Jaguar Land Rover filed a lawsuit against Ineos Automotive, claiming its Grenadier looked too much like the old Defender.Matt Bubbers/The Globe and Mail
Ineos Automotive is an unusual startup in that it’s not coming into the car market with a sleek, futuristic electric vehicle like Tesla, Rivian, Lucid, Fisker and many others have.
Instead, the British company, spun out from petrochemical giant Ineos Group in 2017, came out of the gate with a decidedly old-school gas-burning SUV called the Grenadier. Think of it as a new old-fashioned off-roader. Canadian deliveries finally began in 2024.
Late last year, Gregor Hembrough left his job as the head of Polestar USA to join Ineos Automotive as its executive vice-president for the Americas. A few weeks into his new job, he spoke to The Globe and Mail about the company’s outlook for the Canadian market, quality issues, Grenadier customers and what to expect from the brand’s coming smaller SUV.
Ineos Grenadier SUV is a billionaire’s pet project that (kind of) works
What’s the outlook for Ineos Automotive in Canada, particularly given the overwhelming popularity of SUVs and pickups?
The Canadian market is looking very buoyant right now, more resilient than the U.S. at this point [in November 2024].
What I see is just under two million cars being sold in the Canadian marketplace, which, unlike in the U.S., will be the best since pre-COVID. What makes it even more interesting for me is the growth in the SUV and pickup truck segment in the Canadian market. So it’s a good time to bring the Grenadier wagon and Quartermaster [pickup] into the marketplace.
How many Grenadiers have been delivered in Canada?
We don’t publicly talk about the sales numbers at this stage of our journey. There are 20,000 Grenadiers already on the road globally, and that’s just since the sales start [in 2023].
How big is the current Canadian dealer network and any expansion plans?
Two, we have Dilawri in Toronto and Weissach in Vancouver. We’re looking at adding a location in Calgary [this year]. We’ll continue taking a look at whether markets such as Montreal and Quebec City or even one in the Maritimes start making some sense.
How many employees does the company have?
Globally, we’re just about 2,000. Here in North America, between headquarters (in North Carolina) and field based, we’re somewhere just under 50.
What has been done to fix the Grenadier’s teething issues? I’m thinking about the door seals that would peel off and annoying beeps from the overspeed warning.
The overspeed warning is something they aim for drivers to be able to toggle off and for it to stay off. We’re looking at early 2025 as far as having that fix.
The door seals have been fixed in production and there’s also a service bulletin on that. The other one that some customers might have experienced is some dripping from the safari windows on the Fieldmaster. That’s been rectified in production and fixed. The last one was a door button that sticks in sometimes and that’s been fixed as well. By and large – and again I have 34 years in the [automotive] business – those things are incredibly minor when you’re launching a brand new vehicle. For me, one of the things that impressed me the most when I was deciding to come across to the company was the fit and finish and the quality.
Who is the typical Ineos customer?
We’re seeing customers where this is the first car in their driveway; it’s their daily driver. But we’re also seeing customers where this is the third or fourth car in their driveway.
The predominant trade-in right now in North America is the Land Rover Defender. We’re also seeing trade-ups from Bronco and Wrangler. We’re seeing trade-overs from the Mercedes-Benz G-Wagon. And then we’re seeing a little bit of everything in between, from Ford F-150 Raptors to anything under the sun.
In the North American market, [customers] have an ultraluxury budget and they’re buying Grenadier because of the uniqueness, not the ubiquity.
What income bracket are we talking about?
In the U.S., it’s $500,000-plus household income.
These drivers could afford a Bentley SUV, or an electric G-Class. The materials and finish in those machines are, frankly, head-and-shoulders above the Grenadier. How are you pulling in those luxury customers?
We know from our early customers we have some hardcore overlanders in the U.S. and even in Canada as well. These are the early adopters that not only wish to get away for the weekend, but actually do. In fact, it’s more than a weekend, it’s weeks. They live on the grid, and they live off the grid as well.
Climbing into the sky-high cabin requires an awkward leaping lunge using the door and/or steering wheel for leverage.Matt Bubbers/The Globe and Mail
As you start getting past the early adopters and start going into a little bit of mass-market, you’re starting to capture customers with the escapism-type mentality. These are the people that get the Grenadier Trialmaster with the raised air intake so they can take their mountain bike to a park and go ride it off-road. You know, quite honestly, this is me. I can’t wait until the snowfall comes so I can get down my driveway and back up again with zero problems.
What can you say about future product plans, and the smaller Ineos Fusilier EV that was reportedly shelved?
We’re a very small company right now. We don’t have the ability, we don’t have the luxury, of having a misstep. We’ve got to swing for the fences and appeal to the mass market.
That being said, the Fusilier, which is a smaller version of in the Ineos portfolio, is still within our life cycle. So that car is still coming. I believe what you’ll see is probably something that’ll be much more akin to a hybrid rather than a full electric. We felt that a hybrid approach – where we have a range extender, so the internal combustion engine will be a small one – will be very efficient.
Why should customers trust Ineos enough to spend $100,000 on a vehicle from an upstart automaker? It seems risky, especially after the messy collapse of Fisker.
We’re playing in a very established market; we’re going into an SUV segment with an internal combustion engine, albeit with a unique product proposal.
The Ineos brand is extremely well capitalized. Ineos Automotive is a brand that lies within a portfolio of 20-something other brands that rolls up to Ineos. We’re not a standalone company.
This interview has been edited and condensed.