Today, I was driving down I-20 on my way home from work, and the 18-wheeler in front of me had a tire explode. This isn't the first time I've had a run-in with rogue tire treads - two months ago, a flying tire tread knocked my side mirror out of its position. In fact, when you have a 35-mile commute each way down a highway known to be a tire graveyard, you know it's only a matter of time before you're the unfortunate victim of a flyaway tire.
It's in situations like this that I really appreciate my car. I drive a 2002 Lexus ES 300 - a grandmother's car, although I'm pretty sure that neither of my Indian grandmothers ever had a drivers' license - a hand-me-down from my father that's been through 8 years of everything that Atlanta driving has to offer. The more I drive and the more I design. the more I appreciate the thought that goes into Lexus's design choices. There are few companies that I respect more (Apple being another, for their superb focus on design intent). Lexus stands out for a few different reasons:
1. Lexus doesn't engineer cars. They engineer experiences. There is an R&D director that I work with that talks often about the principle of "surprise & delight" - that is, not just meeting design requirements, but exceeding expectations. Surprise & delight is about understanding your design intent, about taking care of tasks that your user didn't even realize they were trying to accomplish.
So they employ hundreds of human factors engineers to study how people interact with their cars. The company understands very well that what people need out of a car isn't the maximum amount of horsepower or payload. People buy cars for the experience of driving. Lexus doesn't focus on features - sure, they have beautiful interiors, state of the art navigation systems, and a thousand other features. But when that tire tread blew up in my face, what I noticed wasn't the automatic stability control that kicked in - it was that I heard only a muted pop in place of a loud bang. The environment inside my car stayed calm, even when my heart skipped a beat.
2. Consumers are far more mature in the car-buying market than they are in other consumer goods. No one tells me to buy a compact hybrid when what I really need is a pickup truck (but lots of people will tell me that I need a Macbook Pro over a Macbook Air). We understand our needs far better in automobiles than we do other things. And that's why Lexus is so successful - they know they can engineer the experience of driving because it's something that people understand very well.
I know how to check my gauges and change my tires, but even the engineer in me doesn't crave horsepower over simple creature comforts.
3. They anticipate how the driving experience should be - from start to finish. Lexus makes sure that at no point in my driving life, I drive anything other than a Lexus. From the showroom to the test drive to routine maintenance visits in which I get a Lexus courtesy car and free gas, the company always has their best foot forward to make things easy for a customer. Sure, they may lose a little bit of money filling the tank back up for you after you've spent the day cruising around in one of their new models while getting your timing belt replaced, but they more than make up for it in loyalty when you buy your next car.
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| (photo courtesy of...) |
1. Lexus doesn't engineer cars. They engineer experiences. There is an R&D director that I work with that talks often about the principle of "surprise & delight" - that is, not just meeting design requirements, but exceeding expectations. Surprise & delight is about understanding your design intent, about taking care of tasks that your user didn't even realize they were trying to accomplish.
So they employ hundreds of human factors engineers to study how people interact with their cars. The company understands very well that what people need out of a car isn't the maximum amount of horsepower or payload. People buy cars for the experience of driving. Lexus doesn't focus on features - sure, they have beautiful interiors, state of the art navigation systems, and a thousand other features. But when that tire tread blew up in my face, what I noticed wasn't the automatic stability control that kicked in - it was that I heard only a muted pop in place of a loud bang. The environment inside my car stayed calm, even when my heart skipped a beat.
2. Consumers are far more mature in the car-buying market than they are in other consumer goods. No one tells me to buy a compact hybrid when what I really need is a pickup truck (but lots of people will tell me that I need a Macbook Pro over a Macbook Air). We understand our needs far better in automobiles than we do other things. And that's why Lexus is so successful - they know they can engineer the experience of driving because it's something that people understand very well.
I know how to check my gauges and change my tires, but even the engineer in me doesn't crave horsepower over simple creature comforts.
3. They anticipate how the driving experience should be - from start to finish. Lexus makes sure that at no point in my driving life, I drive anything other than a Lexus. From the showroom to the test drive to routine maintenance visits in which I get a Lexus courtesy car and free gas, the company always has their best foot forward to make things easy for a customer. Sure, they may lose a little bit of money filling the tank back up for you after you've spent the day cruising around in one of their new models while getting your timing belt replaced, but they more than make up for it in loyalty when you buy your next car.
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