August 2014
Until now the van world has generally been considered immune from the pace of change that sees car designs changing more often today than ever before. Last year our data reported that the shelf life of some car models has halved since the 1970s as manufacturers compete to keep their products as fresh and interesting as possible.But design changes and introduction of new features in the van market have always taken place at a more sedate pace – until now.
The growing importance of aesthetic appeal is identified by our van price forecasting which states that the days of vans being seen purely as a work tool are over. Historically the only part of the light commercial vehicle market which was strongly susceptible to fashion tastes has been the 4x4 lifestyle vehicle. This was because, although it is a commercial vehicle, it is generally viewed and used as a family vehicle as well as a ‘workhorse’.
At CAP we are familiar with how car manufacturers refresh their models by introducing ‘facelifts’ or all-new replacements with increasing regularity. This has led to a constant race between manufacturers to have the freshest product in the market, while many light commercial vehicle models have evolved very much more slowly.
For example Ford has spent the first 18 months of the life of the Transit Custom successfully cultivating the ‘artisan’ retail smaller business sector. Looking at registration statistics there has been a high proportion of ‘Trend’ and ‘Limited’ models, with relatively high specification, sold. Along with this kind of design and feature dynamism, designed to inspire the end user to keep up with the latest look and feel, comes the risk of less stable used van values.
