Lira - a(nother) Lebanese made car

So apparently on June 17th "Lira" a Lebanese-made solar-powered car will be introduced.

All right, I shall skip the (lousy) naming considering the Lira is now sort of useless in terms of value and that the repertoire could have very easily included other sexier names, and apparently it is interesting  that the car is sun-powered which is wonderful what's with the diesel prices going berserk as of late.

A friend suggested that the Lira owes some of its design to the much-maligned Fiat Multipla (here) or the Kia Soul (here) according to me. 

But here's the surprise, this is not the first-Lebanese car to be "designed" and produced in Lebanon. Ladies and gentlemen, let me re-introduce to you to:

Ranger4.

The ad below dates back from 1980:

All right, the Ranger4 does seem like a Jeep and a mini had a love child.

The ad says that the Ranger4:

Has an appealing shape and has versatile uses

Compatible with all climates

Inflammable body

Safe driving

Spends 20 liters of fuel for ever 210 kms

14 horsepower and 1100 cc engine

Available spare parts

I am not sure how much Lira compares to all that.... But hey, here's to another Lebanese car.

And truth be told, I have no idea what happened to the Ranger4 venture.... 

Moskvitch is back - no news about Trabant

Taking a break from the seat-gripping (no pun) elections result in Lebanon (and no, you cannot pin Jad Ghosn's 88 vote loss on me, I don't vote in Metn).

So to quote a satiric comment "Russia has invented a time machine".

Moskvitch is back.

OK, first the story. Renault is pulling out of Russia - like many other major brands following the Ukraine war. But in order not to leave 45,000 people in its factory jobless, it decided to sell their Moscow plant to the municipality for one rouble (with the option of buying it back in 6 years - by then either the war would have ended or the public opinion in the world would have shifted. Whichever comes first).

So Moscow is back to building the car it knows how to build, the Moskvitch. Symbol of all things related to the USSR, the car actually won some design awards, some races, had its line expand to Belgium at one point (with a fully factory there). Sure, the brand was eclipsed by the better-built Lada eventually.

Of course, if one can bring the Moskvitch back, my stomach is tickling about the East-German Trabant. If you have not seen the Trabant scene in the movie Goodbye Lenin, please do, it's comedy gold. 

Actually why not watch Goodbye Lenin here... 

Linglong tire - someone injected the effort

OK I admit, it is a little destabilizing when you notice an ad placed on just two unipoles - as a matter of reference, in 2005 any campaign with less than 600 billboards was not even considered visible. But I digress. Welcome to Linglong tire ad, obviously a brand which I am assuming is new to the Lebanese market long accustomed to Bridgestone or other such high name recognizable brands. But hey, desperate times call for desperate measures and new entrants to the market. 

What struck me in the Linglong tire ad was that someone actually injected the effort. Sure this is not Cannes Lions award winning ad, but at least someone did put the effort there, in the idea, the execution mostly, and as long as it grabs the eyeballs, then the effect worked. "Lead your own path" - indeed, why not as a headline? And of course, all this written in an "asphalt" design. Once more, the effort has been made which is more than many brands actually put into theirs.

Car companies new logos: rebranding away from 3D

Well, when everyone does it, it is no longer a novelty. But it seems everyone is doing it out of necessity. After the bigtime fad of the 3D quasi-airbrushed logos for car brands, in the last few months, no less than 10 different brands have announced new logos (Volvo, Nissan, BMW, Mini, Dacia, Renault, Kia, Peugeot, VolksWagen, and Fiat have all went this route).

Actually, I also read somewhere that Audi has filed papers for a new logo very much in line with the ones presented in the image above. What is interesting is that in all cases, suddenly a new 2D logo has appeared. Truth be told, there are many elements of similarity with these brands' old logos from the 60s/70s. However, nostalgia is certainly not the driving element to be sure. Rather, it is the new social media. 

Let me give you this design secret, long time ago (that would be till 2010 or so), to make sure a logo worked, we used to put it on the smallest surface on which it will be printed - namely the business card, if the logo was still visible then it was acceptable. Today, the smallest surface on which the logo will be displayed is no longer the business card but your Instagram handle. And the less complicated the logo, the more streamlined, simple, 2-Dimentional, the more you have the possibility of being immediately seen by your audience as everyone is competing for eyeballs. 

However, in defense of the car brands, each one tried to keep its own identity separate as opposed to clothing brands who went almost anonymous with their new logos (for some odd reason major luxury houses have decided to go the let-us-all-look-the-same route). If you do not believe me look at the image below.