A Case Of Double Vision

Inchcape Singapore Managing Director Jasmmine Wong has her eyes set on the future of the automotive industry, but it doesn’t mean she has lost sight of the opportunities and challenges that are right in front of her

- Marc Almagro

I never expected to be selling cars, or to be working in the car industry, but here I am,” Ms. Jasmmine Wong, managing director of Inchcape Singapore, says. Her remarkable energy and enthusiasm fill up the room where she is being prepped for her pictorial. “Don’t get me wrong – I love cars, it’s a passion that I share with my husband, and it helps me in my job, but that’s not the only thing that got me here.” Ms. Wong is the first female to lead Borneo Motors (Singapore) Pte Ltd, the authorized distributor and retailer of Toyota, Lexus and Hino in Singapore. Borneo Motors, in turn, is owned by London-based multinational automotive distribution, retail and services company Inchcape plc.

Ms. Wong clearly brought with her a keen understanding of consumer behavior, albeit something that she honed while at Nestle. Selling a car and selling a chocolate drink, she explains, share more interesting commonalities than we realize – a lot of which are worked out inside the consumer’s minds. “But buying a car is a long-drawn out decision. The customer himself may not even realize the factors that have accrued over time and finally brought him to the point where he drives the car out of the showroom.

“What we do is to give them information to make a better decision. It may not be straightforward advertising, but planting key information that a customer can accumulate and use as he goes through multiple consumer touch points.” It may be subtly worked into a lifestyle scenario, such as taking the family out on a weekend to Sentosa, or a girlfriend to a fancy dinner, where the need for the right vehicle – a hatchback or a sedan – can be suggested. “When we do advertising, when we do communication, we try to put them in the right spots.”