Editor's Rating: 
The Good: Fuel efficiency, quickness, practicality in a small package
The Bad: Tight rear seats, small luggage space, overly quirky interior
The Bottom Line: A green machine with pizzazz
Reader ReviewsOkay, so we all know we're going to have to make some changes with gasoline prices maybe heading to $4 per gallon. For my part, I'm thinking about downsizing from a Ford (F) Explorer to a Mini Cooper. And my big question is: Can a person live with a Mini Cooper on a day-to-day basis without going batty from the inconveniences of such a small vehicle?
The basic answer: Yes, if you want to (and you don't have a family or your spouse is short and your kids are very small). For a single person or childless couple, it's actually fairly practical.
In an era of rising gasoline prices, the Mini's main appeal is clear. It's fun to drive, with handling worthy of a product made by BMW (BMWG), yet it gets phenomenal gas mileage. My turbocharged '07 Mini Cooper S test car with an automatic transmission was rated to get 27 mpg in the city and 34 mpg on the highway, and in a stretch of 545 miles of largely fast highway driving I got 29 mpg. If you want even better mileage, go with the regular Mini with a stick shift: It gets 32 mpg in the city and 40 mpg on the highway. The regular Mini also has the advantage of using regular gasoline, while the Mini S requires premium.
The Mini's other big appeal is its low price. The regular Mini Cooper starts at just $18,700 with a stick shift, vs. $21,800 for the S version. Mini convertibles start at $22,600 for the regular version and $26,050 for the S. Add $1,350 for a six-speed automatic transmission.
As in the past, you can also personalize the car with all sorts of add-ons, such as a metallic paint ($450), a spoiler ($150), black or white bonnet stripes ($100), alloy wheels, and various types of wood and metal interior trim. Just keep in mind that there's a 10-week or more wait for custom-built Minis.
The Mini Cooper was redesigned for the '07 model year, but the differences are subtle. The '07 is just over 2 inches longer than the old model, and the front end has been simplified. There are several new colors, including Mellow Yellow and Oxygen Blue, as well as metallic silver, blue, and "Nightfire" red. Inside, the center console is narrower, resulting in more leg space.
In the Mini S, the 1.6-liter four-banger is now turbocharged (rather than supercharged), raising the engine's output to 172 horsepower. The regular Mini has a 1.6-liter, 118-horsepower, inline four-cylinder power plant.
Apparently, I'm not the only one who thinks the Mini makes a lot of sense with gas prices so high. Though total Mini Cooper sales are off 10.5% in the first four months of this year, to 11,455, presumably because this is a transition year with the new model being phased in, sales of the fuel-efficient regular Mini soared 27%, to 4,665, during the first four months of the year.
The regular Mini is especially popular with women, who account for 51% of purchases, according to the Power Information Network. That's less than the whopping 58% figure for the VW Bug, but it's still unusually high. By contrast, only 36% of buyers of the Mini Cooper S are women. (The Power Information Network, like BusinessWeek, is a unit of the McGraw-Hill Cos. (MHP).)
The Mini's publicity people talk about the car's "go-cart feel" as if it's a positive attribute, but it takes some getting used to. The '07 may be longer than the previous Mini, but it's still only 145.6 inches long, and has a wheel base of just 97 inches. The car is also set very low to the ground, so you really bounce around on rough roads and out on the highway. When I first started driving the new Mini I found the ride overly hard and uncomfortable.
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