My understanding was that Ferrari was in the business of selling a very specific badge, a very specific engine purr, a very specific shade of red and a certain relative level of dynamic performance - the absolute value of this last one changes with time. All this on 4 wheels.
Are you telling me that selling branding rights to Acer laptops and to cheap cologne is (an important) part of their core business?
I wouldn't call about 10% of their net revenue nothing, but also not a core part of their business. I think it goes more towards promoting the brand and image.
One should remember that Ferrari was effectively on the verge of bankruptcy for most of Enzo's tenure as leader. Eventually he was forced to sell to FIAT, and spent his last few years pretending that he was free to make the choices that FIAT's owner Agnelli wanted him to make. Ferrari eventually turned a corner once Enzo died.
Enzo Ferrari always wanted to make a better Alfa Romeo, and he did. Branding was a side effect that other people exploited later.
My neighbor is a huge car guy and owns everything but Ferraris because “they make you buy all the shitty Ferraris before they’ll let you buy the good ones” :p
Jay Leno also doesn't feel a lot of pressure to own those kinds of cars because they're not really what he's into. When you look at what he actually does, he's a collector of and benefactor for the restoration of niche vehicles.
It is uncontroversial to say that Ferraris are cars of note. Somebody will save them. His resources are better spent on the stupidly niche things that nobody will care about if he doesn't. So it's easier for him to say "meh, not for me" than it is for someone to whom those kinds of cars are more relevant.
My understanding is that that's pretty common in that part of the car market. I know you can't get the really high end McLarens unless you've bought one of the cheaper ones already.
Also common in certain parts of the watch and jewelry markets.
If you go to the Rolex subreddit, it's full of people getting waitlisted for watches they want to buy and excitedly posting when they finally "get the call" from the dealer — sometimes years later — that they are now allowed to buy the watch. It's a common "strategy" to buy lesser watches to ingratiate oneself with the precious Authorized Dealer™ demigod so that one day you might be able to buy the watch you actually want.
Go search /r/rolex for the phrase "got the call" and prepare to cringe.
This is the exact same thing that’s happening for folks trying to buy a Porsche 911 GT3, GT3 RS, or S/T. Unless you buy multiple cars you don’t want, you’ll never get an allocation from Porsche. The end result is that most folks have to spend $100k-$300k over MSRP to buy one from someone who did get an allocation. The craziest part is it’s probably still cheaper to pay that insane markup than it is to buy the cars to get an allocation.
Isn’t the thing with Rolex that the cheaper watches are some of the hardest to get? You can walk in to a dealer and walk out with a gold or two tone watch, but ask for a plain stainless steel model and they’ll laugh at you.
>unless you've bought one of the cheaper ones already.
You don't even get a foot in the door with 1 from Ferrari.
I read a Reddit post from someone who had an acquaintance that speed-ran the process (clearly a 9 figure+ individual), and it was ludicrous.
I think it took him something like 3-5 years, while it normally takes double that. I think right out the gate he had to buy a few of them, then he could buy the nice ones, and the special editions, then he bought a used f40 or something like that which was 7 figures, and started participating in the racing experience they have, so there's a parallel track where you have to buy some track focused cars as well. Along the way he made sure to show up at all of the events, and it's important to, because to get on "the list" there is a scoring system behind the scene where everything that a customer does is assigned a point value, and only the customers with the highest level of points get the allocations. That includes things like maxing out options on every curve you buy, and paying up for the bespoke personalization services.
I think it was something like 3 years, 10+ cars, and 10 million dollars to get through the gauntlet.
The entire Ferrari Challenge "race series" is guys shipping their cars around the country and participating in "races" exclusively so they can stay/be on the list for future allocations. It's wild.
It's even a thing in a company as "downmarket" as Porsche. Which is kind of joke, because during the pandemic, practically every 911 sold was a high-margin "hard to get" GT3RS.
>“We are not – we are not – a car company. We are a luxury company that is also doing cars.”
Replace Ferrari with Rolex and it's basically the same article. Veblen is such a good business model and place to work, if you can hack it that is.
Imagine you're a sales guy at Honda dealership, well you have to work hard to convince the middle aged dad why buy a CRV instead of a Toyota RAV4.
However, if you work at a Bugatti dealership, you don't need to convince the oil-rich Sheikh why he should buy the 2 million dollar car, he already wanted to buy it before he even stepped in. So not only is your job easier than the guy in the Honda dealership, it's also much better paid. The very definition of inequality. The same is true for other businesses. It's much easier and profitable selling Azure /Office 365 subscriptions to businesses, that some SW solution from a mom & pop shop.
> "However, if you work at a Bugatti dealership, you don't need to convince the oil-rich Sheikh why he should buy the 2 million dollar car, he already wanted to buy it before he even stepped in."
Respectfully disagreed. The sales people for veblen goods work extremely hard because competition is intense even within that space. The Bugatti salesman is competing with Ferrari, McLaren, Lamborghini, etc.
The margins per-sale are great, but because of your low volumes you experience a lot more volatility. Minor fluctuations in sales have disproportionate impact on your bottom line.
I once worked for a luxury real estate brokerage and had opportunity to talk to real estate brokers who dealt in ultra-high-end real estate (the kind of properties that people make YouTube videos about). One conversation stood out to me that's relevant here:
I asked him about a listing for a Manhattan penthouse that had been making the news (mid-8-figure buy-in), and his response was that it was an incredibly risky property to represent, because the list of potential buyers is perhaps a dozen people long. If none of them move on the deal then you're holding an absolutely immense albatross.
Ultra-high-end goods are generally susceptible to this. Your market is small enough that it doesn't take a lot to existentially threaten you, and there is no shortage of people who want to eat your lunch (just like with any other market).
>I once worked for a luxury real estate brokerage and had opportunity to talk to real estate brokers who dealt in ultra-high-end real estate (the kind of properties that people make YouTube videos about). One conversation stood out to me that's relevant here
Do you happen to have more sharable anecdotes / thoughts around this? I realize its off topic, however I think it still has value to warrant that.
I'd be interested in anything you can share about it. I'm curious how the 'day to day' folks see things vs how its sold and told to the rest of us via news magazines or books.
It's a super interesting scene, and was a great eye-opener into how the mega-wealthy side of the world goes. A few things that pop into my brain in no particular order:
- At the high end, everyone's got a gimmick. You can't just be personable and charming, you have to be so memorable as to feel like some fictional character. Your clientele are expecting more than mere representation, but something/someone who makes their life actively more interesting.
- Part of this may have been the market (NYC), but I got the distinct feeling that a lot of this was that buyers wanted a NYC fairy tale. If you're wealthy enough, it's not enough to have an agent, your agent has to spring forth and become a side character in the adventure story of their life.
