For years I have seen the glossy, multi-page WeatherTech floor mat ads in R&T. Finally decided to see if they had anything for the S-Type. Got on their website, populated the "Shop by Vehicle" side bar with "Jaguar/2008/S-Type", hit Submit, and up popped a page with "Available Products for Your 2008 Jaguar S-Type". Pictures and all. Great, so I ordered the "Floor Mats All-Weather".

What arrived was a joke. Not even close to fitting the S-Type. The rear mats were so big that they did not even fit in behind the front seats. The front mats had a geometry so far off that they did not remotely lie flat on the floor, and there was nothing to match the floor anchoring fixtures (paging Toyota and the amazing acceleration-inducing floor mats).

I wrote them an exceedingly cheesed-off e-mail. A synopsis of their response was: "Oh, we never said that they were designed to fit your car." Ummm - then why does your website pictorially suggest otherwise on the page for a specific application??? As a great favor, because I was so obviously upset, they offered to refund the cost of the mats (plus the shipping - which they said was contrary to their usual policy). However, I did have to eat the shipping for the return of the mats.

They did refund my original expenditure. Henceforth, I will not even glance at their glossy ads.

 

Wow! What a crappy deal. I hate stuff like that. I ordered exhaust mid-pipes for my Lighting, after waiting 6 weeks and SEVERAL emails and phone calls later... they finally told me that they have not bean in stock for over 6 months, and no word from the manufacture when a new shipment willbe available. Websight has 7 in stock!!! WTF they told me a seporate company does invatory, they just take money. Fianlly got refund after 3 months. $800.00 pluss!!!

Online shopping---> 90% GREAT DEAL / 10% WTF!!!

 

When I had my 370Z I called periodically to see if they had all weather mats, they kept telling me that they'd be available soon, but they never were for two years. I finally told the lady that instead of 400+ page ads in every magazine I open perhaps they should take that money and acutally make products. Morons.

 

What a bunch of crap. The worse thing you can do is screw something up and then try and put it back on the customer. makes you want to drive there and kick someone in the crotch!

 

At least they refunded you in other words they were not scam

 

Obviously it was not a scam - I never even suggested that. It was merely exceedingly poor customer service. Plus it looks like mine was not the only such experience. In fact, in their initial response to my whingeing complaint e-mail, they sent me a reply referring to the problem with mats for my "2007 Endeavour". To which I replied - Endeavour, what Endeavor....we are talking about a Jaguar S-Type. Sigh...

Turning to a wider focus...I don't know about youse guys, but I am getting increasingly appalled at the quality of customer service provided by commercial entities in general. I seem to blow more and more time thrashing through all sorts of screw-ups - car parts, medical billings, ladies garments (on behalf of my 91 year old mother!), it just goes on and on. Basically, I am a positivist and think that most folks are trying to do their jobs to the best of their abilities. But they are either over-worked, under-trained, or grossly un-motivated. It all comes down to incompetence (or even worse: intentional decisions to under-perform) at the MANAGEMENT level.

I now have a new policy: one strike and you are out - I take my business elsewhere. Closing out my floor mats adventure: I ended up swallowing hard and paying 2X as much as I originally paid to WeatherTech in order to get OEM carpeted mats from one of our Forum vendors, JPAM Parts - prompt service, exactly the correct parts, perfect fitment, cosmetically an identical match.

 

I agree with you that in general, customer service as we knew it 25 years ago has fallen off a cliff. The larger the company, the lousier the customer service in many cases. But every now and then I stumble into a situation where the product is top-notch and the customer service that goes along with it is world-class. It usually occurs with small, family-owned businesses that have found a niche and do it superbly. I had that experience last week as I repaired my home audio woofers myself using parts and knowledge obtained from a small Florida company called Simply Speakers. What a great experience. My faith in mankind has been restored for awhile, and my beloved Altecs sound brand-new again. I'm a happy guy....

 

Thanks for posting this before I made the same mistake.

So their ads are all BS then.

 

Perhaps not *all* BS - I'm sure that for run-of-the-mill vehicles, with large sales volumes, their products probably fit just fine. The problem is that "ours" are not R-O-T-M vehicles, and they do not discourage the illusion that their products fit us as well. And that illusion is what their website promotes to dummies like me who actually believe the photos thereon. They have to be making some large volume of sales to support their constant advertising programs.

