Volkswagen /

Volkswagen (abbreviated VW) is the original and biggest-selling marque of the Volkswagen Group, which now also owns the Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, SEAT and Škoda marques and the truck manufacturer Scania. Volkswagen means "people's car" in German, where it is pronounced [ˈfɔlksˌvaːɡən]. Its current tagline or slogan is Das Auto (in English The Car). Volkswagen was originally founded in 1937 by the Nazi trade union, the German Labour Front (Deutsche Arbeitsfront). In the early 1930s German auto industry was still largely composed of luxury models, and the average German rarely could afford anything more than a motorcycle. Seeking a potential new market, some car makers began independent "peoples' car" projects – Mercedes' 170H, Adler's AutoBahn, Steyr 55, Hanomag 1,3L, among others. The trend was not new, as Béla Barényi is credited with having conceived the basic design in the middle 1920s. Josef Ganz developed the Standard Superior (going as far as advertising it as the "German Volkswagen"). Also, in Czechoslovakia, the Hans Ledwinka's penned Tatra T77, a very popular car amongst the German elite, was becoming smaller and more affordable at each revision.