No one is laughing now. Since Volkswagen took control in 1991, Skoda has been transformed by German know-how (and $2 billion cash) into Europe’s fastest-growing manufacturer. Turnover has jumped ninefold in the past decade, and 81 percent of last year’s 450,000 new Skodas went to foreign buyers. Two new models, the family-size Octavia and the mini-scale Fabia, have picked up a clutch of awards for customer satisfaction. This week the classy new Superb sedan–aimed at big-spending business types–goes on display at the Frankfurt Motor Show. Comparing the Skoda story to a particularly melodramatic episode of “Dallas,” the old TV soap opera, the tabloid Mirror called it “history’s greatest comeback since Bobby Ewing stepped out of the shower.”
For Czechs, this is a happy return to the precommunist past. Founded in 1895, Skoda was known by the 1920s as “the Rolls-Royce of Central Europe,” according to company literature. Later it would expand into armaments, and the allure of controlling Skoda was one reason Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia in 1939. Even under communist control after the war, the company never quite lost its engineering reputation. Beside the stinky two-stroke Trabants and Wartburgs of East Germany, which were never sold in the West, Skoda reeked of class. Says Alfredo Filippone of the Association of European Motor Manufacturers: “Certainly they were behind everyone else, but at least they kept the flame alive.”
Now Skoda hopes to rekindle Czech prestige, and sees the new Superb sedan as the car of Czech cabinet ministers. One problem. New models are little more than reshaped Volkswagens, rolling out of a German-designed factory at Mlada Boleslav near Prague. The Octavia is a stretched Golf, the Fabia is a close cousin to the Polo. Says Christian Breitsprecher, a motor-industry analyst in Frankfurt: “They may say they are making Skodas but everyone knows it’s all Volkswagen technology.”
The business logic is simple. Volkswagens have become so popular that demand is pushing up prices, threatening the loyalty of fans who fell in love with the original cheap, reliable “People’s Car.” Buying into Skoda was an easy way to come up with an affordable new brand, using inexpensive Czech labor. VW has gradually increased its stake and now owns Skoda outright. The new Skodas are seen by auto historians as direct descendants of VWs of the 1930s. Says Viennese taxi driver and Skoda convert Viktor Thums: “It’s really like an old Volkswagen. It may not be quite as comfortable [as other models], but it just runs and runs and runs.”
It took some time to convince the public of Skoda’s new German virtues. Company ads distinguish the new car by spoofing the original. In Britain, TV spots play on the notion that the new-look Skoda is just too good to be a Skoda. One features a baffled parking-lot attendant who tells a Skoda owner that “vandals” appear to have stuck a Skoda insignia on his car. Says the British market-research guru Peter York: “You had to give the old Skoda a ritual burial that would allow people to acknowledge their feelings.”
The rebirth of Skoda as a German car doesn’t bother most Czechs, who are pragmatic about their history as a shrimp among the giants of Europe. One of the first Czech privatizations, the successful Skoda sale paved the way for others. And remaining independent wasn’t in the cards, says Milan Poslt, the Skoda-driving deputy mayor of Mlada Boleslav: “The plant would probably not have survived without the investment, which brought a new approach to work and improved quality.” Today Skoda still accounts for one in two new cars sold in the Czech Republic, and its market share is on the rise. German owners are no turnoff to Czech consumers. For Skoda marketing director Dieter Eichelmann, the bottom line is this: “Skoda is no joke anymore.”
