Note: this post was first published in May 2022. The figures have been updated and the thinking developed for this Hub version.
Engineer a classless product. Create a classless service.
VW have produced the Golf since 1974; fifty-two years and have sold over 37 million of them globally, making it the best-selling Volkswagen of all time and one of the best-selling cars in the history of the automobile. Remarkable does not quite cover it.
What I find fascinating about the Golf’s sales figures is not their scale alone, but their consistency across more than half a century of economic turbulence, geopolitical upheaval, technological disruption, and shifting consumer taste. Most products that achieve significant initial sales fade within a generation. The Golf has outlasted recessions, fuel crises, the rise of the SUV, the electric vehicle revolution, and the digital transformation of the automotive industry itself.
Now in its eighth generation, the Golf remains the top-selling car in Germany and Austria. The principle that built it is as relevant today as it was in 1974.
What classless means #
I believe the Golf’s longevity has a great deal to do with class, or more precisely, with the complete absence of it. And I don’t mean this negatively. Quite the opposite.
The Golf looks equally at home parked outside a mansion as it does outside a suburban semi. An owner feels equally comfortable driving their Golf down the Kings Road in Chelsea as they do using it for the school run. A farmer would trust it. A student would aspire to it. A managing director and a first-year apprentice would make the same shortlist independently and arrive at the same decision.
Its reputation for reliability, affordability, and driving enjoyment has earned it a loyal customer base and numerous awards, including multiple Car of the Year titles. But those credentials are the result of the classless principle rather than the cause of it. The Golf didn’t earn loyalty by being the best car at any one thing. It earned loyalty by being genuinely good at the things that matter to real people; consistently, affordably, and without pretension. Southernteamvolkswagen
This is what classless means as a product philosophy: a product that serves people rather than a class of people. Quality that is genuine rather than performative. Value that is accessible without being cheap.
The variants that amplify the core #
VW’s execution of the classless principle is worth understanding in detail, because it contains the most instructive lesson for any business trying to apply it.
The core Golf remained consistent. Reliable. Recognisable. Every generation preserved the essential qualities of the one before while improving on them. But VW understood that while the base product served most people well, different buyers within the same broad audience had different specific priorities.
So, they engineered variants. The GTI for performance enthusiasts who wanted to trade fuel economy for driving excitement. The R for those who wanted something closer to a sports car beneath an unassuming exterior. Eco-friendly models for buyers with environmental priorities. Estate versions for families who needed the boot space. Each variant added features that mattered to its specific audience, but the fundamental Golf character remained unchanged across all of them.
The GTI and R variants have continued to perform strongly. In the first half of 2024 in the United States, GTI sales jumped by 156% year-on-year and Golf R sales increased by 125%. These are performance variants of a fundamentally classless product; proof that bolting on carefully chosen extras for specific buyers does not dilute the core appeal. It amplifies it.
The clever part, as I wrote in 2022, is identifying which extras to cost-effectively bolt on for each type of buyer. Not everything for everyone, but the right things for the right people, built on a foundation that works for all of them.
What this means for a service business #
Translate the Golf’s architecture into the world of business services, and the parallel is direct.
You are not trying to be everything to everyone. You are not chasing the premium market with jargon and exclusivity, nor racing to the bottom with discounted commoditisation. You are building something classless; genuinely useful to a broad range of people within your market, consistently delivered, and priced in a way that reflects real value without artificial inflation or unnecessary cheapness.
The core service stays consistent. The quality of thinking, the relationship-first approach, the genuine interest in what the client is trying to achieve; these do not change depending on who is buying. What changes is the specific application: different variants, the same core character.
For many growing businesses to succeed in the long run, one way of increasing their chances is by engineering their product or service to appeal to a broad range of tastes, budgets, and preferences. What must remain consistent throughout is the basic feel, quality, and approach. The clever part is identifying which thoughtfully chosen extras to offer for each type of buyer.
That is the principle. And it is more durable than any marketing trend, any algorithm, or any passing competitive advantage that cleverness alone can manufacture.
Thank you for reading.
Author: Richard Bull-Domican, founder of New Era Financial Introductions, a B2B lead generation consultancy with over twenty years of experience. The perspectives shared here come from two decades in the field; not theory, but practice.
I create small, digestible guides on Gumroad for business owners who hate aggressive tactics and prefer relationship-led approaches. New resources are added regularly. For longer reads on lead generation and the human side of sales, follow me on Medium and join the daily conversation on LinkedIn.
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