercedes Benz which is currently celebrating 125 years, and hopes to be “clearly fighting” its German rivals on an equal footing by 2015.

Jean-Pierre Diernaz, marketing director, Infiniti Europe, says: “The German brands are very engineering driven – we are more human inspired and more intuitive. We bring a new take on the luxury market – a fresh point of view less about tradition more about modernity. We’re not about a logo we’re about an experience.”

The brand’s first two years in Europe were about opening “art gallery style” showrooms and building foundations, but it is now entering a growth phase. It plans to open a new showroom every two months and reach 100,000 units by 2015 – it currently sells 10,000 units annually.

He says its ambitious growth plans are backed by ambitious marketing includes sponsorship of the Red Bull F1 team and the “Since now, the perfect line is a curve” campaign to tell the brand story.

The campaign, created by TBWA/G1 Paris and TMW, will roll out across Europe this week. Russia and the Middle East will follow.

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