More press coverage!

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runboy

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A couple of press articles this week.

The latest Autoexpress has a review of the new Renault Megane, and amongst "the best of the rest" is the A2-usual review-great build and quality, stylish, roomy for what it is, not the fastest thing on four wheels, a bit pricey. Still, more press coverage.

What Car? has a new section on residual values. This month in small hatchbacks is the A2 1.4SE with a class leading retained value of 46% after 4 years. They say years one and two take their toll, but it slows down after this.

Steve - 2003 1.4SE petrol, Silver, black/black interior
 
Clarkson has just listed in his cars I love and hate section of topgear the A2 as a car he hates but he does say he doesn't see the point of the car.

Clarkson does not seem to be a car lover though. He just likes big toys.

Phil
 
Clarkson......Never heard of the bloke......There was once a bloke who loved to hate everything the general public likes, and loved everything the general public hates...then he vanished from TV for ages......:)

Steve - 2003 1.4SE petrol, Silver, black/black interior
 
To be honest, any car costing less that £35k is unlikely to satisfy Clarkson - but most of us have to live in the real world where money and practicality are an issue.

I think he's just bought himself some £90k Mercedes sports car which he raved about in the Sunday Times - should be powerful enough to carry his ample girth but unlikely to be big enough for his head!
 
Bought the latest issue of Topgear last night and there was a "free" suplement listing cars Clarkson likes and hates, it was in this section.

Cheers

Phil
 
quote:Originally posted by Harps

To be honest, any car costing less that £35k is unlikely to satisfy Clarkson - but most of us have to live in the real world where money and practicality are an issue.

I think he's just bought himself some £90k Mercedes sports car which he raved about in the Sunday Times - should be powerful enough to carry his ample girth but unlikely to be big enough for his head!

Not entirely fair. His car of choice in that particular section was the Focus. He couldn't see the point of a £15k four seater and the A Class faired similarly badly.

The thing is he has a point. £15k for a supermini. Given that I cycle to work I'm handing over my 3 series to the wife and we'll buy something cheap for abouit £6k next year as our second convenience car. I cannot believe I ever spent £16k on an A2 and A Class, it just isn't worth it regardless of the design quality.

Clarkson swapped to the Merc from his Ferrari 355. The article was pointing out why the Merc is in fact a better real world car in comparison to the 355. Well, as real world as it's capable of being. The major point of the article was to point out that even Merc dealers can be awful as he really had to struggle to get any more info out of them and get a test drive. Now I'm not saying he deserves special treatment but I think it was a little naive of the dealer not to roll out the red carper for a bloke who is basically a journalist.
 
What Clarkson ignored is the company motorist. The A2 makes great sense to me as it is good to drive and very cheap to run. In my position I care about company tax bracket and fuel costs and he has missed this point completely. It also looks smart and presents a corporate immage. It allows you to feel a bit different. I have had 2 focusses and both were excellent cars and I loved them. I put around 15k miles on both but after 2 weeks I did not feel special driving them. After 17k miles in the A2 I still look forward to every journey.

Another thing motoring journos miss is interior space, at the weekend I discovered I will never buy a BMW 3 or 5 series as I cannot get comfortable in them which is ridiculuos given their size but the A2 is fantastic as I am 6'4''.

This is of course my opinion

Phil
 
Clarkson ignored the company motorist full stop. It doesn't make his opinion any less genuine.

Even assuming Audi sell a few thousand A2's this year few of them will be company cars.

For the private motorist if you want to pay to be special fair enough but the Focus represents considerably better value (especially if you pick up a pre registered model).
 
When we were shopping around for our new car, we looked at the Focus, the new Fiesta, Civic etc but after coming out of the showrooms, we'd be driving along going there's one, there's another one..... and another.
We went for the A2 because of it's original styling, build quality, image and exclusivity.

I bet Clarkson buys Levi's when a pair of Budget jeans from Matalan or Poundland would do exactly the same job. Why?? Image.

1.4SE petrol in Merlot Red, Biege interior, 16" 5 spoke alloys, DIS, Open Sky, Elec rear windows.
 
I agree that in terms of value for money fords are good but if I was parting with my own money I would not buy any of the current range as they are just too common (I am a snob). The A2 is the 1st company car I have had that I would consider buying with my own money. It is exactly what I will try and do at the end of the lease agreement if it remains this reliable.

Phil
 
I bought my A2 quite simply because I did not want a big car - but wanted the quality build that I would not have got from a Fiesta (trust me, I was tempted by the new Fiesta and nearly bought one). The A Class and A2 are not really superminis nor small compact hatches - so to even be comparing them to a Focus is unfair. If truth be told, they can only justifiably compared to each other and also maybe the likes of the Fusion and Minerva.
 
OK, so I'll throw the Jazz into the equation.

Stylish, reliable, good quality, better badge than other lesser considered cars and cheap at around £11k fully loaded.

Next to a Jazz the A2 and A Class do look very expensive indeed.
 
I agree that the Jazz looks pretty good - and the build quality should be pretty high as well.

So the difference then is the badge as a few people have implied - compare the Golf to the A3 - and you realise that Audi want an extra £5k having made £2k worth of improvements. You pay the premium for the badge.

Similarly with Mercs - they still make pretty good cars - but the Stuttgart Star carries a premium price - no matter how good the opposition. Going back to Clarkson's argument then, for the sort of money he paid for for his Merc/Ferrari, he could have bought an earth-shattering Japanese supercar.
 
I don't disagree with that but once you get to over £30k value does tend to slip away from the equation. TBH the Merc SL is one hell of an advanced car and probably worth the money.

I've kind of opened my eyes on car purchases now (of which I have made too many).

Yes, I'd prefer the more stylish car with more cachet but I'm not going to pay for it again. I'd be more comfortable with a Golf or a Focus (bought pre reg of course) than I would be with either A Class or A2.
 
It's interesting that the Jazz has been mentioned - we narrowed our choice of car down to the A2 or the Jazz. I was very impressed with the Jazz - incredibly flexible seats, good to drive, nippy twin-spark engine and kind of cute looking - especially from the front. The dealers seemed pretty good as well - within 10 mintes of walking into the local Honda showroom we were heading out on a test drive on our own, having been told to bring the car back whenever we wanted !

However, despite all the worthy qualities of the Jazz, we chose the A2 in the end. Why ? Well, I could lie and say it was down to the superior build quality or some such guff (the Jazz seemed equally well screwed together altough the interior of the A2 has better materials and is generally a nicer place to be) but if I'm honest, the real reason is image. We much prefered the look of the A2 and by buying an ex-demo the final difference in price was only a little over £2K (we were only offered a token discount on the Jazz) and that seemed worth paying. The alternative would have seen me throwing a sulk in the Jazz everytime we passed an A2 on the road

Anyway, Clarkson can go swivel. Has he still got that fighter-jet parked on his lawn ? Now that's what I call a mid-life crisis :)
 
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