- There's a lot of spilled ink about the mega-wealthy buyers (Middle Eastern oil barons, Russian oligarchs, Chinese billionaires, etc.) but they are a vanishingly small portion of the population of very wealthy people. In general I think most people have a poor appreciation of how little of the ultra-high-end consists of foreigners and high-profile business people that they've heard of.
- Related, there are way more wealthy Americans than most people appreciate, and the sources of their wealth are way more mundane than most people suspect. There are more 8-figure luxury condos being sold to families that own car dealerships and trucking companies than tech wunderkinds or petro-oligarchs. By multiple orders of magnitude.
>Respectfully disagreed. The sales people for veblen goods work extremely hard because competition is intense even within that space. The Bugatti salesman is competing with Ferrari, McLaren, Lamborghini, etc.
Respectfully disagree. Which oil-rich Sheikh did you see who only has one supercar in their garage and not all of those you listed? These people aren't stock brokers or tech bros who need to work and save money for for years in order to be able to finally afford one dream car, but they own a multi generational empire that makes them enough money to afford all those cars.
>If none of them move on the deal then you're holding an absolutely immense albatross.
Comparing real estate to exotic cars is apples to buffalos. Most exotics are already sold before they leave the factory floor.
> "Respectfully disagree. Which oil-rich Sheikh did you see who only has one supercar in their garage and not all of those you listed?"
Except this isn't the main market for Ferrari, McLaren, Lambo, et al. There are maybe a few dozen people on this planet who fit into that kind of stratospheric wealth.
The bulk of their sales are to the "merely multi-millionaire" rich - your business executive, late-career law partner, guy who owns a chain of dental practices, etc. These are people who are not exactly scrimping and saving for their Ferrari, but certainly don't have the infinite money cheat code.
If you think Ferrari's sales ledger is consisted mainly of oil barons and other billionaires, I dunno what to tell you.
The oil sheikh with dozens of supercars is what drives the mega rich to aspire to own two supercars and the deka rich to fret about maybe buying their first one.
> he already wanted to buy it before he even stepped in. So not only is your job easier than the guy in the Honda dealership, it's also much better paid.
Luxury brands spend millions on marketing and brand awareness. In some sense, all the "sales work" have already been done before a person sets foot into a Bugatti dealership. Reputation takes decades to build but just a few missteps to destroy. Brand is way more fragile than people think. As soon as Bugatti stops making great cars, they'll fall into a place where they can't compete in the luxury market, nor the mass market Japanese car brands like Honda or Toyota.
In that sense, luxury fashion seems to be a easier market than watches or cars. You don't need an innovative engineering team. Just spend millions on marketing to uphold the common narrative you are a luxury brand. And that shirts with your logo on it costing 10x more than a similar product at say H&M, is not only justifiable, but sensible.
> When was the last time you saw an ad to buy a Bugatti Chiron?
Ads don't just have to be a photo on a billboard, though, or the entire thing of influencers wouldn't exist.
How many times has the Chiron been on Top Gear - I reckon at least three times (I can remember once in the Clarkson era and another time in the Harris/Le Blanc era; the magazine's had one at the Nürburgring at least once)? Sure Bugatti's letting them loose with a multi-million euro car out of the goodness of their hearts.
How come you know about the Bugatti Chiron? Did you even saw one for real in your life?
The simple fact that you (and me, and everyone else here) know about it show that people in marketing are doing their job.
I don't remember seeing an ad for a Bugatti Chiron, I am obviously not the target market, but I stumbled upon an ad for a private jet! Also other luxury cars and watches that make Rolex look like child toys. I was when I worked in a helicopter company and someone picked up a magazine from the showroom where customers get their helicopters delivered. The content was out of this world, I remember an article on the merits of private jets over travelling first class (I guess anything less is unthinkable), with purchase recommendations. So the ultra-rich get their ads too.
I would never own a rolex because where I live only ambulance chasers, businessmen who are definitely guilty of wage theft, morbidly obese elderly men in gold chains who reek of cigars, and street pimps wear them but from what I can gather they charge approximately $1,000 for a service and a mechanical watch needs servicing every 5-10 years depending on how complicated it is and how often it is worn.
So that's like a $100-200/yr. annual subscription to wear an already expensive watch.
Assuming I take your anecdote at face value, I'm quite impressed at how well you keep tabs on all of the Rolex owners you've met, identified their occupations as well as illegal or immoral activities.
I've seen people wearing watches, but hell I have hard time identifying the brand of watch, let alone where the person wearing it works.
It's pretty easy to spot a Rolex once you know a little bit about them. Get a closer look and it's even easy to spot fakes.
However, I agree with the first part of your comment in a way, but it's really not that hard to get a rough estimate of someone based on how they choose to present themselves. They didn't exactly get forced into that look.
That's a valid argument, that some stereotypical appearances are relatively consistently accurate.
Though I'm wondering what, exactly, defines the appearance of a specific lawyer who pushes for accident victims to sue, or businessmen that participate in wage theft. How do you tell them apart from... other lawyers or random people wearing suits?
I'll say this though, when it comes to corpo execs, at least in the USA, if they think they can get away with some illegal and/or unethical activity and they believe that it won't impact any potential profits (either greater than the punishment or benefits to themselves, because we rarely if ever jail executives in this country or hold them accountable without immense public scrutiny), they'll do that thing 9.9 out of 10 times.
Wage theft is rampant here, especially for lower wage workers. The government simply doesn't exist in a capacity to actually prevent these things, and people in general are too apathetic to other peoples well being, let alone engaging in appropriate political discourse, that the needle rarely moves forward for your average citizen.
I taught myself how to service Swiss watches this month. It’s a very difficult skill (I failed).
The people who did the training and have the surgical ability to fix a Rolex deserve $1000.
An elaborate precision machine that is 35mm across and hand-built over a year (so they say), it makes sense that “cheap” Swiss watches are $9000. Rolex retails for 2-4x of that due to brand cachet and artificial scarcity, even though they are by far the highest volume manufacturer.
The nm of chips doesn't mean anything anymore, and it's really not more impressive anyways - that's built by a machine, which is the epitome of precision. A hand-built 2nm chip might be more impressive, but also impossible anyways.
I don’t think an equivalent Omega or Breitling is that much cheaper?
Rolexes also keep their value incredibly well. I bought a nice Tag many years ago (I knew nothing about watches) and it’s now worth about $1000 on the used market at best. Had I bought a similar priced Rolex instead, it would have kept its value, if not even appreciated.
