Aston Martin says its Lagonda brand is definitely dead

Aston Martin has definitively killed off any bid to revive the Lagonda badge, with boss Lawrence Stroll declaring that the proposed luxury sub-brand “is not connected in any way” to plans for future electric cars or plug-in hybrids. The demise of Lagonda has been mooted since 2021 but now any lingering doubts have been extinguished. 

The British manufacturer has issued a number of Lagonda concepts during the past decade and launched the low volume Lagonda Taraf saloon in 2015. Each time it declared that the name was ready to make a return on cars with a greater emphasis on luxury and less focus on sporting dynamics.

However, speaking during Aston’s 2023 earnings call, the firm’s Executive Chairman Lawrence Stroll clarified that the Lagonda projects, conceived before he assumed control of the firm, have been knifed completely. “They were under the previous management,” Stroll said, “and that plan is completely dead. It’s not connected, in any way, to our electrified vehicle plan.”

Stroll believes Aston’s existing positioning is luxurious enough to fulfil customer needs. “There’s enough luxury in our sports cars,” he said, “so we’re not considering a ‘less-performance, higher-luxury’ car. We have the right level of luxury in our products.”

Aston Martin is planning to introduce four BEVs but has knocked back the timeline on them to 2026, allowing space for a couple of plug-in hybrid models to be introduced in the meantime. When asked to give the reasoning behind the EV delay, Stroll said, “It’s market-demand driven. As most OEMs are experiencing, consumer demand [for EVs] at the Aston Martin price point is not where we thought it was going to be two years ago. We’re simply pushing it back - all the technology is in place, the platform is in place - the only thing not in place is the customer demand at this early stage. We’re being prudent in making this decision.”

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