The Beginning Of The End? MINI Slashes 400 Jobs At Oxford Plant

Good. Its karma for screwing Honda over when they secretly bought Rolls Royce, and they gave Bentley to VW. VW has dieselgate, and now BMW has lost its mojo. And Honda is thriving.

Wow, you have almost no clue what you are talking about.

First Honda was upset at BMW and British Aerospace over the purchase of the Rover group, which at the Honda had a 20% stake in, which they were trying to raise to 50% when British Aerospace sold it to BMW, resulting in Honda having to rethink their global strategy.

BMW sold Range Rover to Ford for 2.9 Billion dollars, kept a few names like MINI then sold the rest of the Rover group (which was a massive money-loser) for 18 dollars and change.

The Rolls Royce sale was completely different. BMW had been supplying engines for Rolls and Bently who at that time was owned the Vickers group, they approached BMW about buy Rolls, BMW expressed interest and the agreed on a price of about 350 million for both Rolls and Bentley. Just before the deal was to close VW swooped in offered 750 million. Vickers at that point said it would have to go to the shareholders for a vote, BMW said they had a deal for 350 Million and the were staying there. The Shareholders chose VW.

VW had not done it's due diligence when the made the offer and BMW had an ace in the hole. The Vickers group did not own the Rolls Nameplate nor the Spirit of Ecstasy image, which was owned by Rolls Roll's Royce Aerospace, which at the time BMW was working with on a private jet. BMW bought the name and logo for 50 million dollars, leave VW with Bentley and the ancient Crew factory.

As far as profits go, Yep Honda makes more money but they are also a much bigger company.

I do believe that BMW has lost some of there Mojo, but still a whole lot more exciting cars than Honda does.

@scenic you proved @tarzan's point about karma.

Mini is such a dead brand...even "Mini of the Hamptons" gave up the franchise a few months ago (the Six Sigma Auto group operates the highly successful BMW, Audi, Porsche, and Jeep/Dodge franchises along a stretch of Montauk Highway in Southampton, NY).

If Mini brand doesn't work in the Hamptons, where does it work?

My friend at BMW Hamptons told me that although there are Mini's in Hamptons, no-one drives them because they are so impractical. He said its rare to have a Mini Convertible that accumulates more than 1,000 to 2,000 miles per year - its people's third/fourth/fifth car that is used for the beach run and that's it.

Other more mainstream Mini's are not really 'repeat customer' cars...they get only one and then usually trade the Mini for a BMW next door or a Subaru.

TO give a sense of how Mini/BMW Corporate has failed to support the brand/retailers, the nearest dealer for Mini warranty work is now about 70 miles away in Huntington, NY). Corporate let a franchise go, in one of the most affluent markets in the nation - lots of Mini customers will be pissed off.

However, I'm sure with that stellar British Mini quality, they will have ample, non-warranty service work despite the low miles. I guess you can service your Mini at a BMW dealer but just can't get warranty work done there.

BMW is nuts if they don't just quickly pull the plug on the whole Mini brand. If Mini is done, can Rolls Royce be far behind?

Mini should have been a model sold in BMW dealers rather than a full-line manufacturer. Mini failed to stay relevant just like the New Beetle and the New New Beetle.

Bye-bye, ta-ta, so long Mini!

They'll blame it on Brexit.