It's beyond what is the watch. Rolex is good, but omega speedy starts (started before inflation/tariffs?) at $5k. And is certified for Space(tm)! Some good smaller brands (nomos) at around $2k.
Watch market above that starts getting weird. You have some special models, technically equivalent w/ cosmetic bling hitting $80-100k
No, you can go buy any Harley you want. You can't just buy any Ferrari or Rolex, you have to be invited, usually by buying lower level stuff they want to get rid of.
I guess they probably don't want the dirty uneducated "new money" crypto bros, TikTok influencers and OnlyFans hoes spoiling their brand image, they want the well connected Epstein Island elites who come from royalty and old money.
Of course Ferrari and Porsche don't control the secondary market, although I understand they might put restrictions on how soon you can sell one of their high end cars.
I’m surprised that the current AI boom isn’t called out in the comments or the article. From my POV technology investing is the poster child for the issue discussed. The internet bubble, online ads, crypto, and AI all fall short of the promise of RoI.
the problem with rarified air is that only Ferrari can race Ferraris. Given the low volume, high prices, and resultant engineering issues (cough cough overheating) that wouldn't exist in cars more on the mass market, requiring teams of engineers to support.
The average car enthusiast for track days will be seen running Mustangs, Corvette/Camaros, BMW M2/4s, Toyota GR 86s/Supras/Corollas, Honda S2000s, Nissan Z's, etc. But Ferrari is essentially irrelevant.
Sadly, I think Porsche is going that way; before, one could also run with the above gaggle with a decent 911 or Cayman. Now that the entry level is climbing well above the $100k mark new, and what was supposed to be their track car (GT3) is approaching Ferrari prices, they are becoming less and less relevant. And they might not even survive the China situation...
I'm not too familiar with the history of a few that you've mentioned, but the Mustang (excluding the GTD), Supra, Carolla, S2000, Z never had track focused cars. For the time-poor and money-rich racing enthusiast, lacking a turn key package isn't really an option.
Your local track days where you see the likes that you mentioned - you'll also likely get a few Porches etc too. But there's absolutely a culture of racing higher end cars, the GT3's, Ferraris (488 Pista, 360 Challenge Stradale, starting to see XX's around too), the Valkyrie and Valiant etc. There's also those that grab older Cup cars and track them to the track. There's absolutely a market for turn key, track focused, road legal Ferrari's.
A couple years before Enzo died, there was a TV tire commercial which asked "Why do Ferraris come with Firestone tires? Because Mr. Ferrari wants it that way." and then showed a picture of Enzo smiling.
It was Goodyear, specifically the Eagle VR50. The advertisement featured a Ferrari 308 GTB.
Ferrari had only adopted radial tires in racing a decade earlier. I'm curious as to what deal they got with Goodyear at the time, as radial tires (including high performance versions) were already long ubiquitous in the United States by the time that commercial came out, which I believe was actually after the end of the 308's production run.
TFA explains the true driving force behind Enshittification.
It takes a very strong will to say no to growth and investment, because you know it will make what you do change from excellence in to shit. Sometimes your customer base morphs (see Facebook) and you survive. Sometimes your only market was the high end discerning customer, and now that you’re shit, you’re dead.
I don't think it's so much that investment does that as leaving your competencies. I've been working at a private firm for years now. The culture is excellent and we use the products we make. We also don't make our product do every last thing it could possibly do, nor do we support every last thing our product in theory could: we focus on what our customers want and buy now. You can't use what we make for everything, but what you can use it for, we lead our industry in.
We've grown tremendously but we're still sub-200 in head count and want it to stay that way. We're rolling in profits because we keep our operation lean and responsive.
It seems to me the enshittification happens when you try and offer a service to the entire world and can't manage to succeed at that unless everyone and their mother uses it, which itself requires shit tons of employees and IT resources and datacenters, and if it doesn't work out, it all goes in the bin.
I'm currently listinging to Founders Podcast - The Obsession of Enzo Ferrari[1]
Though some of the points may be correct under current management, I think this quote would have Enzo turning in his grave "We are not – we are not – a car company. We are a luxury company that is also doing cars."
This playbook where you put your brand on a bunch of random things to sell, while the prime focus gets watered down only works for a short period of time.
Aston tried the same thing, going so far as putting their badge on child strollers.
The car industry is going through such upheaval that much of this may not matter in the next 20 years, but I fear they are going to destroy a great brand through a lack of focus.
Ford did try before. For example, the 2006 Ford GT. In comparison, the similarly-priced Ferrari F430 of the era was the mass market automobile with about 5x as many made.
So I wonder how much one should draw from these rationalizations of prestige marketing. At the end of the day Ferrari still uses its larger super-car production capacity to keep even Ford only an occasional entrant into the low-end of market.
Building a halo product that attempts to compete in a luxury niche is very different from running your (whole) business like a luxury niche leader.
We see similar cases with the highest end Chevrolet Corvette. If you look only at statistics and performance numbers, they are arguably competitive, but cheaper. But GM intends to sell as many Corvettes as they can. They do not particularly restrict them in quantity or with a particularly inflated price that represents their role as a status signal or unobtainable luxury piece.
That's why I choose two cars that are at effectively in the same target market at around the same price from the same time period, from Ford and Ferrari.
You're choosing cars (single products) but claiming that businesses are operating in a similar manner. All Ferrari cars are part of how Ferrari operates, while the GT was an exception to how Ford operates.
And I don't dispute that. Simply that Ferrari is the Ford of super cars, building in large quantity for that market.
And I really doubt the applicability of the luxury approach to software. People will vastly overpay to have a 5% faster automobile because it's a personally-owned status symbol and has racing-pedigree. I don't recommend building a company around a new 5% faster database since it isn't a source of prestige for anyone. For many potential customers it'd barely put a mark in their bottom line. And it might be negative if it compromised in any other aspect to obtain it. Benchmarking isn't a reliable winner-take-all marketing approach like racing-based marketing (and it sure isn't as popular).
That still doesn't prove anything. The market demand for the Ford GT could have been 1/2 what Ford produced but the market demand for the F430 was double what Ferrari actually produced.
I am not saying that is actually the case, but production #s just don't really tell the whole story.
Ford only dabbles in these kinds of cars, they have different reasons for picking the # of units they build. They are a lot like Honda, they are not dedicated to this and they instead just build a small # of sports cars every once in a while to try and improve their reputation.
The article glosses over the core founding purpose of each company too. Ford was founded to build massive #s of assembly line built cars at a price the average worker could afford. Ferrari very reluctantly built street cars to fund racing and decided the sport/luxury cars were the best way to make the maximum money with the smallest # of street cars. Less street cars meant less distraction from building the racing cars.
