The Everyday Ferrari

Driving the most market-researched exotic in history

- Angus MacKenzie

Market research never created a great car. No one asked GM to build a Corvette or Ford a Mustang. The engineers and entrepreneurs who made cars that changed the world— Ettore Bugatti and Ferdinand Porsche, Henry Royce and André Citroën, to name but a few—built what they knew was right, not something shaped by the opinions of others. So what, then, are we to make of the 2019 Ferrari Portofino, the most market-researched new Ferrari in history?

Deep breath ... the Portofino is not a great Ferrari. Maranello’s newest GT joins a lineup that includes both the scintillating 488 GTB (our 2017 Best Driver’s Car) and the spectacular 812 Superfast, and it’s competing with a back catalog crammed with glories such as the 275 GTB and the Enzo. Viewed in that context, the Portofino is simply a very good Ferrari. Faint praise, be damned: It’s the perfect Ferrari for those who want a fast and elegant, refined and luxuriously equipped 21st century gran turismo they can drive 24/7

At a shade over 200 grand, the Portofino replaces the California, the best-selling Ferrari ever and a car that has transformed the iconic Italian sports car builder’s customer base: Roughly 70 percent of Californias are owned by people who had never owned a Ferrari before, says Ferrari marketing chief Nicola Boari. It is, he grins, “one of those rare moments where a marketing target became reality.”