Land Rover: Licenced to thrill

A Land Rover competition, offering a trip for two across the European Alps, is stirring up plenty of interest, writes motoring editor ALASTAIR SLOANE.

No, it's not actor Sean Connery's voice on the Land Rover television commercial, the one about retracing Hannibal's Trail.

It just sounds like his polished Scottish tongue. Land Rover wanted it that way because it believed a take-off of James Bond's international voice was bang on the button for such a promotion and competition.

Besides, it figured New Zealanders were a game lot and the getaway would be as challenging as any James Bond adventure.

The competition winners will fly British Airways business class to Paris, just like Her Majesty's secret servant would do.

They will be gently shaken and not stirred from their slumber before heading into the Alps, again like a Bond movie mix.

However, there will be no pretend baddies high in the hills, no deadlier-than-the-male females. No vodka martinis. No Aston Martins. No Saville Row suits. No Miss Moneypenny. Just hard work and a hell of a lot of fun.

More than 15,000 New Zealanders have so far entered the competition (completing a simple Land Rover promotional sentence) and are in the draw for a week-long trip for two in a convoy of Land Rovers across the Alps from France to Italy.

In the first three days of the competition, which is still open, nearly 5000 entries were received - a response that made Land Rover sales and marketing manager Robin Colgan, himself a Scot, a happy man.

"We wanted to break the deadlock of standard car advertising that often leaves the consumer cold," said Colgan.

"The competition gets people's attention and the advertising rekindles New Zealand's romance with Land Rover."

Hannibal was a Carthaginian military leader who slugged it out all round the Mediterranean with the Romans 2000-odd years ago.

Hannibal's Trail is in memory of his boldest military move, when he crossed the Alps with 40,000 soldiers and several elephants to blindside Rome and beat up northern Italy. The Romans retaliated by sacking his ancient home town, Carthage, across the water in North Africa.

Hannibal abandoned Italy to defend the family home and pretty much lost his power base forever. He wandered from war to war, and poisoned himself 183 years before Jesus was born.

Hannibal's alpine route is done twice a year and is part of the Land Rover Adventures programme, a British-run operation offering off-road adventures in some of the world's most diverse regions.

Packages range from one-day experiences to seven-day crossings of the rainforests of Belize, 10-night treks through Africa, America, Europe or Australia, an 11-day crossing of the Kalahari, and a tour of the Desert Kingdom of Jordan.

There is also an adventure programme closer to home, on Land Rover's 28ha off-road course near Rotorua.

Colgan and his managing director, Peter Lockie, pointed out the new facility to company directors from Britain and Australia last week.

They also pointed to sales for 2001, up more than 40 per cent over last year. May was the best sales month for two years, with 62 models shifted. Included in that number were 19 Range Rovers, equalling the best sales month on record for the luxury off-roader.

Land Rover lost money in 1999, despite a worldwide record sales year, and new owner Ford has publicly said it wants it to be making money by 2002. So far, so good.

A new Range Rover will be unveiled in Europe later this year and Land Rover is looking at developing two replacement models of the off-road icon, the rugged Defender.

A pointer to this is the way present Defender models are being dressed up to attract younger buyers.

One would be a traditional model aimed at military and agricultural applications, and the other a "softer" version for the popular lifestyle market.

The replacement for the traditional model is code-named L50. A prototype was reportedly ready for trials many months before Ford bought Land Rover from BMW. But BMW apparently had doubts about developing a single Defender model for both military and lifestyle use and put the dual-purpose project on hold.

But now, according to reports in Britain, the Defender is assured of a future. Land Rover chairman Bob Dover was reported as saying the company needed to do more to break into the fashionable lifestyle market.

The plan is to replace the Defender with two separate models that look alike but have different target markets. The two would have different suspension systems.

One would be underpinned by beam axles to deliver off-road ruggedness, while the other, more luxurious model might use an independent A-frame wishbone set-up developed by BMW for moderate off-road ability.

Whatever happens, the new Defender will keep its rugged looks. Land Rover has long recognised it as an engineering project and always said it would be careful not to style it.