I'm not saying it proves anything but Ferrari is one of the higher volume manufacturers within super cars This applies even compared to many of their competitors we think of as mass market car producers (such as Ford, Toyota, Honda) when they make cars that compete with Ferrari.
As you say that's almost entirely due to demand. But the focus should be on how does Ferrari consistently keep such a large portion of the high end car market? Because that's the key to their success. Many companies can make cars that they can sell out in small volumes at Ferrari prices. But they don't see it scaling, while Ferrari does.
> But the focus should be on how does Ferrari consistently keep such a large portion of the high end car market?
Formula 1
There is no other brands that has as much history in Formula 1 than Ferrari. McLaren is the second one in current constructors at 988 race entries but only started fairly recently (compared to Ferrari) to sell street cars, Lotus a distant 3rd one but hasn't been in formula 1 for the last 30years. Mercedes involvment in Formula 1 is fairly recent. In a way, FERRARI IS FORMULA 1 and FORMULA 1 IS FERRARI. Both need each other. Among other F1 teams and appart from Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes, only Alpine Renault is fully involved and is definitely not in the luxury sports car market. In the case of Aston Martin it is really much more sponsoring/rebranding of a team than a real constructor as the Aston Martin team, formerly Racing Point, is running a Mercedes Engine. Appart from McLaren which is less known in the street there is simply no other brand like Ferrari in Formula 1. Here are some numbers according to Wikipedia:
_"Ferrari holds the record for the most Constructors' and Drivers' Championships won with sixteen and fifteen, respectively.[8][9] Ferrari also holds the record for the most wins by a constructor with 248,[10] the most pole positions with 253,[11] the most points with 10572,[12] and the most podiums with 834.[13] Ferrari has also entered more Grands Prix than any other constructor with 1114 entries and also maintains the record for the most Grand Prix starts with 1111.[14]"_
Alfa Roméo and Maserati used to be in the same if not better place than Ferrari in the early 50's. And their place in the luxury market constantly faded once they scaled down (being engine suppliers) then stopped their involvment in Grand Prix racing.
Yes, although "larger" here might not be understood by many people. The 360, which was said to be a "larger" production car (by Ferrari standards), only approximately 17,000 of those were ever made.
Making a high performance, expensive, rare car is a small part of the recipe. Most Ferrari owners own more than one Ferrari (65% according to Ferrari of North America study from a decade ago or so, not sure if there's an updated number). A significant number of owners own more than 2. Ferrari famously has dealer prioritization and waitlists that reward you for buying more cars, just like Rolex which another poster mentioned below. When I was servicing these cars around 2015, many customers would buy FFs and Californias that they didn't necessarily want just to have the option to buy something like a first year 458 Spider, not even one of the particularly rare offerings. If someone got something truly low production like a LaFerrari or F12 TDF, chances are that customer had already bought 10+ cars from the dealer and immediately trades in many of their cars at a multi hundred thousand dollar loss to them as soon as they are able to get out of a "regular" model into a special edition. Ferrari drives/meets also serve as social clubs/networking which certainly does provide some positive value for many owners of these vehicles. Very few customers I ever met really cared about outright performance/$ and would have been cross shopping a Ford GT with a 430.
Also they are very specific owners. There's one guy here in LA, specifically the San Gabriel Valley neighborhood who realized there were a ton of visitors from mainland China flush with cash who were either coming as tourists or buying property, i.e. the "fuerdai" phenomenon. Cue a few strategically placed watch/jewelry and lambo/ferrari dealerships later, and I think he's one of the top sellers of their cars in North America...
Man, what I wouldn't give for one of those Ford GTs though. Really cool car imo. The fact that it comes from Ford kinda makes it more exciting to me. Like yeah, a Ferrari is a Ferrari, but wtf is a Ford doing here?? And why does it fit in so well??
My understanding was that Ferrari was in the business of selling a very specific badge, a very specific engine purr, a very specific shade of red and a certain relative level of dynamic performance - the absolute value of this last one changes with time. All this on 4 wheels.
Are you telling me that selling branding rights to Acer laptops and to cheap cologne is (an important) part of their core business?
> a very specific shade of red
To be fair, Rossa Corsa (i.e. "Ferrari red") has changed significantly over the years.
I wouldn't call about 10% of their net revenue nothing, but also not a core part of their business. I think it goes more towards promoting the brand and image.
https://www.ferrari.com/en-EN/corporate/articles/2024-full-y...
One should remember that Ferrari was effectively on the verge of bankruptcy for most of Enzo's tenure as leader. Eventually he was forced to sell to FIAT, and spent his last few years pretending that he was free to make the choices that FIAT's owner Agnelli wanted him to make. Ferrari eventually turned a corner once Enzo died.
Enzo Ferrari always wanted to make a better Alfa Romeo, and he did. Branding was a side effect that other people exploited later.
My neighbor is a huge car guy and owns everything but Ferraris because “they make you buy all the shitty Ferraris before they’ll let you buy the good ones” :p
Is Jay Leno your neighbor?
I suppose the fact that the #1 car guy in America won't buy Ferrari amplifies the signal that Ferrari isn't actually a car company
That they also won't let you modify your cars to your liking (see Deadmau5's fights with Ferrari) is another
But he has admitted that he likes them and that they are excellent cars, he just not like the whole experience: https://youtu.be/VUPOvcolNZg
Jay Leno also doesn't feel a lot of pressure to own those kinds of cars because they're not really what he's into. When you look at what he actually does, he's a collector of and benefactor for the restoration of niche vehicles.
It is uncontroversial to say that Ferraris are cars of note. Somebody will save them. His resources are better spent on the stupidly niche things that nobody will care about if he doesn't. So it's easier for him to say "meh, not for me" than it is for someone to whom those kinds of cars are more relevant.
This is true.
One of rich folks here I know automatically orders the latest Ferrari, gets it in some months or years, then sells it after driving one month.
Even for some profit. Because he is one of rare people who is "on the list."
Then orders the next one.
Ferraris are a bit like NFTs for boomer investment bankers.
My understanding is that that's pretty common in that part of the car market. I know you can't get the really high end McLarens unless you've bought one of the cheaper ones already.
Also common in certain parts of the watch and jewelry markets.
If you go to the Rolex subreddit, it's full of people getting waitlisted for watches they want to buy and excitedly posting when they finally "get the call" from the dealer — sometimes years later — that they are now allowed to buy the watch. It's a common "strategy" to buy lesser watches to ingratiate oneself with the precious Authorized Dealer™ demigod so that one day you might be able to buy the watch you actually want.
Go search /r/rolex for the phrase "got the call" and prepare to cringe.
