Market Watch

Despite the hype surrounding it, the hybrid 918 Spyder did not sell like hot cakes when it went on sale in late 2013, a hypercar insider tells us. But that was before people realised that ‘you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone’.

- David Sutherland

Part of the trick of selling a hyper car is to build in its legacy before the first example is delivered, ensuring that when the usually limited production run ends, the car slips effortlessly from dream new car to legendary, super-coveted status. But despite Porsche being the purveyor of the world’s greatest sports cars, historically it has not managed that process well, as evidenced by its first two truly exotic Porsche road cars, the 1986 all wheel-drive, turbocharged 959, and the 2003 to 2007 carbon-bodied, V10-powered Carrera GT.

The former was under priced, leading to an early and massive inflation in values, thus depriving Porsche of revenue that could have been in its, rather than speculators’ bank accounts. By contrast the latter was too expensive for the time, at £310,000, leaving Porsche unable to find buyers for all 1500 Carrera GTs, and cutting the run to 1270.

It seemed that Porsche had for a third time misjudged pricing when, after an extended period of drip feeding information to the press, it finally launched the sensational hybrid 918 Spyder in late 2013, priced at around £850,000 before options. A total of 918 cars were to be built, and wealthy customers were expected to form a cheque book flapping queue.