Video: Disgruntled Lamborghini owner sledgehammers Gallardo

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By Tim Beissmann | March 16th, 2011

A frustrated Chinese millionaire has destroyed his faulty 2010 Lamborghini Gallardo supercar following numerous mechanical issues and poor treatment from service staff.

According to China Car Times, the former Lamborghini owner decided the best way to draw attention to his plight was to take to his black bull with a few sledgehammers, aligning the day of destruction with World Consumer Rights Day on March 15 for maximum exposure.

The man reportedly purchased his vehicle around six months ago for between $534,000 and $764,000 but could not get the engine to start on November 29 last year.

Servicemen at the Qingdao Lamborghini dealership towed the car to their garage, damaging the bumper and chassis in the process.

When the man went to collect his Gallardo, he found the new problems and noticed that the engine had still not been fixed. The dealer refused to take responsibility.

He then tried to take his frustrations right to the top, unsuccessfully attempting to contact Lamborghini CEO Stephan Winkelmann.

With no one listening to his pleas for assistance, he decided the best way to get attention/revenge and make a statement about his consumer rights was to publically pummel his problem car.

During the event, the man said he was disappointed Lamborghini had not accompanied its world famous vehicles with high quality after-sales service in China.

He said booming sales had made China one of the Italian brand’s most important global markets in recent years, and insisted Lamborghini needed to treat its new customers with more respect.

pezza

Classic……. a shame….. but still classic

jeremy

Imagine the damage this publicity could cause in a growing market like China!
Steve

Silly man, he’s filmed himself smashing his own car. No insurance claim for him.

Arky

Presumably he can afford it.

Anthony

I’d still buy it, I think that damage can be buffed out
AB

If should have done this to all the poor quality chinese product I’ve bought !

Evilution

Did you pay half a million dollars for the poor quality Chinese product?

AB

Did more than half a billion people buy poor quality chinese products?

Evilution

Did half a billion people bought poor quality chinese products with a gun held to their head?

d

That doesn’t even make any sense at all

Hansome_AL

So are you trying to say that Lamborghini products are produced in the same quality of Cheap Chinese products that you are referring too?? if that the case, then lamborghini is much worse than the Chinese… At least the chinese charge their products cheaply..

C’mon AB, if you buy something cheap, you should now that it might have its own disadvantages, but when you buy something expensive, do you still expecting it to break easily?? c’mon AB I guess you are the person who fixed his car right… I can see the resemblance of brain level there…

Evilution

It means nobody forced anyone to buy poor quality chinese products. Its a matter of choice and consumers are responsible for their own choices. After all, you get what you paid for but in this case, if you paid half a million on a top end car, the least you expect is a letter of apology from Italy and willingness to rectify it.

AB

As would also like a letter of apology everytime my poor quality chinese product breaks!

dadarjapit

You’re totally missing the point here.

The “poor quality Chinese product” that you’re referring to are mass produced on the cheap, so if it breaks, it breaks. If you’re expecting them to track ALL, every single one person who buys their products, then I don’t have anything else to say to you.

But Lamborghini don’t produce thousands of their products PER DAY, and if you’re paying half a million dollar for something, then you would EXPECT them to take care of their customers..

What makes you expect the same level of service for the “poor quality Chinese products” that you bought? The key word being “poor quality”.

dadarjapit

I think his anger towards Lamborghini after-sales service is totally reasonable.
But its how he handled it that wasn’t. Truly outrageous.
nobody

You have no idea what “luxury goods” mean, no wonder you are confused

Mr Plow

Someone should take a sledgehammer to the owner for being such a rich, spoilt brat.

Anthony

I don’t think so. If one can’t expect near perfection after spending over half a $mill on a car then when can one expect perfection?

He’s possibly a dick-head for spending that much on a car anyway… but then again he’s rich, so he’s not weird, he’s eccentric!

JEKYL & HYDE

makes for a great poster in the porsche/ferrari showrooms…

Damian

Porsche and Ferrari should edit the clip to have a Matt Damon voice-over, explaining the background behind the carnage. Then have the clip on “repeat” in every one of their showrooms.

Andrew

Why him? That movie would suck…

*Smash*
“Matt Damon!”
*Smash, smash, SMASH*
“Matt DAMON!”

Ima Hogg

At least sell it and make some money and give that money to charity.
http://beltedradial.blogspot.com beltedradial

The customer service rep should be strapped in a chair, Clockwork Orange style complete with eye drops, and forced to watch this from start to finish.

Really, is customer service that difficult (on average)?
MD

I dont see how destroying the car will make Lamborghini take notice and start treating customers any differently. If someone buys their product, then is not happy with it and destroys it, what should Lambo do? replace the destroyed car?

I find his actions quite pointless…..

Andrew

This is the information age. People all over the world have seen this. Potentially now, Richie Rich has seen this, had second thoughts about that new Aventador he was considering and is now heading to Ferrari for an FF.

Not really a realistic situation for at least 85% of the worlds population, but the lucky few do have that ‘problem’

Lars

More money than sense. Shows again that money can not buy everything.
Sumpguard

This will end up all over the news for sure. Not good publicity for Lamborghini but then that’s the point.
Patrick

I think it’s the Chinese people who took care of his car that are to blame for. Not the Company itself…

Evilution

If you read the passage properly, it mentioned that the Lambo owner took the issue to the top but got no reply from the CEO of Lambo. Nice try, trying to pass the blame to the Chinese.

The Voice of Reason

How hard would it have been for the CEO to get a delegate (or even his bloody secretary) to pen a reply that would have made the owner felt like someone was listening?

