(Approximate Years: Owned 2009-2012, my age 31-34)
We collected our new Fiesta on March 1st 2009, our first brand new car!
My girlfriend of the time (now wife) liked them since she saw them at the London Motor show the year before, with a particular soft spot for the pinkie-purple one as soon as she clapped eyes on it. When it was released, we took a trip to our local Ford garage to see what sort of deals were on offer. She had a mk6 Fiesta at the time, which was a great little car and she got a great deal on that when she bought it several years prior.
Although we weren’t intending to buy, the deal was good and the car looked great, it was a real step up from the previous model, the new car really moved things along in design and comfort. It was a choice between this pink colour and the bright yellow/green colour which was also one of the launch colours. My wife chose the former after seeing a few green ones on the road, but she hadn’t seen any pink ones. The deciding influence was also that the interior was colour coded for the pink car, whereas all other colours just get the standard dull-grey dashboard. A benefit of the pink dashboard is that it detracts from the scratchy plastic that Ford still use on its interiors. This something that is highlighted significantly on the grey dashboard, as the rest of the product felt like otherwise good build quality.
The delivery date was the 1st March 2009. After a few calls saying it would be delayed, then it wouldn’t, then it would again, it was delivered on 1st March.
The service by our local Ford garage was great. We got a good deal on the car including free mats, mud flaps, and a few other bits and bobs. We went for the 1.25 Zetec model, as this offered a good balance between specification and price. We also purchased two years of servicing which, when purchased upfront, was discounted by a miserly £20 – but it was still £20 in our pocket.
Specification
The car had air con, a CD player (which played MP3 CDs), an iPod connection, alloys, quick-clear screen, Bluetooth connectivity and a funky voice-activated radio! You can just talk to it to use many of the functions including the phone. The downside is that it doesn’t respond very well to ladies – I think it’s a trait of the technology requiring a more boomy voice to acknowledge. It also had power steering which made light work of turning, and some fancy clutch wizardry which made it virtually un-stall-able.
Inside I thought they were very nicely laid out and for its time it was very up-to-the minute in trendiness, as Fiestas always seem to be. The dashboard is typical modern-car big, so it has its own little window on the side. Ours, being pink, had a matching dashboard and seats and looks very funky indeed. Maybe a bit love or hate, but there won’t be many girls who don’t like it.
The seats have an appearance and feel from the class above; very nice and chunky with good lumbar support and huggy sides.
The pre-purchase secret
After getting home on the day that we signed up to our new car, we had a look at personalised number plates and my good lady found one that she really liked. It was £400 so she thought it was a bit too expensive for her. Herein started my super-secret purchasing plot of great surpriseiness. I contacted the dealership and told them of my plan to buy the plate as a surprise and they agreed to keep it quiet. I purchased the registration entitlement and took this down to the dealer. Thankfully it arrived in the post on a day I arrived home early, so she didn’t see it.
Several weeks passed and my wife said nothing else about the number plate until the day we went to sign for the car (the week before collection). Amazingly, she had remembered the registration and asked if the dealer could try and get that one for her as the standard number plate. The salesman played along with my game and said they couldn’t, as they can’t pick registration numbers any more (that bit is true). They were fantastic with my secret; they even printed copies of the agreement documents without any registration numbers and told my wife that they don’t get the plate number until the 11th hour, hence it being blank. In addition, our sales man instructed the mechanics to ensure the plates were not put on the car until the day before (they were kept in the boot) just in case she comes down looking. They also kept the car in the compound at the back so there was no chance of her seeing it and wanting a sneaky peak. It was funny when he told me about the lengths they went to, to keep my surprise under wraps when we were in the showroom – at one stage rushing into the garage bays to move it round the back when the salesman noticed she was in! Even the account manager pretended I hadn’t met him before when we went in to sign. I think they went above what was required of them in this respect to make sure the collection day was that little more special for us, and I was very grateful indeed.
The collection day
Our appointment was at 9am (the first ones to collect!) on the 1st March. The car was parked outside the showroom but at the opposite end to the entrance. We were a few minutes early and after confirmation it was indeed our car, we went to have a look at it until the salesman was ready. The first thing my lady said as we walked over was “I wonder what my registration number is going to be!!” When she saw her lovely new car, gleaming in the sunlight with her very own personalised registration on it she got all teary and overwhelmed, bless her. To say she was happy was an understatement and was definitely the right decision to buy the plate. I think it finished the car off nicely and makes it more personal to her/us.
Since then….
When we bought the car originally, they were still brand new and it got quite a bit of attention in all of its pinkness. Driving the car was a very comfortable and relaxing experience, which regularly reminded me that you don’t really need anything bigger than this for daily transport. It did everything very well, had all the creature comforts of the time that you could ask for and feels responsive when driving. Fords are typically very good at handling and this one didn’t disappoint.
It was accessorised in a way that only girls can, including a Little Miss Naughty air fresher, a flower shaped tax-disc holder and a pink worm teddy thing(!) which lived on the parcel shelf – all matching the car of course! We also bought some kick plates for it after browsing the accessories catalogue.
We averaged around 40mpg in the three years that we owned it. On long motorway journeys, it brought that number up to a fuel sipping 48mpg+. Lovely!
We sold it in 2012 after the arrival of our daughter. The main reason for the sale being we had a three-door car and when you are in a car park, we quickly discovered that those big doors give you very little room to scramble about in the back and get a baby out of their seat. The buyer? My Dad! He always really liked it from when we bought it new – and as of now (2021) he still has it! It has developed a few faults in that time, which my Dad hasn’t had fixed as he isn’t one to pay a garage to fix non-essential problems, being the Yorkshireman that he is.
Currently the air con no longer works, it has a leak into the boot which he can’t find the root cause of, the remote central locking doesn’t work and the boot won’t open unless the key is right next to the sensor. However, he has always looked after it cosmetically and mechanically, having a full service history and just 60,000 miles on the clock.
When I sold the car to my Dad, I had it fully detailed by Tony Spears (Autoshine Specialist Detailing) and it literally looked brand new afterwards.
It still looks good today (inside and out) and drives just as good as the day we bought it. I do love Ford cars!
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