result #1 - pictures of the interior

result #1

Putting women in the driver's seat (Steve Dow, 05/10/04)

Finally, car makers are asking what female drivers want, Steve Dow writes.

WHAT do women want in a car? Volvo reckons the answer is a sporty coupe with "gull-wing" doors that open like a bird in flight, with storage space for handbags and hollowed-out headrests to accommodate ponytails.

The result is Volvo's Your Concept Car (YCC), the first car to be designed entirely by women.

Australians will get their first glimpse of the concept car on Thursday at the Australian International Motor Show in Sydney. Designed by a core team of eight women, the coupe took 15 months and $6 million to build. The bonnet is sealed, which means no one but a mechanic can look under it at service time (the water tank has been moved near the side petrol cap). There are interchangeable seat pads with a choice of eight interior colours. The prototype's exterior colour is "chameleon"; a warm, soft yellow that verges on a greyish blue, depending on the light. The seats allow easy access rising to meet the posteriors of driver and passenger and the exterior has an "easy clean" surface, using advanced paint to minimise the detergent required to clean it.

The emergence of such a gender-specific car is a symptom of an industry that knows it needs to tap into girl purchasing power. Despite women being directly responsible for at least half of new car purchases, they are often patronised or ignored by showroom sales staff in a culture that continues to view cars as secret blokes' business.

Volvo Australia spokesman Todd Hallenbeck, however, insists the concept car is aimed at women and men, and that much of the press coverage garnered by the YCC has got it wrong by flagging the car as intended for women only.

But US sales consultant Martha Barletta, author of the book Marketing To Women, says in Volvo's campaign literature on the YCC: "If you meet the expectations of women, you exceed the expectations of men." Barletta's endorsement doesn't exactly exclude men, though it does flatter the female buyer.

Hallenbeck says it could be a few years before Volvo releases such a car. "The gull-wing doors are perhaps too extreme to become a production reality, but in general terms, the YCC is buildable." Price, he says, is "too hard to predict".

Wheels magazine editor Ged Bulmer says the YCC has attracted plenty of headlines, piquing public interest. But some of the car's features, such as the sealed bonnet, are a "bit of hype". "I would find that a bit patronising," he says, adding that some female drivers, like some men, prefer to change the oil themselves.

Not all women have the same needs, he says. A 20-year-old single woman in Sydney might see the YCC as cool, but a mother in the suburbs who has to pick up the kids from school has vastly different aspirations, seeking bigger, versatile cars that bespeak safety.

Based on research about how women use cars, Ford launched its "crossover" car, the Territory, in Australia a few months ago. It is part sedan, part all-wheel-drive vehicle. The Territory has 30 storage compartments, and moveable pedals that can be adjusted to suit leg length. Surely all of this belated attention to women signals the car industry is finally female-friendly? Not so, says the Australian Consumers' Association, which reported in its magazine Choice in March that women "still experience negative treatment and outright humiliation when buying a car or having one repaired". "Chances are when a woman walks into a car yard or a workshop, she'll be patronised with very little useful information about the car, while the mechanic will try to rip her off," Choice said.

These problems are well documented. A 2000 study by the NRMA of 2445 women found 51 per cent did not enjoy the experience of buying cars.

Critically, male car salesmen greatly outnumber saleswomen. In 2000, for instance, Holden had just 100 saleswomen nationally compared with 1570 salesmen. Such ratios are similar at other car company dealerships. (Holden has since been granted exemptions under the NSW Anti-Discrimination Act to specifically recruit women into car sales roles.)

One industry analyst, who declined to be named, says Holden "mystery shopped" at its own dealers, with women posing as buyers. "They were horrified. That's why they tried to fix it."

Holden spokeswoman Emily Perry says there are 148 female sales managers and sales consultants at Holden dealerships nationally, though women are more highly represented in roles such as administration, stock control and customer follow-up. She confirmed mystery shopping is conducted, but to test salespeople on the "whole gamut of services", not primarily to see how sales staff treat female customers.

Bulmer says several car companies have tried to redress the industry's blokey imbalance, "but despite their best efforts, this remains an issue". Wheels still receives angry letters from women car buyers. Their most common complaint? "It seems unbelievable, and you'd think, 'surely not', but they still get the old, 'why don't you go get your hubby or boyfriend to come in and we'll talk to him'."

What about attitudes to women employed in the automotive industry? Anna Rosen, the 28-year-old lead exterior designer of the Volvo YCC, says she was "shocked" that so much media attention had been paid to the fact the car's designers were all women. (Of course, the gender tone of the coverage may have something to do with her employer promoting the novelty of an all-women team.)

"It [the coverage] proves that women are seen far too rarely in the car industry," Rosen says.

"I think not listening to women as a customer group is very stupid."

it used to be a dream...

Fast and nice machine used to be referred as big-boys-toys, however there are some sleek machines designed for and by the fairer gender-- other than MPVs, van or wagon. (I'm not being a feminist here, but just to share with you what i have found... :) peace!) So... let us discover these machines.