ENGINEER EXPLAINS 7 REASONS WHY MINIVANS ARE BETTER VALUE THAN SUVs

hello everyone it's David from online press guess what I'm in Boston on business and I'm driving a 2023 Toyota Sienna behind me and I know what you're thinking David no one buys minivans anymore people only want to buy SUVs and crossovers well you know what now that I have driven this for a while now I really do think that people have forgotten how good minivans are when it comes to practicality and functionality in many ways it represents better value than today's crossovers or sport utility vehicles so let me give you seven reasons why I believe minivans are still good and perhaps better buy and a better value than SUVs let's go foreign welcome back by the way I'm in Boston here which is kind of interesting because as some of you guys know I actually went to school in Boston for my postgraduate studies because I studied MIT in Harvard and I was kind of coming back to my third home not quite second home because I consider Toronto to be my second home where I spent many years as well anyhow I want to walk you through seven reasons why I actually think minivans in general especially this Sienna here is a better buy and a more logical Choice than sport utility vehicles and crossovers because they just don't offer the same amount of practicality and functionality so let's start with the first one which is all to do with how the minivans are designed because of the way body is shaped and profound and because of the way they designed the interior you get maximum utilization there's nothing out there that can match the minivan in terms of the overall space overall efficiency and packaging look at how much space we have here obviously the front row is very good but maybe it's compared remote to a large SUV but when you get to the second and the third row that's where the big differences are this is like almost like a first class cabin in aircraft here these seats can recline we can also pull up the leg out here as well which I'll show you a little bit later and look how much space there is between the first row and the second row there's just tremendous amount of space and it's an extremely comfortable environment and you know what it's not just about the passenger space it's also about the trunk space as well so I'm going to open the back here and show you what I mean by that because there's just so much cargo space now right now I have the third seat up and you can tell it's pretty reasonable space maybe a little bit tight in the legroom there but once again those two seats are pushed all the way back right now once I push those forward you get decent amounts of a third round space including lots of Headroom but look at the trunk space here I don't have too much stuff in here right now but look how deep it is goes all the way down here and then you can put stuff all the way to the roof line so this space is just a far cry from anything else that's in the sport utility vehicle or crossover category and obviously these things fall down as well so let's just pull this up and see if I can do this kind of live and let me pull this one as well I can't quite fall down the seats right now because I have the front two row seats pushed all the way back so I'm kind of doing this live stream style so let me push these seats forward and let's see what we can do so just move these two seats a little bit forward still lots of space between front row and the second row but I was able to move it so that I can actually fold down the third row and if I don't combo this inward I still get this deep deep amount of cargo space that goes all the way to the floor here right to the top but now I can tumble these seats backward and then hide them into the cargo area and that way you get a flat seat so let me do that right now so I can just push them back like this still both seats like this and now I have a pretty well flat floor and look how much space I have enough to you know move a move a house or two and that's something that today's SUVs are not very good especially if their body on the frame such as the Toyota Sequoia or maybe even the new Land Cruiser any of the models with body on the frame design will have this floor much higher because there's a frame underneath which eats up the space and it's worse if you have a hybrid where there's additional battery pack underneath as we have seen in Sequoia so once again in terms of specialization nothing can beat the minivan both in terms of cargo space as well as space for the second row of people and you can see for example here I can bring out the ottoman style seat and basically almost fall flat not quite but it's very comfortable and practicality nothing beats minivans third reason why minivans are superior to Crossovers and Sport Chiller Vehicles is the fact that we get this sliding door which is usually powered so that I just have to touch the door and it will close and you know what this way the sliding door stays close to the body it doesn't swing open like the front door so it's easier to get in and out in the parking space and as you know sport utility vehicles do not offer that the only one that offers it is the New Sentry SUV that was just shown recently and they show sliding door as one option but having this sliding door makes a huge difference in terms of getting in and out of the