The warranty on your new Citroen Grand C4 Picasso will expire around the time your oldest begins taking the bus to secondary school. Assuming that he or she turned six around the time the family outgrew a conventional five-seat sedan/hatch/wagon, the Citroen people mover you bought when child number four came along will be covered for defects and roadside assistance right through the eldest's primary school years.
Even better, the warranty covers the car for unlimited kilometres during that six-year period. So all that running around to footy practice, band practice, karate, tennis, cricket, swimming, sleep-overs, holidays, trips up the country to Great Aunt Myrtle's, birthday parties at McDonalds, the Maccas drive-through itself and all the other extra-curricular activities that cumulatively add up to over 100,000km covered in a typical year will not shorten the warranty period.
The new warranty coverage is offered with the Grand C4 Picasso and Citroen's DS line also. It's an initiative the importer is implementing in response to market research. Statistical data clearly showed that the offer of a six-year warranty was a strong catalyst that could tip the purchasing decision in Citroen's favour.
"These are the people that we need to target – the ones that are just on the edge of tipping over, to buying us," said Citroen's national marketing manager, Manuel Tyras, addressing journalists during a briefing for the new Picasso.
Citroen, though a known brand in Australia for 90 years, has battled with a reputation for complex systems and unconventional mechanicals that were occasionally unreliable and expensive to service. That image has lingered on into the current era. The announcement of the new warranty signals faith in the modern product, says the importer's marketing honcho.
According to Tyras, the majority of respondents surveyed were prepared to buy a Citroen over a rival if the Citroen offered a five-year warranty. The six-year warranty the company is now offering replaces a three-year/100,000km warranty that still applies to C3, C4 and C5 models.
"Introducing this warranty shows our commitment to the product, and our commitment to the brand in Australia."
Subsequently, Tyras explained that the warranty will not trickle down to other models in the Citroen range.
"At the moment, it's on these two lines; the DS line because it's our premium, and the Grand C4 Picasso because it's family-focused – and we thought that was important."
In later conversation with motoring.com.au, Tyras said that recent buyers of DS models who had purchased prior to the implementation of the new warranty would be looked after at dealership level. In some cases the buyers had been offered retail incentives at the point of purchase that would compensate for missing out on the longer warranty.
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