Giving German-built a run for its money
Shopping for a car for Dad reveals that French is the way to go, despite the stories
DO YOU actually own a car?” is a question I am often asked. And, in case you care, I do. It’s a 20-year-old Mercedes-benz 230E. It’s just run in at 290 000km, it’s got sheepskin seat covers and a big hole in the muffler so it sounds more sporty than it actually is. The front-left suspension does a brilliant impression of a belligerent monkey as you go over speed bumps and it is hilariously slow. When I first test-drove it I told the guy selling it I was pretty sure it was broken. But no, it’s just that slow. But the damn thing’s brilliant. It’s called Kobus and, if you’re middle class, chances are your Dad drove one.
The truth is the last time I endured a car-buying experience was years ago. Kobus and I seldom get to enjoy the Cape’s great roads because, in my line of work, there are an awful lot of new cars launched every month, and it’s as important for me to drive them as it is for a music reviewer to listen to the latest offering from that band Justin’s Beaver. And so it was interesting to join my Dad on his new-car-buying mission the other day. He had a budget, he wanted a decent sedan and a reasonable trade-in on his ageing Audi. The first thing I had to do, gently, after asking him to sit down, was tell him how much a decent German car costs these days. After smelling salts and a stiff drink, we established we would test-drive a VW Jetta, a Nissan Juke and a Peugeot 508.
It was illuminating, because it is here, at the sharp end of the buying experience, where you get to see which companies are willing to work for a sale and which aren’t.
Peugeot Umhlanga was brilliant. They were smart and polite, not at all pushy, knew the product and didn’t seem to feel the need to tell whopping lies. They were also keen to offer a brilliant trade-in price. They called back. They e-mailed quotes as promised and generally gave their car as good a shot as possible of getting sold.
Nissan was also good. They asked too many questions before we could get into the car (“does the Audi have a spare key?”). But VW Umhlanga was
This, even in a world where I expect barefaced lies and mind-blowing incompetence, was a special effort
comically atrocious. A salesman lied about there being no demo model in the spec we wanted to test drive, and had to hurriedly and embarrassingly change his mind when it was clear we would leave. The car arrived dirty, with the driver’s seatbelt clicked in, as the salesman who runs that car is too clever to wear a seatbelt and would rather sit on it, than under it, to ensure the seatbelt alarm doesn’t go off. This obviously confused my Dad, who has reached 67 by doing radical stuff like wearing seatbelts his whole life.
The prodigy running that car will not make 67. This is probably good for the gene pool. The salesman, nonetheless, from the back seat, thought it hilarious to tell Dad: “You can’t even work a seatbelt, ha ha!” What a weapons-grade idiot.
We switched the car on. Range: 13km. Wouldn’t do to have diesel in a test car, of course. During the obviously brief test drive, the salesman was unable to describe the specifications of the car, to unpack costs at all, or in any way sell the car to us because he didn’t actually know anything about it. I am not easily shocked by car salesmen. But this, even in a world where I expect barefaced lies and mind-blowing incompetence, was a special effort. He topped this off by never phoning through the quote or, in fact, getting in touch with us at all. It’s four weeks on and we have yet to hear if VW Umhlanga would like to sell us a Jetta 1,6 TDI DSG.
And, frankly, even if they had, the idea of bringing your new car to VW Umhlanga for a service gave us all hives. “You’d be stuck with these guys for five years,” I said to Dad, who paled noticeably at the prospect.
So Dad bought a Peugeot 508. He got a good price on his old Audi and a full five-year service plan (Dad will pay for tyres, petrol and broken glass, should it be necessary, for the next five years, full stop). Oh, and yes, it’ll depreciate horribly like all large French cars, but that’s okay, because five years from now, Dad and I will go and find somebody else who really, really wants to sell him a car.
And I’ll bet you one five-yearold Peugeot it won’t be VW, which makes some fine motor cars (the fuel consumption on that 1,6 diesel is simply astonishing) but unfortunately seems to have lazy dealers.
All of this aside, my Dad bought a really good car. I wouldn’t have it any other way, of course, but still, it’s worth making the point that, at R309 000, the 508 my Dad bought (the 1,6THP) is a heck of a lot of car at the price.
Reputations die hard in the motoring world and the idea that French cars are unreliable and don’t have stock of parts locally is really a 10-year-old story. But it does mean that Peugeots tend to fly under the South African radar. We are obsessed with German cars, but given that you can only just get a range-bottoming 3-Series or a C-Class for less than R400 000, a much bigger, extremely wellspecced 508 for R100 000 less makes a ton of sense.
That 1,6l turbo-charged motor is no rocket in a car this size, but it’s certainly powerful enough and, crucially, is very fuel efficient on the freeway, which is where my parents tend to spend their motoring lives.
Add quad-zone aircon, electric everything, a silky six-speed automatic gearbox, leather trim, a full-size spare wheel ( joy!), six airbags, keyless entry and an official extra-urban consumption of just 5,3l/100km and the 508 starts to feel like a bit of a bargain, a little prick for the bubble of German arrogance. And that can’t be a bad thing.