Area of interest producer Ineos Automotive is leveraging its private method to customer support and a slowly increasing assist community to transform Australia’s rusted-on Toyota LandCruiser 70 Sequence loyalists.
Shaped after Land Rover wouldn’t promote the tooling and manufacturing {hardware} for the unique Land Rover Defender to British billionaire and chemical engineer, Sir Jim Ratcliffe, Ineos Automotive at the moment presents SUV and ute variations of the Grenadier 4×4, each of which compete straight with the 70 Sequence.
Nonetheless, Toyota holds a dominant place within the native market, with the 70 Sequence racking up 10,301 gross sales in ute guise alone final 12 months – 1000’s greater than the following hottest heavy-duty ladder-frame off-roader. Ineos, in the meantime, has averaged roughly 1000 gross sales per 12 months since launching Down Underneath in 2022.
That vast discrepancy may be chalked all the way down to a number of elements, together with Toyota’s broadly recognised model, its sprawling community of roughly 300 sellers, and the LandCruiser’s long-held status for reliability and mechanical simplicity.
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As such, with simply 26 sellers, a reputation nonetheless unfamiliar to many patrons, and a product that is but to reveal its long-term sturdiness, Ineos may be very a lot caught in a David vs Goliath battle to seize market share from its Japanese rival.
However relatively than shrink back from the problem, Ineos is embracing and even exploiting its underdog standing, in response to native boss Justin Hocevar.
“What we simply need to do as a group is guarantee that we’re on our A-game on a regular basis with reference to supporting clients wherever they’re,” Mr Hocevar informed CarExpert on the launch of the mannequin 12 months 2026 (MY26) Grenadier.
“We have got some tales of people that’ve had one thing occur – one thing’s damaged, or they’ve damaged one thing – in actually distant areas, and we have been capable of snap to consideration, transfer heaven and earth to get a component to them faster than I’d say the standardised processes of a big company might do.
“After which it is about giving them the suitable tech assist and making the suitable folks accessible as properly – if any person who does not actually know the automobile that properly has the flexibility to attach with somebody who does – even when that is just about – then we are able to actually assist.
“They’re the situations, after they come up, that give us a chance to reveal that even with out the dimensions and may of a big participant like Toyota, you may truly react actually, actually rapidly with trendy logistics.”
That is to not say Ineos is not seeking to improve its bodily presence in Australia.
Reasonably, the marque has plans to collaborate with unbiased garages to enhance its attain, notably in regional Australia. This program would see far-flung workshops tackle inventory of Ineos components, in addition to obtain coaching from the manufacturing facility in an effort to present servicing and repairs.
A small bump in dealership numbers can also be on the playing cards for 2026, after the community briefly shrunk final 12 months on account of Ineos’ shift away from an company gross sales mannequin.
“We’ve got to maintain constructing that community out as properly, as a result of on the finish of the day, the extra service areas in the suitable areas, the higher. The problem in doing that for us is our dimension,” stated Mr Hocevar.
“We are able to solely assist so many shops. There is no level getting a vendor in a distant location to decide to all the prices related to having a franchise solely to have low throughput there. That is the problem.
“I feel you will see us concentrate on having stronger gross sales and repair shops, not essentially pushing for extra of these, however augmenting our community with some service-only companions.”
Additional methods have been mapped out to sweeten the Ineos possession promise, though they continue to be underneath wraps in the interim.
“We have got a couple of extra issues up our sleeve that may come… we’ll make some bulletins all through this 12 months round another issues that we will do to assist assist clients,” Mr Hocevar stated.
Earlier makes an attempt by Ineos to broaden its viewers embody the 2025 “Love It or Go away It” marketing campaign, which gave potential house owners the choice to ‘promote’ their Grenadier Quartermaster ute again to Ineos inside six months/15,000km of shopping for the automobile.