This is the exact same thing that’s happening for folks trying to buy a Porsche 911 GT3, GT3 RS, or S/T. Unless you buy multiple cars you don’t want, you’ll never get an allocation from Porsche. The end result is that most folks have to spend $100k-$300k over MSRP to buy one from someone who did get an allocation. The craziest part is it’s probably still cheaper to pay that insane markup than it is to buy the cars to get an allocation.
Honestly, it’s a genius marketing tactic. Despite the artificial scarcity, the company increases sales while not diluting the brand’s prestige.
If everyone was able to afford a Rolex or a 911, they wouldn’t be cool anymore because their unattainability is what makes them desirable.
That said, even if I could afford a GT3 RS or a Daytona, I would never play their stupid game to get one.
Isn’t the thing with Rolex that the cheaper watches are some of the hardest to get? You can walk in to a dealer and walk out with a gold or two tone watch, but ask for a plain stainless steel model and they’ll laugh at you.
It's easier to buy a Rolex at the airport than at a AD these days lol.
>unless you've bought one of the cheaper ones already.
You don't even get a foot in the door with 1 from Ferrari.
I read a Reddit post from someone who had an acquaintance that speed-ran the process (clearly a 9 figure+ individual), and it was ludicrous.
I think it took him something like 3-5 years, while it normally takes double that. I think right out the gate he had to buy a few of them, then he could buy the nice ones, and the special editions, then he bought a used f40 or something like that which was 7 figures, and started participating in the racing experience they have, so there's a parallel track where you have to buy some track focused cars as well. Along the way he made sure to show up at all of the events, and it's important to, because to get on "the list" there is a scoring system behind the scene where everything that a customer does is assigned a point value, and only the customers with the highest level of points get the allocations. That includes things like maxing out options on every curve you buy, and paying up for the bespoke personalization services.
I think it was something like 3 years, 10+ cars, and 10 million dollars to get through the gauntlet.
The entire Ferrari Challenge "race series" is guys shipping their cars around the country and participating in "races" exclusively so they can stay/be on the list for future allocations. It's wild.
It's even a thing in a company as "downmarket" as Porsche. Which is kind of joke, because during the pandemic, practically every 911 sold was a high-margin "hard to get" GT3RS.
It is very common to luxury brands. I believe it is the same if you want to buy a Birkin bag.
I've heard lots of stories like this about ferrari.
It is basically like a kindle book - You aren't buying a car, you are buying a license.
Ferarri investigates you, and makes you sign a contract on how you use their car.
Your neighbor is a smart guy.
granted, even the good ones have issues...Gordon Murray had choice words for the welding quality on the F40s...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good
As for stock price, it's not reflective of their core strategy, it's reflective of an explosion in demand that is apparently starting to soften.
>“We are not – we are not – a car company. We are a luxury company that is also doing cars.”
Replace Ferrari with Rolex and it's basically the same article. Veblen is such a good business model and place to work, if you can hack it that is.
Imagine you're a sales guy at Honda dealership, well you have to work hard to convince the middle aged dad why buy a CRV instead of a Toyota RAV4.
However, if you work at a Bugatti dealership, you don't need to convince the oil-rich Sheikh why he should buy the 2 million dollar car, he already wanted to buy it before he even stepped in. So not only is your job easier than the guy in the Honda dealership, it's also much better paid. The very definition of inequality. The same is true for other businesses. It's much easier and profitable selling Azure /Office 365 subscriptions to businesses, that some SW solution from a mom & pop shop.
> "However, if you work at a Bugatti dealership, you don't need to convince the oil-rich Sheikh why he should buy the 2 million dollar car, he already wanted to buy it before he even stepped in."
Respectfully disagreed. The sales people for veblen goods work extremely hard because competition is intense even within that space. The Bugatti salesman is competing with Ferrari, McLaren, Lamborghini, etc.
The margins per-sale are great, but because of your low volumes you experience a lot more volatility. Minor fluctuations in sales have disproportionate impact on your bottom line.
I once worked for a luxury real estate brokerage and had opportunity to talk to real estate brokers who dealt in ultra-high-end real estate (the kind of properties that people make YouTube videos about). One conversation stood out to me that's relevant here:
I asked him about a listing for a Manhattan penthouse that had been making the news (mid-8-figure buy-in), and his response was that it was an incredibly risky property to represent, because the list of potential buyers is perhaps a dozen people long. If none of them move on the deal then you're holding an absolutely immense albatross.
Ultra-high-end goods are generally susceptible to this. Your market is small enough that it doesn't take a lot to existentially threaten you, and there is no shortage of people who want to eat your lunch (just like with any other market).
>I once worked for a luxury real estate brokerage and had opportunity to talk to real estate brokers who dealt in ultra-high-end real estate (the kind of properties that people make YouTube videos about). One conversation stood out to me that's relevant here
Do you happen to have more sharable anecdotes / thoughts around this? I realize its off topic, however I think it still has value to warrant that.
I'd be interested in anything you can share about it. I'm curious how the 'day to day' folks see things vs how its sold and told to the rest of us via news magazines or books.
It's a super interesting scene, and was a great eye-opener into how the mega-wealthy side of the world goes. A few things that pop into my brain in no particular order:
- At the high end, everyone's got a gimmick. You can't just be personable and charming, you have to be so memorable as to feel like some fictional character. Your clientele are expecting more than mere representation, but something/someone who makes their life actively more interesting.
- Part of this may have been the market (NYC), but I got the distinct feeling that a lot of this was that buyers wanted a NYC fairy tale. If you're wealthy enough, it's not enough to have an agent, your agent has to spring forth and become a side character in the adventure story of their life.
- There's a lot of spilled ink about the mega-wealthy buyers (Middle Eastern oil barons, Russian oligarchs, Chinese billionaires, etc.) but they are a vanishingly small portion of the population of very wealthy people. In general I think most people have a poor appreciation of how little of the ultra-high-end consists of foreigners and high-profile business people that they've heard of.
- Related, there are way more wealthy Americans than most people appreciate, and the sources of their wealth are way more mundane than most people suspect. There are more 8-figure luxury condos being sold to families that own car dealerships and trucking companies than tech wunderkinds or petro-oligarchs. By multiple orders of magnitude.
>Respectfully disagreed. The sales people for veblen goods work extremely hard because competition is intense even within that space. The Bugatti salesman is competing with Ferrari, McLaren, Lamborghini, etc.
Respectfully disagree. Which oil-rich Sheikh did you see who only has one supercar in their garage and not all of those you listed? These people aren't stock brokers or tech bros who need to work and save money for for years in order to be able to finally afford one dream car, but they own a multi generational empire that makes them enough money to afford all those cars.
