4 June 2001: Land Rover has introduced a Women's Panel into the product development process, to ensure the views of female customers have been fully considered at every stage.

The group, which is comprised of women volunteers from within the company, extends across a range of levels, backgrounds and areas of expertise within Land Rover.

The panel will be shown anything from vehicle sections, such as dashboard executions, through to full vehicle concepts. They will be giving their views on all aspects of future product design and execution, so that the next generation of Land Rovers can appeal to a wider range of consumer than ever before.

"This is not about developing cars for one or other sex," said Anne Youngson, Manager Special Vehicle Operations. "It's about drawing on the opinions we have available within Land Rover to make sure we've considered all of our potential customers fully."

The group starts work next week with an exclusive viewing of a suggested new incarnation of a current Land Rover vehicle. The group will appraise the vehicle statically in the first instance, trying out the switchgear, comfort and ease of seat adjustments, ingress and egress as well as the ergonomics. Their comments will be fed back formally into the product development process.

Women buyers take up a 43% share of the new car market in Britain, with estimates of their percentage of influence on total car purchases as high as 80% when joint family purchases are taken into account. The new Land Rover initiative builds on the company's already successful record in accommodating the female customer. Future products will be geared increasingly to catering for customers of either gender and of all ages.

"The types of recommendations we expect the panel to be making are likely to be practical changes that will make the vehicles more accessible to the less traditional buyer," added Youngson.