[PrideRed]

If Porsche is so concerned about the cars they manufacture, they should sell it without profit. After all Porsche builds car that are intended to be driven by enthusiast only, so I recommend them to forego profits.
Most of these sports car are either bought to show off or to trade! If only enthusiasts had bought the cars, Porsche, Lambo,Ferrari's would have been history by now.

[avira_tk]

This is good move by Porsche, cars like the GT3 are a form of publicity and if the owners are not going to take it out, the halo effect is gone. Sports car brands have much more control over the customers, Ferrari already has a similar policy in place.

Customers aren't going to run away, how many other brands exist in this space?

[suhaas307]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

Disclaimer: I don't own a Porsche and in this lifetime am not likely to own one ever either.

What the gentleman is peeved about is that he is losing out on the after market profits on his product. This is not the first time the OEM of an uber expensive toy gets lathered up about the after market premium that they (the OEM) feel they should be able to access through higher original tag price. Business jet manufacturers have tried this more than a couple of times and burnt themselves in the bargain. Gulfstream (many of whose customers must be Porsche owners) tried it in recent years and only succeeded in upsetting customers (who are rich, influential and possess fragile egos), losing market share and having to layoff 5000 employees. Mr. Andreas may want to examine these precedents.

The problem, I believe, lies not with the brand / manufacturer, but with the over-enthusiastic press that labelled the 911R as the last naturally-aspirated manual car from Porsche.

The dealers cashed-in on this and due to the crazy demand (especially in the US market and a few other markets) and consequently, the dealer mark-up on the 911R sky-rocketed.

I'm not entirely sure, but apparently some dealers received fewer allocations for the 911R as a result of this.

Of course, there is no record of Porsche stating that the 911R would be the last NA + manual car anywhere! They only mentioned that the Carreras would no longer be naturally aspirated.

Originally Posted by avira_tk

This is good move by Porsche, cars like the GT3 are a form of publicity and if the owners are not going to take it out, the halo effect is gone. Sports car brands have much more control over the customers, Ferrari already has a similar policy in place.

Customers aren't going to run away, how many other brands exist in this space?

I agree.

The difference between Ferrari and Porsche in this regard, is that Porsche listens to their customers and converts feedback into actual substance. They're pretty proactive!

For example, several customers were miffed by the tedious manual roof on the 987 Boxster Spyder. It took literally 10 minutes to fix the tent on the car. With the newer 981 Boxster Spyder, this problem was addressed. Even though the roof remained manual, the operation of the same took no longer than a minute or two.

Similarly, the 991.1 GT3 was PDK-only, but the 991.2 (face-lift) can be had with a manual, and this was at the instance of customers who wanted a manual transmission.

In fact, the 911R was conceived as a consequence of all the noise the purists had made!

[Maky]

Porsche has now announced the 'Touring Package' for the unlimited production 911 GT3 which retains the engine, manual gearbox and strips away the big wing on the back. This effectively makes it a 911 R.
Most excellent. Cry havoc....