>If none of them move on the deal then you're holding an absolutely immense albatross.
Comparing real estate to exotic cars is apples to buffalos. Most exotics are already sold before they leave the factory floor.
> "Respectfully disagree. Which oil-rich Sheikh did you see who only has one supercar in their garage and not all of those you listed?"
Except this isn't the main market for Ferrari, McLaren, Lambo, et al. There are maybe a few dozen people on this planet who fit into that kind of stratospheric wealth.
The bulk of their sales are to the "merely multi-millionaire" rich - your business executive, late-career law partner, guy who owns a chain of dental practices, etc. These are people who are not exactly scrimping and saving for their Ferrari, but certainly don't have the infinite money cheat code.
If you think Ferrari's sales ledger is consisted mainly of oil barons and other billionaires, I dunno what to tell you.
The oil sheikh with dozens of supercars is what drives the mega rich to aspire to own two supercars and the deka rich to fret about maybe buying their first one.
It's not a good/bad business so much as a _different kind_ of business, with different engineering/sales requirements and different customers.
Neither is better, or more profitable over the long term than the other, but you really need to know which game you're playing.
> he already wanted to buy it before he even stepped in. So not only is your job easier than the guy in the Honda dealership, it's also much better paid.
Luxury brands spend millions on marketing and brand awareness. In some sense, all the "sales work" have already been done before a person sets foot into a Bugatti dealership. Reputation takes decades to build but just a few missteps to destroy. Brand is way more fragile than people think. As soon as Bugatti stops making great cars, they'll fall into a place where they can't compete in the luxury market, nor the mass market Japanese car brands like Honda or Toyota.
In that sense, luxury fashion seems to be a easier market than watches or cars. You don't need an innovative engineering team. Just spend millions on marketing to uphold the common narrative you are a luxury brand. And that shirts with your logo on it costing 10x more than a similar product at say H&M, is not only justifiable, but sensible.
>Luxury brands spend millions on marketing and brand awareness.
When was the last time you saw an ad to buy a Bugatti Chiron?
> When was the last time you saw an ad to buy a Bugatti Chiron?
Ads don't just have to be a photo on a billboard, though, or the entire thing of influencers wouldn't exist.
How many times has the Chiron been on Top Gear - I reckon at least three times (I can remember once in the Clarkson era and another time in the Harris/Le Blanc era; the magazine's had one at the Nürburgring at least once)? Sure Bugatti's letting them loose with a multi-million euro car out of the goodness of their hearts.
How come you know about the Bugatti Chiron? Did you even saw one for real in your life?
The simple fact that you (and me, and everyone else here) know about it show that people in marketing are doing their job.
I don't remember seeing an ad for a Bugatti Chiron, I am obviously not the target market, but I stumbled upon an ad for a private jet! Also other luxury cars and watches that make Rolex look like child toys. I was when I worked in a helicopter company and someone picked up a magazine from the showroom where customers get their helicopters delivered. The content was out of this world, I remember an article on the merits of private jets over travelling first class (I guess anything less is unthinkable), with purchase recommendations. So the ultra-rich get their ads too.
Ferrari makes money on F1, sells T-shirts and hats and whatnot, along with very expensive cars.
Does Rolex have other revenue streams aside from overpriced watches?
I would never own a rolex because where I live only ambulance chasers, businessmen who are definitely guilty of wage theft, morbidly obese elderly men in gold chains who reek of cigars, and street pimps wear them but from what I can gather they charge approximately $1,000 for a service and a mechanical watch needs servicing every 5-10 years depending on how complicated it is and how often it is worn.
So that's like a $100-200/yr. annual subscription to wear an already expensive watch.
Assuming I take your anecdote at face value, I'm quite impressed at how well you keep tabs on all of the Rolex owners you've met, identified their occupations as well as illegal or immoral activities.
I've seen people wearing watches, but hell I have hard time identifying the brand of watch, let alone where the person wearing it works.
It's pretty easy to spot a Rolex once you know a little bit about them. Get a closer look and it's even easy to spot fakes.
However, I agree with the first part of your comment in a way, but it's really not that hard to get a rough estimate of someone based on how they choose to present themselves. They didn't exactly get forced into that look.
That's a valid argument, that some stereotypical appearances are relatively consistently accurate.
Though I'm wondering what, exactly, defines the appearance of a specific lawyer who pushes for accident victims to sue, or businessmen that participate in wage theft. How do you tell them apart from... other lawyers or random people wearing suits?
I'll say this though, when it comes to corpo execs, at least in the USA, if they think they can get away with some illegal and/or unethical activity and they believe that it won't impact any potential profits (either greater than the punishment or benefits to themselves, because we rarely if ever jail executives in this country or hold them accountable without immense public scrutiny), they'll do that thing 9.9 out of 10 times.
Wage theft is rampant here, especially for lower wage workers. The government simply doesn't exist in a capacity to actually prevent these things, and people in general are too apathetic to other peoples well being, let alone engaging in appropriate political discourse, that the needle rarely moves forward for your average citizen.
I don't think you can. I agree mostly on that point, I just think it's worthwhile to recognize that stereotypes aren't just completely random, is all.
I taught myself how to service Swiss watches this month. It’s a very difficult skill (I failed).
The people who did the training and have the surgical ability to fix a Rolex deserve $1000.
An elaborate precision machine that is 35mm across and hand-built over a year (so they say), it makes sense that “cheap” Swiss watches are $9000. Rolex retails for 2-4x of that due to brand cachet and artificial scarcity, even though they are by far the highest volume manufacturer.
2nm chips are more impressive if we're talking about precision. And I have one in my pocket for less than the repair cost of a Rolex.
The nm of chips doesn't mean anything anymore, and it's really not more impressive anyways - that's built by a machine, which is the epitome of precision. A hand-built 2nm chip might be more impressive, but also impossible anyways.
try replacing an individual resistor if it fails...
You can get a really nice Omega/Breitling/Tag for much less than 9k, no? Rolex just seems to be the luxury watch among high end watches.
I don’t think an equivalent Omega or Breitling is that much cheaper?
Rolexes also keep their value incredibly well. I bought a nice Tag many years ago (I knew nothing about watches) and it’s now worth about $1000 on the used market at best. Had I bought a similar priced Rolex instead, it would have kept its value, if not even appreciated.
It's beyond what is the watch. Rolex is good, but omega speedy starts (started before inflation/tariffs?) at $5k. And is certified for Space(tm)! Some good smaller brands (nomos) at around $2k.
