{"id":3400,"date":"2011-03-09T09:00:28","date_gmt":"2011-03-09T09:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.badreputation.org.uk\/?p=3400"},"modified":"2013-05-31T16:13:02","modified_gmt":"2013-05-31T15:13:02","slug":"want-a-sexy-car-buy-a-volvo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/2011\/03\/09\/want-a-sexy-car-buy-a-volvo\/","title":{"rendered":"Want a sexy car? Buy a Volvo"},"content":{"rendered":"

According to X & Y Communications, an agency (apparently) specialising in the impact of gender differences on business, women ask themselves one fundamental question<\/a> when contemplating the purchase of a car. Is it the price?, I hear you wonder. Is it the safety rating, or the fuel efficiency?<\/p>\n

No. It’s: “Will it make me look hotter when I step out of it outside a bar or restaurant?”<\/em><\/p>\n

Yes, the main thing that will make a woman decide on a particular car is how ‘hot’ she feels in it. Telegraph<\/strong> <\/em>writer Neil Lyndon – bemoaning the fact that his wife’s friend opted for a car she liked and he deemed useless – goes on to tell us all about the new Citro\u00ebn DS3, decorated by graphic artist Orla Kiely<\/a>. Now you really will be able to match your car to your handbag. Isn’t that snazzy, girls? All your tricksy car decisions solved by this one simple, fashionable step!<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The new Citro\u00ebn DS3 - if I use the Orla Kiely design, can I have this racing version? Image (c) CarsRoute.com<\/p><\/div>\n

According to Lyndon, his wife’s divorced friend ignored all sensible, practical considerations when making her car choice, and simply went for a pretty French hatchback. Because that’s what women do, of course: we go for the pretty option despite it possibly being on fire.<\/p>\n

The thing is – and this will come as no surprise to those familiar with his prior work – Lyndon is talking complete twaddle. According to AutoEbid.com’s Help Me Choose a New Car<\/a> function, you can choose from six factors when trying to find the perfect car for you. They are: Comfort, Styling, Handling, Depreciation, Economy, and Safety. The price is a liming criterion: the thing that helps you to narrow your choice, rather than the main principle of selection. In fact, unless you are going into the market with an extremely limited amount of money, the cost of the car will only ever help you to select a class, or possibly a financing option. Put it another way: no one will switch from a brand-new Fiat 500 to a second-hand Volvo XC90, even though both can be had for roughly \u00a310k.<\/p>\n

So how do people choose cars, then, if it’s not the price?<\/p>\n

1. First and foremost, functionality. What are you going to use the car for? If you have five children that will need running to school every morning, you will probably end up with that Volvo. If, on the other hand, you’re looking for an urban runabout, something small and easy to park is probably better.<\/p>\n

2. Up there as a consideration is styling: you want it to look good. In fact, certain TV shows have gone so far as to have an entire segment over whether a car is ‘cool’ or not<\/a>. The guide there, by the way, is whether a cool person would drive it. Perhaps X & Y Communications neglected to canvas the Top Gear audience in their research.<\/p>\n

3. The last, all encompassing question is: I live with it? This includes things like reliability, fuel economy, ability to park it in London, whether the suspension will destroy your spine the first time you drive over road-humps.<\/p>\n

The ‘price’ question helps to narrow your options, and, on occasion, to disabuse you of the notion that you really could afford to buy a supercar if you sell the house and both kidneys.<\/p>\n

The key question Lyndon ignored was what his wife’s friend wanted in a car: she wanted a cute little urban runabout that would cheer her up in the mornings. Put simply, she wanted that ‘new car’ feeling: you’ve chosen well, your car looks good, and you love it more than it is natural to love an inanimate object. If she was a man lovingly polishing his vintage (decrepit) Rolls, Lyndon would have smiled indulgently.<\/p>\n

What Lyndon is bemoaning is not women’s tendency to pick cars that make them look good – we all do that. No one has ever looked at a car and thought, “sure, it’s beautiful, but given the choice I’d go for the ugly, uncomfortable one on the left.”\u00a0 Our budgets and priorities may vary, but the intent remains the same. You buy the thing that makes you feel happy when you’re inside it. Lyndon seems to have forgotten that, or have momentarily blanked out all car adverts, ever. It’s such an established clich\u00e9 that car makers can now produce meta-tastic pastiches of previous ads and we lap it up. Check out this Volvo V60 “How to make a sexy car advert” clip:<\/p>\n