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Two years ago I was talking to a salesman in one of the local Porsche dealerships, and asked him what sales were like in Dec. He said they sold 19 Cayennes, 2 911s and 0 Boxsters. Without the Cayenne, they might as well have closed the showroom until after the first of the year.
While all of us on this forum are certified sports car nuts, the fact of the business is that the majority of car buyers could not care less about a car with two seats an no luggage room to speak of.
The dealership I was in will probably sell a dozen Panameras a month by accident to people that came in to look at an A8 or some such.
Porsche is desperate to break 100,000 units a year, and the only way they can do it is to introduce cars that appeal to non-traditional Porsche buyers.
As for the Cayman, Porsche has variously defined the target market as "sporting drivers" and now "younger drivers". This tells me that they aren't sure where the market for that car really is. In any event, welding a top on the Box was an easy and probably cheap development project, and filled a presumed gap in their product line between the Boxster and the 911.
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