Four take-aways from Goodwood FOS for a new form of experiential Auto Show

Whilst Auto shows outside of China are shrinking and disappearing, the Goodwood Festival of Speed (FoS) in the UK over the last few days illustrated how a post-auto-show event can work — transport to and from the site (and weather) aside.?People are still interested in seeing cars ‘in the metal’, mass-scale car events can still be made to work, and brands do win by showcasing new car designs IRL.?Instead of the classic auto show mall-meets–car-dealer format where even the air tastes transactional, breathing in car-festival events like Goodwood will always be a more enjoyable experience for more people than any traditional auto show. We think there are four key FoS success factors that can be exported to post-auto-show: ?

1. It’s not the car, its about the experience of the car

The FoS is centred on the visceral thrill of the timed high-speed drive up a twisting hill-climb route. Cars rip away from the starting-line in a screaming blur of tyre smoke, the whites of drivers’ eyes can been seen as their steads buck and weave up the narrow strip of tarmac with most cars audible from anywhere on the site and large-scale screens tracking their progress for many visitors too. In the garages the preparation for the hill-climb performance can be experienced too: hot oil smelled; ear drums assaulted by vintage combustion; drivers viewed limboing into cramped cockpits.?It’s not about car brands or models or the individual lumps of metal that cars are, so much as about what they do and how they do it. And whilst most potential venues don’t have a race-track or hill-climb route at their disposal, showing-off how a car drives using VR and film, simulating aspects of what it does when driving in dedicated spaces, enabling people to experience some of the many things modern cars can do whilst parked up even — these are things all car shows could realise but rarely do more than in a tokenistic way. ?

2. It’s about new and unique car experiences?

If cars are interesting, then a new car that hasn’t been seen before is very interesting.?At this year’s FoS there was a truly unique list of new designs to see, sit in and learn more about — although there was a lot of missed opportunities here also — many making European, if not international market debuts: Singer DLS turbo; Porsche Mission X concept; MG Cyberster; Mini Aceman concept; McLaren Solus GT; Lamborghini Revuelto; Kia EV9; HiPhi Z; Ferrari KC23; Lotus Eletre; Caterham project V concept; Nighbolt EV; BMW 5 series / i5; Alpine A290B concept; AIM Ev sport 01; Polestar 5 prototype — and others too. ? We saw a few of these in the most recent Shanghai, New York, and LA Auto Shows, but for most Goodwood visitors they were very new and unique cars to see, and together make for a list with the scale and stature that Geneva would once have been proud of. Auto shows need new and unique cars, and enabling their newness and uniqueness to be experienced as accessibly and richly as possible is a key measure of success.

3. It’s not about selling cars its about showing off what they can do

The brand-store has shown the car industry that sales environments are a major turn-off for many if not most people unless they are actively seeking to buy something (and even then…).?Traditionally auto shows very much sit as an extension to the classic car dealer experience but with more ‘show-biz’ spectacle dialling up their ‘brand-push’ message which is almost always a shouty brag about their cars and their tech and their brand. The FOS has a good chunk of this as brands’ pop-up stores take the brand-store concept and drop it on the grass, but some do offer genuine entertaining and interesting experiences: Hyundai perhaps doing this best with an elegant on-brand stand that offered a spectrum of games and engagements pieces — there was always a queue to plat ’N-Shift’ and the other dedicated fun games on the stand, it was truly stand out. ?

4. It’s about the periphery?

Want to eat at an Auto Show — please help yourself to a sub-motorway service station offer of fast-food vendors squeezed to the sides of the show space by the toilets.?Want to eat at Goodwood — choose from a diverse array of high quality foods offers dotted around the heart of the space with some seating and plenty of grass to sit on.?Maybe have a look too at some of the many esoteric smaller booths selling peripherally automotive goods, or have a ride in one of the many driving simulators or even real-car passenger experiences.?Whilst the headline reason-to-be at the FoS will always be centred on the cars, the quality of the lowest part of the experience will be the unforgettable book-end for the visitor, and for some, the side-shows will even win out over the headline acts.?

Goodwood Festival of Speed is now an established event — 30 years old this year — and one that sits in a space between the classic posh-car concourse d’ elegance, motor-racing event, and music festival in its scale, format, and ambience. Not many shows can do this, although several regions could have one and don’t. But all auto shows could take-away the way this type of social-cultural event focuses on the experience of the car, not the car itself.?They could also focus more on the value of new and unique experiences, on the non-sales orientation of the wider engagement with people that the show has, and the way that peripheral activities at the show broaden how people enjoy being there too.?If Goodwood cracks how you get on and off the site (which is still really poor, unless you helicopter in and out) and maybe helps its car brand customers better see how to curate pop-up experiences, it will be hard to fault.?Even as it stands though, the FoS is a template for a new form of experiential auto show. ?