Clearly the biggest draw for Leclercq was the fact that he could start from “a white sheet of paper” — “It doesn’t happen very often in the life of a designer,” he said. Yet he recognizes the challenges as well as the opportunities this brings. Though the company’s been around since 1976, Great Wall has yet to define a consistent design language.
“We don’t have a brand identity right now,” said Leclercq. “But the good thing is that the owner of the company realizes this and wants to further design. He is a very open-minded person and recognizes the importance of design. And in the current market where cars are similar technology-wise design is the cheapest way to make a difference. My goal is to develop a clear identity — when you see the front of a BMW it’s really strong and if any other company tries to copy it, it looks like a copy. A couple of companies have managed to develop a really strong brand identity and form language — which is more difficult to develop — and this is the first thing I want to work on. We need to define a brand strategy and a brand identity — front, side, rear. What do we do for SUVs? What do we do for limousines?”
To help him achieve this goal, Leclercq is currently looking for an exterior and interior design chief as well as senior designers. “I’m looking for designers with three to five years and five to seven years [experience] as well as managers. I want to bring in some people with a little more experience.”
But the development of a clear brand identity is only half of Leclercq’s strategy for Great Wall.
“I also want to make the cars more premium. In the economic market, you have to go premium — Toyota and Lexus did that really well,” says Leclercq. “The French brands, for example — in comparison to the German brands — Citroen in the 60s was very premium and I would say they were probably more premium than a brand like BMW. Then they decided to go more economical and Peugeot, Citroen, even Renault, cannot sell cars for more money, whereas BMW and Mercedes went upmarket and it’s easier for them to sell smaller cars coming from the premium market. Even at the lower end of the market, I think it’s important for Great Wall to really go premium, at least with some cars, and to do this we must push quality.”
Leclercq is under no illusions that his push to achieve these objectives will be challenging. The language barrier is a clear obstacle to effective communication, which he sees as being one of his main challenges, but he must also become familiar with a team at a company that has historically outsourced its design efforts.
While Leclercq’s got his work cut out for him, he is very optimistic and has a clear vision for how he intends to achieve his objectives at Great Wall. We wish him the best in his new role.