vehicle and once again minivan trumps SUVs for ease of entry and exit because of the slide indoor the fourth reason is to do with the value overall pound for pound kilogram per kilogram the minivans are cheaper sometimes substantially cheaper than sport utility vehicles and crossovers that offer similar space inside and this scene of course is quite reasonably priced even fully equipped is way cheaper than something like a Toyota Sequoia which doesn't offer as much practicality so even though people are not too crazy about buying minivans just because of the type of branding they represent you know what if we can throw that away for a second and don't even think about the name minivan definitely this is the better value the fifth reason is to do with efficiency because minivans are definitely more efficient than equivalent sized SUV especially if their body on the frame the Sienna has a hybrid system as well and even though it's not super fast in terms of acceleration it's more than enough to go around town and pass cars on the highway but more evidently it is extremely efficient and because it is lighter due to the fact that it's unitized body compared to body on frame models like such as a sequoia you just get overall better efficiency and save some gas so if you want to just have a better value and also say feel well definitely mid events are better than bigger export utility vehicles the sixth reason why I really do like minivans is something that's a little bit different than what you might expect and that is to do with the cool factor which you might be surprised because no one thinks minivans are cool but there's a bit of a Resurgence in in terms of The Branding of minivans because in many parts of the world including Japan and Asia minivans are definitely considered cool especially as a luxury people mover and cars like the Lexus LM which was introduced recently is showcasing how good minivans can be and how desirable it could be as a people mover and that is something of interest because perhaps here in North America people are beginning to realize that minivans can represent both brand recognition or luxury Comfort or even coolness because elsewhere in the world it is definitely becoming more trendy so even though this Sienna right here might not be the most trendy vehicle to drive around you know what it could be very different if you years time if Lexus introduces something like a LM to the market and everybody is going to begin to think that minivans can offer luxury and can offer a cool Factor the last and the seventh point I want to talk about in terms of why minivans are great buy is the fact that it provides such amazing level of driving Comfort maybe not so much for the driver but at least for passengers in terms of quietness refinement smoothness and then in terms of how the suspension is able to soak a bumpy road there's nothing that can beat minivans because of the fact that minivans are unitized body and then suspensions are calibrated for maximum Comfort all the passengers I have driven in minivans like the Sienna always say how comfortable it is how quiet it is and how they can spend hours and hours in the minivan compare that to something like a Toyota Sequoia or a forerunner or even the Lexus GX I'm driving and you'll quickly realize that the minivan provides a better refined feel on the road I do admit that the driving field isn't all that fun but I will say that it is more stable than a typical body on frame because they tend to ride very high but also they tend to be a little bit bumpy and they lose control pretty easily when you go to curvy Road whereas the unitized body minivans like the Sienna here is able to maintain good suspension control and pretty good feedback from the road and it just provides a very smooth ride that is unmatched so yes minivans might not be the best choice for those people who want to enjoy driving and who wants to be seeing the latest sport utility vehicle we can put aside some of your predisposed ideas about minivans then these represent overall just the best value for practicality functionality and comfort and refinement so I hope you enjoyed my quick video here about Toyota Sienna I mean really enjoy driving here in Boston area because Boston roads aren't the best roads they're pretty bumpy and they can be quite jarring but in this Sienna it's an absolute Joy because it's so comfortable and the passengers including my wife are saying that this is just so comfortable and they can spend hours in it but let me know in the comments below if you think minivans are coming back in terms of reputation branding and recognition and whether you think minivans are still outdated old-fashioned and just isn't fun anymore and that you would only consider buying sport utility vehicles I really think that people should change their mind and try minivans again because at least in Japan where I'm from minivans are still truly cool anyhow if you enjoyed my video give me a thumbs up and make some comments and if you haven't done so yet would you kindly subscribe as well thank you so much and until next video I'm signing off for now take care foreign

Channel: AutomotivePress

Views: 232,129

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Id: u8EFm3yba6U

Length: 10min 51sec (651 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 28 2023