BMW i4

In my opinion BMW Ireland and their dealers destroyed the brand in Ireland for a huge amount of loyal fans.

They chose to focus on profit over scale which is their right but they destroyed the loyalty of the people actually buying their cars.   

The dealers gouging on trade in values and all round poor customer service at the dealer level and at the BMW Ireland level.   Again if something goes wrong on your new 100k plus car, don't really care attitude. We will get to it, you are just a number mentality despite some people myself included spending 200k plus every 3 years on cars. 

They pushed money into trying to target a new younger audience with PCPs deals, branded content with ambassadors in the Irish Times of all places as opposed to focusing on their existing customers base.  

The result, sales down 9% this year, half of BMW Ireland employees are gone, when you don't have scale you don't need as many employees at the BMW Ireland level.  Shot themselves in the foot the staff with that strategy, didn't they.

If Merc grow again same as this year or BMW continues to drop sales next year Merc will overtake them and BMW will sit behind Audi and Merc on sales but look at our profit margins on those sales they will say. Yeah but for how long? Given the range of cars and like for like model life cycle of the cars that is a disgrace.  A complete failure in the market.  How the BMW UK masters aren't on them for this I don't know.

As someone who loved BMWs from a young age and bought them new like confetti, I actually hate the brand and dealer network which is big word to say.

I think it is an excuse to be honest that they sell internally to keep BMW off their backs. Every brand has been hit with factory supply issues.

They have chosen profit margins over scale, which means fewer cars. It's a deliberate strategy at the BMW Ireland level. Lower volume but higher margins or least the story they are selling.

It's all optics.

Same with the BMW Ireland membership club or subscription thing whatever that was. Again poor strategy and execution.

What do they do in Santry all day at BMW Ireland. Lets sponsors a few more Triathlons and order our management cars.

The price rises are now on the configurator, so the basic i4 is now the bones of 70k.

Well, my dealer tells me BMW haven’t told them definitely whether current orders are price protected or not despite the fact they previously told them they were. He said he hopes to have clarity by the end of the week.

I have told him that if I’m asked for another 4K they can keep the car.

If the Enyaq RS is €65k then it's the smaller battery and probably basic spec? A 77kWh RWD iv80 with a few options is €70k.

Today is D-day, supposed to be collecting the car later today…revenue are down at moment so they are having issue getting it registered.

But just to throw a curve ball, got a call from the owner of dealership there. They were contacted by BMW Ireland about my letter of complaint about my experience which I sent on Tuesday.

Owner told BMW Ireland that he agreed with absolutely everything I said in the email and he left it with them to see if they will come back with something.

Hes adamant it’s BMW Germany dictating that the cars must be registered this year and that they are only enforcing it for the electric cars…and even said they are doing it because they can with the demand. Says it’s BMW Germany that will just assign the car to someone else if it’s refused by customer.

Sounds like a plausible explanation, why on earth would they just not tell us this at least rather than letting us feel like we’re been screwed over for no reason than just because they can in current climate!

Did you pick up your car today in the end Rodge?

Sure did. It was dark so haven’t taken any proper snaps, will hopefully get around to giving it a full detailing on Sunday and take a few then.

Its a joy to drive, surprisingly quite in the cabin…road noise is very low considering no engine humming away. The adaptive suspension also really does a job on making it very smooth to drive (comparing to s line A6 with standard suspension)…defo feel less bumps than the 191A6.

And boy is the instant acceleration fun! (Might be divorced by wknd if wife is a passenger again)

Only complaint so far is the rear reversing camera seemed a little grainy, it was dark so will be interesting to see what it’s like in daylight. Don’t believe the A6 one is grainy in dark.

I won’t say anything about range until I’ve gotten over playing with the acceleration every 30 seconds and gotten in a more normal driving pattern!

Havent heard anything back from BMW Ireland, wasn’t really expecting anything from them at this stage. They haven’t actually directly replied to to my email, they spoke to dealer though obviously as owner contacted me and told me that the ball is in BMW Irelands court.

Whether I purchase another BMW will depend on how they deal with this. I’m not going to dwell on it. If they come back with something decent to make up for it then they are back as an option in future, if they don’t then grand…will be plenty of other EV options in few years.

As as aside, sales manager told me of the three I4s they got in last week…one person refused it and it was allocated to someone else and gone already.

Tail lights replaced and my wallet 850 lighter.

Got it at agreed price. Person that declined it did so because of them not allowing a 231 reg.

Was around €63/64k c. March 2022 ?

I'm going to maintain radio silence until it arrived. first words out of his mouth in mid Oct when we put everything together was that the car didn't go up in price (he was waiting 10 days to do figures as he was waiting for an email on prices across the board). Agreed a price to change, a little horse trading, then I came back for the upgraded sound system, and he said it will be an extra 1k... but moved it from 112 to 111 production, and that's the last I heard. Promised a mid-Late Jan delivery initially, but it could be earlier now. Like Davy said, I wouldn't freak over a 222 plate, but I would over at 2k price rise. So I'll keep the head down, won't contact him until delivery and hope he doesnt spring the price rise on me!!