When the MINI Countryman goes on sale in September it will start at £16,000, pitching it about £2,000 more than the distinctly less practical Clubman. However, the biggest shock is its equipment list, which instead of being as sparse as Noel Gallagher's lyric book, is actually chock full of stuff.
Standard issue for your £16k will be air conditioning, roof rails, rear parking sensors, four or five seats (a no cost option), a DAB radio, heated door mirrors and Bluetooth. Not bad. Alloys aren't standard though.
As we already knew, five power outputs will come at first, ranging from the 98bhp One, through the 122bhp Cooper and ending with the 184bhp Cooper S. That's a new 1.6-litre petrol engine too (the latter turbocharged), which boasts better emissions and economy than the current version and will appear in other MINIs when it's facelifted shortly. The diesels are a One D with 90bhp and 159lb.ft, and a Cooper D with 112bhp and 199lb.ft.
Pricing is, as you'd guess, incremental between the basic One petrol and the £20,810 Cooper S. There's no JCW variant planned as yet. Front-wheel drive is standard (it's a crossover, see) but MINI's 'ALL4' four-wheel drive system is an option on the Cooper S and Cooper D for just over a grand. Sadly there's no ALL4-One, which we reckon would be a One-for-all. Not really, we just wanted to say that. An ALL4 option for the Cooper will come in 2012.
So the Countryman isn't cheap, but it is priced and specced surprisingly aggressively given that, after all, it's a practical MINI; we fully expect a clamour of Next sale proportions among solicitors and IT consultants with young kids when the order book opens, regardless of cost.
Plus, it's also good for, as a MINI Product Manager puts it, those who find themselves in "everyday situations like parking in a field for a sporting event or driving on the beach." Great! Finally we can put Bessie, Car Enthusiast's overworked company donkey, into retirement.
Mark Nichol - 15 Feb 2010