The Battle Of The Small Cars

Last week myself and Lovely Leslie (aka @lesliedupreez) my long suffering SO, decided it was time to replace my awesome but aging VZ Holden Ute with something a bit more modern.

Initially I was all for getting a current model Holden Commodore SV6 but my focused and driven partner began a subtle campaign aimed at acquiring something smaller and cheaper.

And so began a research journey of the internet followed by visits to the nearest large town that had more than two car dealerships, which in our case was Nowra.

Our short list included the Nissan Micra, Honda Jazz, Toyota Yaris, Mazda 2 and a last minute addition of the VW Polo.

After a process of elimination for one reason or another we shortened our list to the Mazda 2 Genki and the VW Polo 77TSI Comfortline. The next day we went back to the Mazda and VW dealers for another look.


The VW Polo is an excellent small car. Even though it is powered by a little 1.2 litre motor the performance was exceptional due to the added boost of the turbo. The build was of excellent quality, internally everything looked good and felt good. It is a great car and a clear leader in its class, in my humble opinion.


The Mazda 2 is also a great little car but does not perform as well as the Polo even though it is a 1.5 litre. Internally the Mazda is a bit disappointing. Whilst comfortable enough it lacks the finer touches, even some common sense things like a centre arm rest. How hard would it be to build them with a bloody centre arm rest!

In the Mazda's favour was availability, colour of our choice and great service from the Mazda dealership. The Polo really only had it's performance and quality going in it's favour, the dealership was pretty average, we can't get the colour we wanted and we have to wait.

After much ummming and ahhhhing we decided on the Polo. Was a difficult choice. At the end of the day, if the Mazda 2 had a centre arm rest I would have bought it. As simple as that.

After meeting quite a few car salespeople in our quest we were appalled at the dreadful presentation that some of these lacklustre individuals consider to be appropriate to earn their living. Ranging from lack of product knowledge (where I could tell them more about the car by using my iPad than they could mention) to an "I couldn't give a stuff" attitude, it was quite mind blowing.

Bouquets

Biggest and only bouquet goes to Nowra Mazda and Dealer Principal Wayne Schlick. Excellent service, patient, not pushy, not sleazy, good product, friendly staff, followed up. Sorry we didn't buy a car off you Wayne!

Brickbats

Alan May Holden, Ulladulla - How dare you quote me $13,000 trade on my ute for the purchase of a car worth up to $40,000. You were way off beam fella, $4,000 to be precise. Call yourselves Holden dealers. You wouldn't know your arsehole from your elbow pal!

Nowra Mitsubishi/Honda/Nissan/Kia and something else which escapes me - How can you expect your salespeople to be on top of so many brands? No wonder the poor woman knew very little! She was nice, tried hard but just didn't know much! On top of that, if I am interested in buying a car from you then give me a frigging trade in price there and then. What's this shit about not giving a figure unless we commit. You lazy asshat! Was it your golf afternoon or something? No wonder lard-arsed car yard managers have a shit reputation!

Ulladulla Toyota - sorry, you put us to sleep. Double sorry that your brouchres cost you $3 each.

Nowra Toyota - get some bloody cars in stock please! Would be nice to see what the top line Yaris actually looked like!

Kinghorn VW, Nowra - you won the sale but it was the car alone that did it. If we based our decision on customer service and followup we would have gone to Mazda.

So, there endeth the latest foray into the world of cars. Let's see what happens. We wait patiently for our new buzz box!