Gary Pusey

T he E nthusiast

“A factory rebuild is positioned as more authentic than anyone else’s, and for some that matters”

So JLR will now source a second-hand Defender for you and rebuild it as a Works V8 with stonking performance, a bespoke interior, serious brake and handling upgrades, and a factory-built plaque. But it comes with a price tag of £150,000. According to the press release only 150 will be made. Is this merely an aspirational number, or will JLR actually sell 150 Defender Works V8s? In fact, I’ve heard that the entire run of 150 was sold out within weeks, with around a third or so being ordered by UK buyers. I reckon that if JLR had set the price at £199,000 they would still have sold the lot.

We’ll probably never find out who buys them, though, and they will be a rare sight on the road. A bit like that very special twomillionth Defender that was sold at Bonhams in London in December 2015 for a hammer price of £400,000. I know there were a couple of telephone bidders slugging it out at the end – I was in the auction room watching and listening to the action – and I heard the final and ultimately successful bid being made and the massive applause that accompanied the amazement and delight that it had sold so well, given that JLR were donating the sale proceeds to the Red Cross and the Born Free Foundation.

The story doing the rounds after the auction was that the bidder was in Qatar and had bought it for his wife! Did he actually conclude the deal? Apparently it’s not unusual in the auction game for a successful bidder to get cold feet after the adrenaline rush of excitement during the auction, and decide the following morning that perhaps it wasn’t quite such a good idea after all.

It’s all gone rather quiet since the auction and I haven’t come across any references to the vehicle since it was sold. I do hope JLR have been on the phone to the buyer, though, asking if they can borrow the vehicle for some of the 70th anniversary year’s special events. It is a very interesting Defender and an important milestone in Land Rover history, and it deserves a wider audience.

It’s no surprise to me to hear that the entire run of 150 Works V8s have been sold. There is clearly a premium attached to a factory rebuild. This is as true for Land Rovers as it is for every other marque, which is why so many car manufactures have created in-house factory restoration facilities, parts remanufacturing programmes, factory-official vehicle certification schemes, bespoke vehicle creation capabilities and so on. And with the classic car marker as buoyant as it has been for the past ten or 12 years, it is no surprise at all that JLR wants to be in on the action. It is great, and the sooner they start serious parts remanufacturing the better, as far as I am concerned. But to my mind it is also vitally important that the independent players are able to survive and thrive alongside JLR’S growing Classic Works activities: those people and companies who have been making parts that the factory has long-since stopped producing, or carrying out servicing, completing restorations, and building bespoke vehicles, long before JLR had even thought of the idea.

I assume JLR decided to launch the Works V8 as a way of keeping the Defender brand out there, making it directly relevant in the 70th anniversary year. But they’ve also taken a significant step into the tuned Defender market that was hitherto the exclusive province of many of those independent specialists and head-to-head competition will be the result. As Tim Hannig, director of JLR Classic, said in the press release: “the Land Rover authenticity is the ultimate finishing touch for discerning clients purchasing these collector’s edition Defenders.” A factory rebuild is therefore positioned as more authentic than anyone else’s rebuild, and for some buyers I suppose that matters and is worth the premium.

But something else is in play here that is far more subtle. Have you watched the Defender Works V8 launch video? If you haven’t, it features the Works V8 storming across the countryside and meeting five of its ancestors coming the other way. And what do the drivers do? They wave to each other just as you and I do when we meet each other in our Series and Defender vehicles. Showing this on the launch film is very clever, in my view, and it creates an ongoing sense that when you buy a Defender you are joining a family, a fellow-band of connoisseurs who have chosen the Land Rover, not a Range Rover or a Discovery, or anything else, as their mode of transport. Solidarity and a common cause, despite the fact that one will cost £150k and the other might have cost less than £10k.

The message in the video is not just about joining the gang when you’ve stumped up your £150k, though. I reckon it’s also about positioning ahead of New Defender and JLR wants to reinforce this link with a past that goes all the way back to 1948. It will be very interesting to see what happens when you and I offer a cheery wave from our Series and Defender vehicles as the proud owner of a new Defender drives towards us, and whether we get a wave in response, or are totally ignored…