The Lamborghini Urus sports utility outsells everything else Lamborghini makes and has drawn scores of new customers to the brand best known for shard-glass sports cars.
Supercar purists have harshly criticized SUVs for the sport utility vehicle’s foray into their beloved brands. But the Urus shows that even high-end exotic car buyers find SUVs irresistible.
The 2021 Urus starts at nearly $ 220,000, a very high price for an everyday family vehicle. That’s truly what the Urus is meant to be: a Lamborghini that someone can drive every day and use like the countless SUVs that now fill segments in the middle of the auto market.
Vehicle specifications and reviews for the Urus indicate that the vehicle is impressively versatile. It can drive from 0 to 100 miles per hour in 3.2 seconds, remarkably fast acceleration for any vehicle, no matter an SUV. And it’s designed to handle like a proper sports car on a race track. But Lamborghini also outfitted the Urus for off-road driving, something Lamborghini is not known for.
But while some have said that the Urus could be the ultimate all-rounder, there are some who have criticized its design for straying too far from the sleek, ragged shapes that Lamborghini is famous for. The Urus has also annoyed some sports car purists, in the same way that Porsche’s SUVs have.
Some supercar makers remain on the sidelines of the SUV craze. British automaker McLaren is one of those companies and says it doesn’t need an SUV to remain profitable. Other companies have apparently given up after some reluctance. For example, Ferrari is reported to be working on its own SUV, after years of internal resistance.
The Urus and its success are signs that Lamborghini is becoming a different company than it has been for most of its history. Now it has to survive in a market where sales of sport utility vehicles have increased dramatically. In the premium and super premium segment alone, SUVs went from just under 12% of total global vehicle sales in 2000 to 50% in 2020, according to LMC Automotive.
Decades ago, vehicles like the Jeep Cherokee, Ford Explorer, and Toyota RAV4 began to bring the sport utility vehicle concept to the masses. Now high-end manufacturers, including some who have resisted, are watching the market go and choosing not to fight it. Trends often descend from premium segments to the mass market, said Jeff Schuster, president of global forecasting for LMC Automotive.
“Now we are seeing that change where the main trend has led premium brands to introduce SUVs in their market,” he said.