Commentary

Test Drive: Polestar 3 Not Just A Rebranded Volvo

Although the Polestar 3 shares some parts with the Volvo EX90, the electric vehicle offers some important points of distinction. 

For starters, the vehicle is shorter, has a lower profile and drives much more like a sports car than its Volvo counterpart. The 2024 Polestar 3 provides performance comparable to the EX90, with the base motor offering 489 horsepower while the upgraded model packs 517 horsepower.

Perhaps even more notable, the Polestar 3 is less expensive, with a starting MSRP of $74,800 while the similarly equipped Volvo EX90 starts at $81,290.

Polestar began as the performance division of Volvo before spinning off as its own division. The two brands currently have some overlap, but with the upcoming Polestar 4 and 5 the offshoot will step further away from the mother ship, although customers can still obtain service at Volvo dealerships. 

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I recently had some time behind the wheel of the Polestar 3 and was impressed with its handling, comfort and aesthetic appeal. I love that the technology is thoughtful — the brand has gone out of its way to make the safety systems helpful and not annoying. It’s a smart move, because what good are safety features if customers turn off the notifications because they are intrusive or overly “nanny”-like?

Despite its sporty feel, there is loads of thoughtful storage, including a clever below the rear floor area with a fold-up cover that can be configured into multilevels. 

Polestar is still growing its brand awareness, although it made a splash with a Super Bowl spot in 2022. Now, the brand is focusing on social media and using influencers to get the word out about its growing line of vehicles. 

Kim Bolan, Polestar senior manager, digital and social media, is coming off a stint of filling in as head of brand marketing in the U.S.  Her new boss as of July is Michael Cardini, who joins the company from the agency side of the business. His background includes stints at Noble People, GroupM, MindShare and Horizon Media. 

Bolan’s task as of late has been working with a group of content creators who have been posting their impressions of Polestar on social media -- mainly Instagram. 

“From a content creation standpoint, we have basically started from the ground up,” Bolan tells Drive Time. “We're working with tech audiences as well as people who are really into EVs and some automotive. They get to experience the car kind of out in the wild, and the feedback is fantastic. So, we're doing a lot of that, and more to come as Polestar 3 is introduced to our customers.”

TikTok isn’t a channel the brand has done much with thus far, she says. 

“A lot of trends on TikTok are fun, but it really doesn't match the brand,” Bolan says. “Twitter —X— is really managed by our PR central team.”

During Polestar Day last year, the automaker partnered with 19 content creators and influencers. 

"They posted all these great stories, and it was brand-centric,” Bolan says. 

Four influencers were brought back to experience the Polestar 3 in a more product-centric way, she says. 

“So we're doing more and more of it,” Bolan says. “And I'm just so excited to get started. As the Polestar 3 is coming out, we'll have a lot of exposure that way to introduce people to our brand, to audiences that we're just not normally reaching.”

Reaching tech-focused consumers makes a lot of sense for the brand, she says. 

"With EVs, tech and EVs go hand in hand,” Bolan says. “It's really interesting — as people are doing their research, they’re turning to content creators to get that information. So it's really great that we're branching out into that space and hopefully we'll just be growing more and more.”

Current Polestar marketing is globally focused, but eventually it will make sense to focus on specific markets, she says. 

“That's kind of the next chapter for us: How do we get our own local versions of the brand and become Polestar USA or even Polestar Canada?” Bolan says. “You can still repurpose a lot of the centralized content, but also branch out and do some more localized events and just activities that we're working on. So I think that's down the road for us.”

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