Audi 2012 Annual Report Download - page 33

Fuel consumption and emission figures at the end of the Annual Report
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If it’s really true that more and
more often it is the wife who
decides which car her husband
is to buy, then Oliver Smith
will need to take a back seat
today. Not that he wouldn’t fancy the
412 kW (560 hp) R8 GT Spyder in
Suzuka Gray metallic, which his two-
year old daughter Amber immediately
clambered into. Quite the contrary.
But Oliver came to Audi City with his
wife Natasha to pick out a family car
oering more space for Amber and
maybe soon for her sibling-to-be, too.
And he has pretty much made up his
mind in favor of an Audi Q3. Oliver,
a carpenter based in Chelmsford,
north east of London, had previously
endured a nerve-wracking odyssey
through traditional car dealerships.
“Buying a new car can be fairly
frustrating,” says
Smith. “They swamp
you with brochures,
driving between
dealerships takes a lot of time, and in
the end you’ll still be unsure whether
you’re picking the right model.”
Audi City should spare him this fate.
The showroom directly opposite the
venerable The Ritz London hotel is the
car dealership of the future. This first
cyberstore in automobile history has
hardly any cars in it. Instead, Oliver
Smith can use video walls 12 square
meters in size, so-called powerwalls,
to digitally configure and study each
of the over 40 Audi models in full
size. First, his image is captured on
camera as he stands in front of the
“What they find here is
that they can
visualize what they con fig
ured before-
hand on the Internet, and do so with an
unprec edented level of detail.” Oliver
Smith, too, uses the touchscreens in
front of the powerwalls to configure
his dream car down to the last detail
himself. What looks like an outsize
tablet PC lets him select his preferred
param eters with the swipe of a finger:
Besides a Samoa Orange metallic paint
finish, what he wants is a 155 kW
(211 hp)
TFSI engine, 19-inch wheels
and an Alcantara/leather trim in
Titanium Gray. More than three million
configuration options are available
for each of the over 40 Audi models.
To work through all of them would
take 44 years, says Nogues. Oliver
Relaxed car shop-
ping: At Audi
City London,
customer adviser
Romain Nogues
welcomes
Natasha and
Oliver Smith
with their
daughter Amber.
powerwall, then he is logged into the
menu navigation. And immediately
Smith is ready to take the Q3 for a
spin on the screen, with the car’s TFSI
engine forcefully making itself heard
via the 40,000 watt sound system.
One step to the left, and the car
swivels around its own axis. The couple
is clearly impressed at watching its
dream car come alive. “People buy
all
kinds of things online today. Clothing,
shoes, TVs. So why not cars, too?” says
Natasha. “I was skeptical at first, but
the technology won me over. If Oliver
agrees, we’ll buy the car.”
“Our customers come in with a pretty
clear idea of what they want,” says
Romain Nogues, one of the Customer
Relationship Managers at Audi City.
Smith
is done with his Q3 in less than
20 minutes – then he pushes the con-
fig ured car from the touchscreen
onto the powerwall using three fingers.
“It is a magic moment when a cus-
tomer sees their car in full size for the
first time, with all the features they
have chosen,” says Nogues. “I call it the
‘Minority Report’ moment: a look
into the future, like in that famous
science-fiction movie.”
To Head of Business Jim Leckie,
Audi City is the biggest playground
imaginable for his customers – whether
it’s the 72-year-old lady from The Ritz
or the stylish banker in his early 30s.
“This technology impresses everyone
as it perfectly imparts the Audi
brand’s emotions to customers,” says
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