Watch market above that starts getting weird. You have some special models, technically equivalent w/ cosmetic bling hitting $80-100k
Sadly, $1,000 is not even that much. Last time I serviced my Zeitwerk they charged nearly $6,000 for it.
how...much does your watch cost?
I looked into this, for a Speedy, Omega charges $900. What a steal!
> ambulance chasers
TIL
Does Ferrari turn a profit on the F1? I support them and it’s been a while since they’ve had any big wins?
Sadly, on my last trip over there, the average Italian Ferrari fan has been suffering akin to a Detroit Lions fan
Replace cars with motorcycles,and luxury with t-shirts, and you have Harley-Davidson.
No, you can go buy any Harley you want. You can't just buy any Ferrari or Rolex, you have to be invited, usually by buying lower level stuff they want to get rid of.
Porsche (and I assume others) does this as well. You need something like $1.5M in Porsche inventory before they'll invite you to purchase a GT3 RS.
I guess they probably don't want the dirty uneducated "new money" crypto bros, TikTok influencers and OnlyFans hoes spoiling their brand image, they want the well connected Epstein Island elites who come from royalty and old money.
I know someone with a GT3 RS who owns no other porches. Is this just for new models? (Theirs was a few years old when purchased)
Of course Ferrari and Porsche don't control the secondary market, although I understand they might put restrictions on how soon you can sell one of their high end cars.
If you cared that much though why not simply get a job selling Bugattis?
They're not hiring. Unless you're the Bugatti dealership's son, or sleeping with him, you're not getting the job.
...For the same reason anyone can't simply get a job making $250,000/yr? It's not like jobs are something you choose - you request it.
Exactly.
I’m surprised that the current AI boom isn’t called out in the comments or the article. From my POV technology investing is the poster child for the issue discussed. The internet bubble, online ads, crypto, and AI all fall short of the promise of RoI.
Car companies fund racing to sell consumer cars.
Ferrari sells consumer cars to fund racing.
Ferrari spends $140mn on F1 and brings home $90-100mn in prize money, plus another £150-200mn in sponsorship.
Ferrari is a very rare thing in modern motorsport. A team that races to fund racing.
Part of that is because they get an extra bonus just by being Ferrari
https://www.sportspro.com/decision-makers/politics-and-gover...
the problem with rarified air is that only Ferrari can race Ferraris. Given the low volume, high prices, and resultant engineering issues (cough cough overheating) that wouldn't exist in cars more on the mass market, requiring teams of engineers to support.
The average car enthusiast for track days will be seen running Mustangs, Corvette/Camaros, BMW M2/4s, Toyota GR 86s/Supras/Corollas, Honda S2000s, Nissan Z's, etc. But Ferrari is essentially irrelevant.
Sadly, I think Porsche is going that way; before, one could also run with the above gaggle with a decent 911 or Cayman. Now that the entry level is climbing well above the $100k mark new, and what was supposed to be their track car (GT3) is approaching Ferrari prices, they are becoming less and less relevant. And they might not even survive the China situation...
I'm not too familiar with the history of a few that you've mentioned, but the Mustang (excluding the GTD), Supra, Carolla, S2000, Z never had track focused cars. For the time-poor and money-rich racing enthusiast, lacking a turn key package isn't really an option.
Your local track days where you see the likes that you mentioned - you'll also likely get a few Porches etc too. But there's absolutely a culture of racing higher end cars, the GT3's, Ferraris (488 Pista, 360 Challenge Stradale, starting to see XX's around too), the Valkyrie and Valiant etc. There's also those that grab older Cup cars and track them to the track. There's absolutely a market for turn key, track focused, road legal Ferrari's.
[dead]
Enzo is rolling in his grave!
"I don't sell cars; I sell engines. The cars I throw in for free since something has to hold the engines in." --Enzo Ferrari
A couple years before Enzo died, there was a TV tire commercial which asked "Why do Ferraris come with Firestone tires? Because Mr. Ferrari wants it that way." and then showed a picture of Enzo smiling.
(I don't recall if it was Firestone or Goodyear.)
It was Goodyear, specifically the Eagle VR50. The advertisement featured a Ferrari 308 GTB.
Ferrari had only adopted radial tires in racing a decade earlier. I'm curious as to what deal they got with Goodyear at the time, as radial tires (including high performance versions) were already long ubiquitous in the United States by the time that commercial came out, which I believe was actually after the end of the 308's production run.
Thanks for the correction! I tried googling it, and got nowhere.
Suggest that you consider a Vespa if you want to experience fine Italian engineering. There's no need to hanker for a Ferrari.
Saying this as a Vespa owner. Its once of the nicest products I've ever purchased.
TFA explains the true driving force behind Enshittification.
It takes a very strong will to say no to growth and investment, because you know it will make what you do change from excellence in to shit. Sometimes your customer base morphs (see Facebook) and you survive. Sometimes your only market was the high end discerning customer, and now that you’re shit, you’re dead.
I don't think it's so much that investment does that as leaving your competencies. I've been working at a private firm for years now. The culture is excellent and we use the products we make. We also don't make our product do every last thing it could possibly do, nor do we support every last thing our product in theory could: we focus on what our customers want and buy now. You can't use what we make for everything, but what you can use it for, we lead our industry in.
We've grown tremendously but we're still sub-200 in head count and want it to stay that way. We're rolling in profits because we keep our operation lean and responsive.
It seems to me the enshittification happens when you try and offer a service to the entire world and can't manage to succeed at that unless everyone and their mother uses it, which itself requires shit tons of employees and IT resources and datacenters, and if it doesn't work out, it all goes in the bin.
One possible solution to enshitting is to basically franchise.
If the market can support 5 of your nice business, instead of growing 5x (which often enshits) spawn four independent copies.
But when you look at restaurants that turn their business into a franchise, quality usually takes a turn for the worse
How would you franchise out a product like software? I haven't really thought about that before.
White label solution
I'm currently listinging to Founders Podcast - The Obsession of Enzo Ferrari[1]
Though some of the points may be correct under current management, I think this quote would have Enzo turning in his grave "We are not – we are not – a car company. We are a luxury company that is also doing cars."
This playbook where you put your brand on a bunch of random things to sell, while the prime focus gets watered down only works for a short period of time.
Aston tried the same thing, going so far as putting their badge on child strollers.
The car industry is going through such upheaval that much of this may not matter in the next 20 years, but I fear they are going to destroy a great brand through a lack of focus.
[1]https://open.spotify.com/episode/2O6toYAw3RjjTQ4SEzKIru?si=1...
<FUNNY> Well their job currently is certainly not being a winning F1 team ;) </FUNNY>
I mean, by the numbers in the article, Toyota has produced about $100B of net profit over the 5-year period, while Ferrari has produced $6B.
