Audi Q7 - premium SUV or blinged-up Sumo wrestler?

There is a well-used adage in the motor industry about new cars buyers, ‘you are what you drive’. Not totally true otherwise customers buying (or mostly contract hiring) an Audi Q7 would be ‘blinged-up Sumo wrestlers’.

Audi’s first foray into the Sports Utility Vehicle (SUV) market sector is the huge Q7. It is over five metres long, 1.98 metres wide, 1.74 metres wide with a wheelbase of 3.0 metres.

It has seating for seven passengers as standard although there are options to have five or six seat layouts if the customer desires. The Q7 has up to 2,035 litres of luggage space, quattro all-wheel drive and height adjustable air suspension.

It is important for the major premium car brands to have a model range covering as many segments of the new car market as possible. They do not need VIP and celebrity customers moving to another brand just because they cannot offer a large SUV for instance.

The Q7, built in Hungary by Audi, might not be ideal size-wise for the UK’s congested roads as it is built for the open spaces of the world’s markets. However the 6,500 UK customers buying the Q7 models each year do not seem put off by its size, SUV image or price.

Audi increased Q7 production in 2007 to over 78,000 of units for their world markets such is the demand. The Q7 is of course more at home in the wide-open spaces of the USA or in the Sheik-doms and oil rich Arab states where money and fuel prices are of no consideration.

Even the Russians and Chinese are now following the Western world and thinking ‘big SUV, big image, high status’ means an important person.

In the UK the Q7 sells against the premium brand BMW X5, Land Rover Discovery, Range Rover, Mercedes-Benz ML, GL and R-Class 4x4s, Porsche Cayenne, Volvo XC-90, VW Touareg and the Lexus RX models.

Customers range from country domiciled city businessmen through to celebrities and of course those ‘mine´s bigger than yours’ professional footballers. Big 4x4s in the hands of business commuters - or affluent school-run parents - are not popular on busy city streets but, for the time being at least, freedom of choice does still exist providing you can afford the costs.

The Q7 will fall into the £400 road tax bracket from March this year, it is in the largest company car tax bracket and it looks as though the proposed new London Congestion Charges will put a £25 per day levy on this type of vehicle and then there is the issue of fuel costs. To fill the tank will set the driver back over £100.

The Audi Q7 ranges in price from £38,075 to £51,890 depending on the engine and equipment level chosen, and of course there is a huge list of Audi options that add drastically to the final on-the-road price.

If these figures worry you the good news is that Audi is to launch a smaller five-seat version, the Q5, later this year but if you want to stay in the big league the Q7 will also become available with a 6.0-litre, V12, 498bhp, TDI turbodiesel engine as well.

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