It is a unique mixture: luxury automobiles, tuning models and vintage cars meet jewellery, art, furniture, made-to-measure clothing and tourism. Everything is clearly arranged in two halls at Euromotor.
Is this a trade fair concept for the future? Karl Ulrich Herrmann has already held this type of event twice in Munich and seven times in Stuttgart. He also organizes the Retro Classic in Nuremberg and Stuttgart. He believes that the young generation can no longer be inspired by classic cars alone; Cars from the 1950s and 1960s are already difficult, and some boys can no longer do anything with youngtimers either.
“That’s why we’re putting everything under the heading of driving culture. Otherwise we cannot survive as a trade fair.” Herrmann’s strategy: “A mixture of lifestyle and car is just right for a certain clientele. The world has changed, not for the worse, but it is different.”
And so you can also indulge in culinary delights here: Champagne and oysters meet Maultaschen, along with fine wines, spirits, sweets and finally cigars. There is entertainment on a small show stage to accompany the event: around 100 exhibitors are expecting up to 6000 visitors over two days. A select clientele, mainly invited by the exhibitors.
Herrrmann defines his target group as follows: “One who can afford this.” And so tuners and refiners stand next to restorers, dealers and manufacturers. The range of automobiles is very broad: from small cars to super sports cars, from an old Mercedes and a Porsche 550 Spyder to a three-wheeled Morgan and a luxury conversion of the Mercedes G model.
Among the new cars, Herrmann has two absolute stars in the hall: The new seven from BMW, which is rather inconspicuous in the room. Locked up with a rope, he stands in the semi-darkness. His headlights are switched on, even the mighty kidney is illuminated at its edges. He looks a bit mystical. But the actual market launch of the seven should only take place in a few days.
The new Lotus Eletre, the first electric SUV from the traditional English brand, is completely different. He’s right in the limelight: a black Formula 1 racer drives across a large screen in the middle of a neat trade fair stand. Former Formula 1 world champion Emerson Fittipaldi is presented as the new brand ambassador. To the right of the screen is a light blue Emira, probably the last Lotus athlete with a combustion engine, and to the left of it the new one, a two-tone Eletre.
“You meet the right people here,” explains Lotus technician Max Votteler. “And they can at least get to the car here, unlike at the classic trade fairs, for example in Frankfurt.” But he’s still a bit surprised, because the clientele is different from the classic Lotus clientele.
While a potential customer makes himself comfortable in the driver’s seat and has the car explained to him, his wife sits next to him in the passenger seat with two little boys on her lap. And the questions to the technician are rather unusual. Because it’s not, as usual, about the details of the chassis technology or the handling. That is probably assumed at Lotus. Instead, it’s about the 800-volt electrical technology, the charging speed or the range.
New Lotus world just. But that’s nothing new for Stefano Previdoli, brand and event manager at Lotus. Since July, the Eletre has been touring Europe on a road show from Cannes to Monaco to Amsterdam, from Oslo to the Nürburgring. There are a wide variety of events at which the new one is shown, from art fairs to yacht festivals and the vintage car grand prix to a concours d’elegance and, of course, to the EuroMotor in Stuttgart.
A new approach, then, to bring the British electric vehicle into play as a new player in the exclusive, sporty SUV segment. The reaction of the trade fair visitors suggests that the Euromotor concept works extremely well for the Eletre. (Benr Ostmann/cen)