I guess I'd rather own Toyota.
>why don’t more companies follow Ferrari’s lead
Ford did try before. For example, the 2006 Ford GT. In comparison, the similarly-priced Ferrari F430 of the era was the mass market automobile with about 5x as many made.
So I wonder how much one should draw from these rationalizations of prestige marketing. At the end of the day Ferrari still uses its larger super-car production capacity to keep even Ford only an occasional entrant into the low-end of market.
Building a halo product that attempts to compete in a luxury niche is very different from running your (whole) business like a luxury niche leader.
We see similar cases with the highest end Chevrolet Corvette. If you look only at statistics and performance numbers, they are arguably competitive, but cheaper. But GM intends to sell as many Corvettes as they can. They do not particularly restrict them in quantity or with a particularly inflated price that represents their role as a status signal or unobtainable luxury piece.
That's why I choose two cars that are at effectively in the same target market at around the same price from the same time period, from Ford and Ferrari.
That's fine, but maybe missing my point.
You're choosing cars (single products) but claiming that businesses are operating in a similar manner. All Ferrari cars are part of how Ferrari operates, while the GT was an exception to how Ford operates.
And I don't dispute that. Simply that Ferrari is the Ford of super cars, building in large quantity for that market.
And I really doubt the applicability of the luxury approach to software. People will vastly overpay to have a 5% faster automobile because it's a personally-owned status symbol and has racing-pedigree. I don't recommend building a company around a new 5% faster database since it isn't a source of prestige for anyone. For many potential customers it'd barely put a mark in their bottom line. And it might be negative if it compromised in any other aspect to obtain it. Benchmarking isn't a reliable winner-take-all marketing approach like racing-based marketing (and it sure isn't as popular).
let’s do a little thinking about how mobile computers got to costing $2000 and then come back to this subject.
That still doesn't prove anything. The market demand for the Ford GT could have been 1/2 what Ford produced but the market demand for the F430 was double what Ferrari actually produced.
I am not saying that is actually the case, but production #s just don't really tell the whole story.
Ford only dabbles in these kinds of cars, they have different reasons for picking the # of units they build. They are a lot like Honda, they are not dedicated to this and they instead just build a small # of sports cars every once in a while to try and improve their reputation.
The article glosses over the core founding purpose of each company too. Ford was founded to build massive #s of assembly line built cars at a price the average worker could afford. Ferrari very reluctantly built street cars to fund racing and decided the sport/luxury cars were the best way to make the maximum money with the smallest # of street cars. Less street cars meant less distraction from building the racing cars.
I'm not saying it proves anything but Ferrari is one of the higher volume manufacturers within super cars This applies even compared to many of their competitors we think of as mass market car producers (such as Ford, Toyota, Honda) when they make cars that compete with Ferrari.
As you say that's almost entirely due to demand. But the focus should be on how does Ferrari consistently keep such a large portion of the high end car market? Because that's the key to their success. Many companies can make cars that they can sell out in small volumes at Ferrari prices. But they don't see it scaling, while Ferrari does.
> But the focus should be on how does Ferrari consistently keep such a large portion of the high end car market?
Formula 1
There is no other brands that has as much history in Formula 1 than Ferrari. McLaren is the second one in current constructors at 988 race entries but only started fairly recently (compared to Ferrari) to sell street cars, Lotus a distant 3rd one but hasn't been in formula 1 for the last 30years. Mercedes involvment in Formula 1 is fairly recent. In a way, FERRARI IS FORMULA 1 and FORMULA 1 IS FERRARI. Both need each other. Among other F1 teams and appart from Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes, only Alpine Renault is fully involved and is definitely not in the luxury sports car market. In the case of Aston Martin it is really much more sponsoring/rebranding of a team than a real constructor as the Aston Martin team, formerly Racing Point, is running a Mercedes Engine. Appart from McLaren which is less known in the street there is simply no other brand like Ferrari in Formula 1. Here are some numbers according to Wikipedia:
_"Ferrari holds the record for the most Constructors' and Drivers' Championships won with sixteen and fifteen, respectively.[8][9] Ferrari also holds the record for the most wins by a constructor with 248,[10] the most pole positions with 253,[11] the most points with 10572,[12] and the most podiums with 834.[13] Ferrari has also entered more Grands Prix than any other constructor with 1114 entries and also maintains the record for the most Grand Prix starts with 1111.[14]"_
source with complete table of current and past constructors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Formula_One_constructo...
Alfa Roméo and Maserati used to be in the same if not better place than Ferrari in the early 50's. And their place in the luxury market constantly faded once they scaled down (being engine suppliers) then stopped their involvment in Grand Prix racing.
Yes, although "larger" here might not be understood by many people. The 360, which was said to be a "larger" production car (by Ferrari standards), only approximately 17,000 of those were ever made.
Making a high performance, expensive, rare car is a small part of the recipe. Most Ferrari owners own more than one Ferrari (65% according to Ferrari of North America study from a decade ago or so, not sure if there's an updated number). A significant number of owners own more than 2. Ferrari famously has dealer prioritization and waitlists that reward you for buying more cars, just like Rolex which another poster mentioned below. When I was servicing these cars around 2015, many customers would buy FFs and Californias that they didn't necessarily want just to have the option to buy something like a first year 458 Spider, not even one of the particularly rare offerings. If someone got something truly low production like a LaFerrari or F12 TDF, chances are that customer had already bought 10+ cars from the dealer and immediately trades in many of their cars at a multi hundred thousand dollar loss to them as soon as they are able to get out of a "regular" model into a special edition. Ferrari drives/meets also serve as social clubs/networking which certainly does provide some positive value for many owners of these vehicles. Very few customers I ever met really cared about outright performance/$ and would have been cross shopping a Ford GT with a 430.
Also they are very specific owners. There's one guy here in LA, specifically the San Gabriel Valley neighborhood who realized there were a ton of visitors from mainland China flush with cash who were either coming as tourists or buying property, i.e. the "fuerdai" phenomenon. Cue a few strategically placed watch/jewelry and lambo/ferrari dealerships later, and I think he's one of the top sellers of their cars in North America...
Man, what I wouldn't give for one of those Ford GTs though. Really cool car imo. The fact that it comes from Ford kinda makes it more exciting to me. Like yeah, a Ferrari is a Ferrari, but wtf is a Ford doing here?? And why does it fit in so well??
Maybe it is not as renowned as Ferrari, but Ford also has a rich racing history, even in F1.
Enzo is literally projectile vomiting in his grave right now.
This is not the Ferrari he created. This is the corpo-monster called "brand". Yuck.