 

I have Lloyd rubber all-weather mats for winter in both my S and X Types. Exact custom fits for both cars and available in many color choices. Available lots of places but I got mine from autoanything.com. (Weathertech/MacNeil makes good products but none for Jaguar.)

 

Thanks for the pointer towards the Lloyd mats (wish that I had known about these earlier!). I will definitely keep these in mind for any future needs. A print-out of the autoanything.com webpage is definitely going into my "save-it" folder.

 

Well, did a bit more research as far as customer feed-back on the Lloyd mats. Lots of pleased customers, but also lots of unhappy folks. The biggest complaint seemed to be that the mats have a smell on the skunk part of the spectrum - and the smell endures for ages. Some said that it was only the black mats that stunk, while the gray ones were fine. Another frequent complaint was that the custom fit was dependent on whoever was using the exacto knife at the factory. Some great fits, but some pretty ragged edges on the periphery - apparently not molded to fit, but simply cut to fit off of flat stock.

How was your experience with the smell and the appearance of the periphery of the mats?

 

I've read those customer reviews about Lloyd and all the other custom fit mat brands. My conclusion was that some people are unable to be pleased. All rubber mats that are custom ordered will arrive from the factory with an odor that can be a bit unpleasant. It's a necessary evil but the good news is it will go away quite quickly. I have Lloyds in both Jags and also a different brand cargo mat in the back of the X-Type wagon. All of them smelled a bit on delivery. I just baked them out in the sunshine on the back patio and solved the issue. They off-gassed in about 48 hours.
As for fit, the Lloyd Rubbertite mats are cut to order by a computer/CAD driven cutting system - not by some guy with a knife. All of mine have clean edges and fit perfectly all around. I have tan in my S and black in my X.
The mats come with the holes punched (but not punched out) for the factory floor retention hooks and they line up perfectly.
There's another brand that looks similar called Hexomat. I liked the looks and colors of the Lloyds better. Have you visited Lloyd's own website? There more info on their mats there.
BTW, I swap out the rubber mats with the Jag factory carpet mats during the summer and fall dry part of the year (only one set of mats at a time will fit). But I find the rubber mats serve me well during the wet winter season.
Total satisfaction (at least in the mat department) here.

 

This thread made me curious about my own rubber mats--they kinda fit but only if I'm not too fussy about the way they fit the little curve (wheel well?) near the driver's door. Come to find out they are X-type mats...


Jaguar X Type All Weather Rubber Front Floor Mats Parts - DragTimes.com

 

Can I resurrect this old thread for a moment?
I had a set of these floormats (above) in my X-Type. I'd REALLY like to find some for my S-Type (STR)
Does anyone know if they are available somewhere?
And if not, do you know of something similar?

 

As has been mentioned previously in this thread, spend some time on the Lloyds mats website. You can custom-order just about any mat design and material you want. I ordered a set of thicker autumn/winter carpet mats for my wife's XK8 a couple of months ago, and they are the best-made and best-fitting mats I've ever owned. They were a bit pricey at $86 for just the two front mats, but I believe they will last the life of the car. They look and fit better than the high-dollar Jaguar Victory Edition leather-bound mats that her XK8 left the factory with. So her Victory Edition mats will be for spring/summer usage while her Lloyds mats will be for our much tougher autumn/winter requirements....

 

Loyds looks like quality stuff. But I don't see anywhere on their site where I can order anything like the mats above. I don't see anything on their site that appeals to me at all, frankly. It ALL looks like stuff that either will stain, or looks too industrial for my tastes.

just me.

 

I spent 500 buying loyds mats for my Volvo V70r wagon and it was some of the best money spent.

They are nice and thick carpet, much thicker than Oem. The smell on mine must have dissipated in the garage waiting to be put in beacuse they didn't seem to smell at all. I got all 4 floor mats plus a nice thick mat for the back trunk area of the wagon. The fit was all perfect.

My wife was all questioning on me spending that amount of money on floor mats, but then they showed up and once she felt them she said they were indeed nice.

 

I just bought a set of four of these for my X-Type from JPLV. They're really nice mats, I think I paid $80-$90 for all four.

It was hard to find the part numbers for them (the front set is one part number and the rear set is another) but what I ended up doing was searching for "Jaguar X-type OEM mats" on eBay. The listings on there had the part numbers so I plugged them in to JPLV and actually got a better price there.

I'm sure searching either eBay or just Google will come up with a vendor who has them in stock for the S-Type

 

Spinall4,

$500 for floor mats?!!

Will you adopt me?