ROVER CITYROVER Mk 2
This article covers the whole Rover CityRover saga in 4 parts. Third Part CityRover Mk 2
CityRover Mk2 (2005): The meltdown of MG Rover didn’t mean it was the end of the CityRover. In July 2005 MG Rover was liquidated with the loss of 6,000 jobs in the company and a further 25,000 jobs in related suppliers companies. Nanjing acquired the assets of the MG Rover Group. In the first year of production around 6000 CityRovers were sold, however there are no figures available for the rest 2 years.
Question arises that was the CityRover that bad? Or the Brits especially Top Gear just exaggerated everything. If one watches the trio era of Top Gear one can see that they make fun of every car that was not made on UK. They even rigged their own cars to prove a point and make it a stereotype like they did with the Reliant Robin. Yes the CityRover was not the best car ever made but it was fine if one looks at the package that it offered. What went wrong was the price which led to all this.
To rectify all this enter the CityRover Mk2. But it was probably the only new production car which was neither launched nor had a new dealership to sell it. Although the CityRover Mk2 did fairly well in the used car markets although they were not used cars.
Motorpoint a car dealership network in UK (which sells nearly used cars under 30,000 miles as they claim) sold 700 units of the car after an year of MGR’s meltdown. It was reported that MGR bought in the car at £1600 each a potential profit of over £3000 per car, but Motorpoint’s marketing people believed they found the cars’ natural price, hence the car sold well.
MG Rover had scheduled 18th May, 2005 for the car’s press debut. That was before black Thursday in early April by then the first batch of cars had arrived at Portbury docks and were left standing there as MG Rover collapsed. Despite that, some 300 of the Mk2 models crept into UK later shipments en route went back to Pune, on the orders of worried Tata Motors management. Long story short, the cars that had resurfaced with Motorpoint and they even bought 900 models from Tata Motors.Â
The CityRover bulit a small following with motorists who looked for an affordable car. And with a new CityRover for £3999 OTR back then the Solo & Select models made sense.
Prices were as follows. The top of the range CityRover with the Select package with Motorpoint’s 3 year bullet proof warranty was for £5500, comparing this with official MG Rover prices for the Mk1 CityRover this would have crossed £8000.
The only catch in this was that the Warranty costed around £299 and a stereo costed around £99. The Mk2 had dual airbags as standard which was not in Mk1, better fit finish quality, some cosmetic touches and new wheelcovers.
The new Mk2 CityRovers were sold mainly to the people who had a Metro/100 and wanted something similar, simple and uncomplicated.
Around 1200 Mk2 CityRovers were sold through non MG Rover dealerships after MG Rover’s collapse and with that the CityRover saga ends.
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