Ever get an idea simply stuck in your head? An idea that just won’t go away? Maybe you came up with it 6 years ago and dismissed it, however it keeps popping up. Maybe you pitched the idea to a few friends and they shot it down. And rightly so, I might add – the idea might be a bit too far out there.
I’ve attempted starting a few ventures in the past 6 years with limited (ok, no) success. Each time I face failure (internal or external) this idea keeps on coming back. Right now is another one of those cusp points. I’ve been working on PassionList.com for a while now (feel free to check out the prototype that’s up and running) but I can’t get around the fact that I….well, I just don’t have passion (pun slightly intended) for it. I think it’s a clever idea, and I’d visit and participate in the site myself. I don’t have a good business plan currently, and even though a new design is in process I just haven’t been putting in the time or effort necessary to make it a successful community.
I could work on it and launch it, or……I could dive into that pesky idea that won’t go away. It’s pretty simple – I want to start a boutique car company. I want to build a sports car that’s unique, a total blast to drive, and affordable.
The graveyard of defunct boutique car manufacturers (especially in the US) is a large one! My hypothesis is that most of these fail for the same reason – they’re usually the vision of a few folks with too much money – they spend a ton of that money building the next hypercar, then wonder why they can’t sell any of their $800k “Ferrari-beaters.” They sell a few at a loss and close shop.
What if a car was designed from the beginning to tackle this product/market fit? Using the tools of Value-based Engineering, customer needs and wants would be fully understood and would match the design from the beginning. I think it would be entirely possible to drastically reduce the cost of bringing a car to market essentially using agile hardware development – getting the customer in on the ground floor of the design process. Not too dissimilar to what Local Motors is doing, but this would involve a smaller team and (hopefully) dedicated customers.
Look, I don’t know if this would work. Development would still be expensive and the margins razor thin. It would still require outside investment and take quite a bit of time. I think there’s something to this idea however.
If we look at long term trends in the auto industry, there are 3 driving factors over the next, say, 20-30 years (in the developed world). Electrics will take over, autonomous vehicles will take over, and personal ownership is going to plummet. Those who will want to drive their own vehicle will certainly have a large enthusiast makeup. I’d like to build cars for those folks. A simple, bare-bones, fun to drive electric vehicle that looks great and unique – a fun weekend toy.
So, how to get started? That’s for tomorrow.