A few weeks ago I received a lovely email from the folks at Peugeot. It was one of those really lovely emails that pops into your inbox and immediately brightens your day. ‘Would we like to have a Peugeot 5008 compact MPV for a week to review?’ Umm let me think?…. We obviously said an immediate yes and couldn’t wait for it to be delivered.
We decided to arrange the review for the week we were in Cornwall on holiday, as it’s always a bit of a mission to pack everything into my smallish hatchback.
The 5008 is a seven-seater family car, with a standard three seats in the back and another row of two seats behind those. It is worth bearing in mind that only small people will fit in the seats at the very back. For families with young children, it might still be a great solution.
The drive
We were loaned the TDi and found it reasonably fuel efficient on the motorway. It did go through significantly more on the stop-start, hilly Cornish roads, but that is to be expected.
The seats are fully adjustable and the drivers seat has electronic adjustment, meaning I could get it exactly right for me; perfect if, like me, you have back issues. The seating was quite high set in the car and being tall this meant I did whack my head on the top of the door frame a few times getting in, I soon learned! Once safely inside there is plenty of leg and head room, even for us tall people.
I have never had a car with an onboard computer so I thought that feature was fabulous. It was multi-functional; stereo, sat nav and parking camera all rolled into one. Having never before used parking sensors or cameras, I must admit I really loved having the extra peace of mind when reversing and parking.
There is a lot of storage in this car, little places to squirrel bits and bobs. Between the driver and passenger seats is a large storage box, with a sliding lid; handy for keeping drinks in when on a long journey. On top of it was a small drinks holder but we didn’t think it felt secure enough to leave drinks unattended in there (especially in a loan car!). I would have loved a better drinks holder accessible to both the driver and passenger. There is also storage space under the floor beneath the second row of seats. These seats have their own tray tables, which can be folded away when not needed.
One high-tech feature I loved was the small clear screen that pops up from the dashboard and displays your speed and the sat nav details. So handy, as it was in my peripheral vision without being obtrusive.
The 5008’s stereo system has a USB Connector meaning you can plug in your smartphone and can also work via Bluetooth. However, I tried a few times and couldn’t get my phone to connect to the car, quite possibly user error though.
Baby loved the panoramic sunroof and enjoyed telling us about all of the things she could see through it. The tinted rear windows and the individual pull-up sun shades fitted to each window gave us peace of mind in the hot weather we were lucky to experience when reviewing the car.
Each seat can be moved independently which opens up so many options if you are trying to transport people and items. They can all be laid flat which gives you a vast amount of room. This is something we would use all the time to help us on our regular tip runs!
Room for improvement?
Although we loved the Peugeot and Mr Hubby and I would happily swap it for our cars, there were a couple of irritations.
Neither myself or Mr Hubby were ever able to enter a postcode into the sat nav, which was a bit annoying. However, the sat nav was very clever in giving you so many options when you entered in even part of the address. When entering a road name for example, having selected one letter the computer removes the letters that are then not possible from your selection, which does make entering details much quicker. I would have been great if the bluetooth had worked and a solid cup holder further forward in the car would have been much appreciated.
The verdict?
It is quite rare that a car can give you space for so many family members, yet is not a huge tank; so I think it is a fabulous option for the family market. The only issues we had with it (apart from the cup holders!) were definitely things that the salesperson would have sorted out for us I’m sure! We will be looking for a new car next year and we definitely wouldn’t rule it out!
I made this video, showing it in action and sharing our thoughts.
Disclosure: We were given the car for a week to review and treated to tickets to the zoo.
All opinions are my own honest opinions.