When you think of Honda, the Jazz is the furthest thing from your mind nowadays. It was unceremoniously cancelled a few years ago in the GCC due to slow sales stemming from its high price. It’s back now in its latest form, although the price hasn’t changed from before. Does it pack more value now?
Over the years, Mugen has earned a reputation for creating some of the meanest looking and sounding Honda’s in the market. And it goes without saying, their new work on the new Jazz doesn’t disappoint, at-least on the design part.
Contrary to what you see in the images, we here in the GCC know the Honda Fit as the Jazz. Honda has published pictures and revealed some information about the next-generation version of their sub-compact hatchback.
While most other manufacturers participating in the 2011 Frankfurt International Motor Show, were busy trying to steal the show with their new models sporting glitzy designs and displaying promising concepts, Japanese auto giant Honda seemed to focus on the greener side of things by exhibiting various plug-in hybrid and electric-vehicle concepts, including the yet-to-be-named Jazz-based Honda EV concept.
The Honda Jazz, a sub-compact hatchback, is the kind of car that should be dominating its segment. And yet, it is the Toyota Yaris and the Nissan Tiida that have a stranglehold on sales, making the Jazz a niche product. For a while, we thought it was the price. Starting at a ridiculous Dhs 63,999 nowadays, and topping out at Dhs 71,999, you could buy a midsize sedan for that kind of dough, let alone a pint-sized runabout. But there was a time many years ago when the Jazz was actually cheap, and even then it wasn’t a familiar sight on Dubai roads.
We weren’t aware that there were any changes planned for the Honda Jazz anytime soon. So when Honda’s Middle East office offered us a test-drive of the 2012 Jazz, we were wondering what had changed. Turns out it is just a facelift.
Honda has just launched the facelifted 2012 Jazz in the GCC. There aren’t many changes other than of the cosmetic variety.
It seems to be ‘factory recall’ season, at least of which is simply fall-out from the Toyota floor-mat fiasco that has spun out of control. Alongside further worldwide recalls by Toyota, Peugeot is doing a precautionary recall for their Toyota-rebadged models. Meanwhile, Hyundai and Honda are having recalls of their own, both related to safety issues.
The Mini started life in 1959 as a British car for the masses. Built by the company later known as Austin-Rover, the little car was so cheap that Ford dissassembled one and tried to replicate it, but couldn’t do it cost-effectively and gave up. That Mr. Bean original was in production right up till 2000, when BMW bought out the firm and redesigned the Mini as an expensive niche model. But by 2001, there were already a slew of modern affordable cars to take its place, not least of which is the Honda Jazz. Both the Mini and the Jazz are now in their second generation.
It just so happened that when we secured the new-for-2009 Honda Jazz for a test drive, we also got a call from BMW’s rep offering us a Mini Cooper S Cabrio. We kept both, if only for a novelty comparo article later on. However, unfortunately or fortunately, we only got to keep the 118 hp Jazz for a less than a day-and-a-half, while we had the 172 hp Mini for three whole days. So we parked the Cabrio and trundled around Dubai exclusively in the Jazz for a day.