…and he asks us some right back! What sort of people buy Audis? Is quattro useless in Singapore? Who buys Ju-Len lunch, and isn’t print dead?

SINGAPORE – It’s not everyday you get to spend quality time with the head of a car brand here in Singapore, but this occasion was rather unique so we had to make a video out of it.

Firstly, it’s an on-the-move interview in the in the back of the luxurious Audi A8 limo and thankfully, without Ju-Len driving, and secondly we could ask Markus Schuster, the managing director of Audi Singapore, whatever we wanted – with his PR handler powerless to stop us (at least without crashing the car, which is very hard).

So in typical CarBuyer fashion we asked the first things that came to mind: What sort of people buy Audis? Isn’t quattro all-wheel drive useless in no-off-road Singapore?

The bargain was though, that he got to ask us whatever he wanted right back, and the results were quite entertaining. The video is almost 30 minutes long, but it’s well worth a watch if only to see Ju-Len squirm his way out of justifying why a man with no formal engineering experience becomes a Car Judger, and it helps that Mr Schuster is quite personable and animated, and not The Living Edifice Of Audi In Human Guise.

Is Quattro all-wheel drive overkill in Singapore?

Ju-Len: The BMW people did not tell me to ask you this. But I want to know: Quattro. All wheel drive. We’re in Singapore. I mean, isn’t it kind of useless? Should you pay extra for Quattro?

Markus: I knew that was coming! (Quattro) I think it’s still really the best and the safest way to really get the power to the ground. And to move around super safely, also very agile.

Ju-Len: So what you’re saying is, maybe you don’t need it a hundred percent of the time, but there may be situations when you do need it and you’re going to be happy that it’s there. 

Yeah. It’s basically, it’s like an airbag, you don’t need the airbag all the time right? But when you need it, it can save your life. 

Markus: And the thing is, look at the thunderstorms we had last week here in Singapore 

with the flooding and everything. In those conditions, you really want to have all wheel drive because it’s just much safer.

Why is CarBuyer still also a magazine? Isn’t print dead?

Markus: Do you think that printed magazines like you make, are they still relevant to people? 
Ju-Len: To answer your question in short, people do still read magazines (and our magazine). Thousands of people, in fact, and I like to think of it like this okay? 

You have the Audi brand, right? And it stands for certain things. You know, quality, engineering, that sort of thing. We have the Carbuyer brand, which stands for certain things as well, sort of good advice for people. 

And we have different models. One model is the magazine, one model is our YouTube channel, one model is the website. We have the same core values. We wanna be simple, timely, authoritative, and relevant. 

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