mk1 wrote:
I see very few Men driving them, I see practically no young people at all driving them, apart from the odd peroxided trophy girlfriend, and the vast majority of ones I see are, as I say driven by 30 something mums. Very similar to the type that drive Freelanders & for that matter the revised VW Beetles.
The New Beetle is not a drivers car in any sense and is I think almost 100% seen as a females car, as is the new Fiat 500. The Abarth versions may help the 500 image as the Cooper has always done for the Mini/MINI and the latest new Beetle has recently been revamped and lowered to make it more sporting in an effort to attract male buyers.
Seem to be plenty of male MINI drivers seen around London and the south east, mainly as you would expect in the Cooper S. Also as you would expect the numbers of young MINI owners are increasing as the used entry level prices drop (my 20 year old son has just replaced his old Fiesta with a modded 2001 MINI One and most of his friends with Unos and Clios (male and female) now want one too. Don't you think that the high volume of 30 something mum owners was due to the originally high price to get into MINI's and them holding their value for so long with low depreciation? I guess the young mums had the money to spend and still like to feel young, cool and trendy about town! Also it seems on the MINI forums that many initially get bought for wives and girlfriends only for the husband/boyfriend to realise what a great drivers car they are and then start borrowing it more and more! I would agree the MINI Convertibles are almost 100% driven by women and believe BMW are hoping the Coupe/Roadster will sell and appeal more to male drivers. The classic Mini before was also mainly bought new by the fairer sex according to the later Austin/Rover marketing surveys certainly during those years without any Coopers on sale.
I have owned a 2002 MINI One as a second/commuter car for the last 4 years and compared with similar priced but now dated looking superminis of the same year, the Mk1 MINI still looks current and is worth far more than a similar price/specced Clio or Fiesta, etc of the same year.......as well as being far more fun to own and drive!
If you get to know what weakspots to look for in MINI's then something like this Cooper below at £2,250 as recently sold on ebay can be pretty good value for a youngster and far cheaper/rust free/more reliable than say a late Mini MPi Sportpack.......much as I love my classic Mini's, I wouldn't want any of my kids using one as a daily driver now mainly from a safety point of view.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/ws/eBayISAPI. ... EF:GB:1123
(Who knows if early MINI's should ever achieve classic status one day, then these yellow ones may become as popular as those rare Fiesta yellow Mk1 Mini's are now!)
Has MINI been successful before ? Must have missed that ! 
) and I have to tell you that I absolutely love the MINI - one of my all-time favourites.
