At first blush, the idea of a Roll-Royce SUV sounds like a natural fit.
This is the 110-year-old marque known for conveying the world’s wealthiest, most powerful people in the stateliest four-wheeled confines known to man. It has been the preferred coach for Tom Brady, David Beckham, Carey Grant, Muhammed Ali, John Lennon, and Queen Elizabeth II, plus a host of billionaires discretely concealed from within its cosseted wood-paneled walls. These passengers are often been shuttled around in big, anonymous black SUVs, too—it seems logical to combine the two experiences.
On the other hand, a massive lumbering SUV just sounds ... gauche. Too obvious. It sounds like clear pandering to popular demands—something to which high-end brands never like to admit.
But that is the very reason the brand will introduce a new 4x4 conveyance, code-named Project Cullinan, sometime next year. It needs to stay relevant, to be making the cars that its audience wants. And, the thinking goes, while the nanny or the butler can drive the Porsche Cayenne for errands around town, the head of the house needs a Rolls. (Whether he or she is driving it or riding in the back seat.)
“A Rolls-Royce SUV would serve to modernize Rolls,” said Ian Fletcher, an automotive analyst for IHS Markit. “There are plenty of customers who don’t want a sedan. They don’t necessarily need a practical car, but they want something that is with the times. It’s to help broaden the consumer base.”
Alex Prindiville, founder of the U.K.-based auto-seller Prindiville Cars, agreed.
“Rolls-Royce are behind the curve,” said Prindiville, who is scheduled to receive the first Rolls-Royce SUV delivered to a showroom in the U.K. “Rolls-Royce don’t want to lose their marketplace to Bentley or to Lamborghini. They are basically launching this product to keep that handful of customers, to keep them from deviating.”
If high-net worth individuals are going to buy an SUV (and there's no end in sight for the segment's extreme popularity), it might as well be from Rolls, the thinking goes. Why give consumers a way out away from the brand?
The Next Step
This comes as no surprise, even despite objections in private from the brand’s top brass about ever making an SUV. As Maserati, Bentley, and Lamborghini became the latest luxury brands to introduce SUVs, auto analysts and industry insiders have expected this introduction from Rolls.