Just bloody arrogance.

Hansome_AL

I guess the CEO must be thinking…”Hmm, 1 Disgruntled unhappy Chinese man??, well there are about a billion of them to go.. So.. What the heck… why bother??” and his finance director also thinks.. “Ohh we might lose 1 person market.. oh well.. we have about 1 million untapped rich chinese people, if 500,000 go to buy Ferraris, that is still 500,000 to go to capture.. So what the heck… “

mmmmmm

I dream of doing this to my rubbish quality apple iMac
Damian

Great publicity for Lamborghini, since this will make it on all 12 CCTV channels in China, as well as the inevitable Youtube viral spread.
My Cars Called T-Rex

“World Consumer Rights Day on March 15″

Did anyone in Australia hear about this before march 15??

Why does china mark world comsumer rights day(and we don’t) when there poor standards are the main reason for exporting poor quality goods to consumers in other countrys.

Anti spam word Lambo

Damian

“Why does china mark world comsumer rights day(and we don’t) when there poor standards are the main reason for exporting poor quality goods to consumers in other countrys.”

Because if it wasn’t for China exporting these “poor quality goods” you speak of, your price of living would be exponentially increased.

I find it ironic how people piss and whine about the Chinese manufacturing cheap goods, when 90% of their possessions are made in China.

My Cars Called T-Rex

So China marks CRD because there exporting poor qualiy goods!!!makes sence to you maybe.

My Cars Called T-Rex

And why does our dumbass gov not inform us of world consumer rights day.

Thanks to them we are a consumtion nation.

To the millonaire who smashed the lambo,Good on you
If i had that much money to burn i’d make my point in the same way.

FTSII

It shows that even with a vehicle of that price, the quality is not better or even worse then a Korean or Japanese car tenth of its price.

tekkyy

to be fair cars are built with different goals in mind

I wouldn’t buy a fancy car and hope it’ll be reliable as reliable as a car built to be robust
it just doesn’t make engineering sense

Adonis

Yeah but if you drop 500+ large on a car you expect it to start

Mikko

Is the millionaire a Triad boss? I counted only 7 sledgehammer hits from him for the cameras. The rest is being done by his minions. It would be better if he did all the damage himself.
Dan

Well if he is not happy with that service, we can strike out him buying a car from a Ford dealer here, when he is on holidays.

pezza

Ford dealer and Mazda are the best in my local area…… did however hear a story about a nissan dealer trying to tell a customer he need to pay for 1 out of the THREE recalls that had been issued for his Navara. For a tailgate that decides to spring open on corrugated roads none the less (if thats not a safety issue I dont know what is!)

Jimmy

It would be perfect as he was watching his Lambo getting smashed to pieces he realised he didn’t have his foot on the clutch when trying to start it.
Jober As A Sudge

Ned – “Whatcha diddely-doin’, neighbor?”
Homer – “Putting speed holes in my car. Makes it go faster.”
Jacob Martyn

Thanks to this i now know there is “World Consumer Rights Day”!
Lovin it…….real

Is he sure he got the genuine thing….and not a Chinese ripoff?

nobody

most of the people I see using fake luxury goods are non-Chinese 0_0 seriously

TMG

Please use the term “my local Ford dealer” and perhaps name them or shame them, as some are a lot better then others, if your not happy with the service, take it else where,they (Ford dealers and others) seem to be on every corner in SEQ if it’s not possible (you live in the country) or the Lambo’s case in point (probably on one dealer in the city) go higher, and see what happens. or use a sledge hammer…

Adonis

smash it and film it – I dare you

vti07

All the people whinging about unreliable/undurable imported product must not forget how much they really cost to manufacture. Eg. A toaster might only cost $2 to make but retail at $20. Think about how much a worker gets paid? Now why would they bother to assemble the product properly or use durable parts? It’s all about maximising profits for the importer/wholesaler/retailer.

Back on topic, this video clearly illustrates the massive gap between the rich and the poor.
SZQ

great strategic move
john

hand built, hand destroyed
ohyea

now he can upgrade to a great wall ute with awesome power, and 0-100 in 14 seconds!
SteveSV

What he should’ve done to really get it up Lamborghini’s nose is that if this bloke can afford to buy this car & also do this to it, then he should’ve gotten 2 or 3 Ferrari’s, chain each one to certain points of the Gallardo & tell em all to floor it.

Ferrari would love it & I’m sure the guys at Lamborghini would be less than impressed seeing one of their cars being ripped apart by a pack of prancing horses!!
TimSimms

He gets mad at Lamborghini so he smashes his own property? I’m trying hard, but I can’t make any sense of this. Can you say ‘cut off your nose to spite your face?’ This is just stupid.

evo

To me his action was to hold up the consumer rights up high by doing something few can and would do – to show big companies that they need to take care of their customers and that not doing so has a negative repercussion

There’s a lot of companies (tend to be the large ones) that tend to only help the ones that kick and scream, and not the ones that politely ask for help.

John

What a shame it only needed a new spark plug

elliot

you are right but hard to get got to get the one from the factore thets what i did with mine

elliot

first he is a dumb ass thats not even a 2010 that is a 05 or 06 back tall lights are not like that on a 2010 and he got ript off you can get one of those here for arond 200000 and 100000 trust me i got 2 and they are not like that
gearboxdawg

What a shame to see a half million car destroyed. Italian luxury car manufacturers should make their cars more reliable and better after sales service. This public stunt is going to hurt them in the long run in the world’s biggest auto market.