Second-hand sense: Alec Issigonis, the man who designed the original Mini in 1959, could never have dreamed that the latest incarnation of his brilliantly innovative car would become a hit in the United States in 2005.
In fact, like many others, he might never have imagined that the car would still even be in production 46 years later. But the beauty of the Mini has always been its elegant simplicity and its character.
It is also richly ironic that the Mini tradition has been kept alive by a German company, BMW. This icon of British design had reached the end of the road with the Rover Group when BMW bought the company and, parting soon after, the Munich company walked away with two of the most storied names in British motoring history, Mini and Land Rover.
BMW recently announced it was having huge problems with supplying demand for the Mini in America where more than 30,000 are sold each year. This isn't surprising, for the Mini is by far the most impressive car of its size on the market and qualifies as a small BMW rather than a little Rover. It looks great, drives brilliantly, is very comfortable for its size, is designed with high levels of safety in mind and matches BMW quality in every area.
There are three versions. The base model is the Mini with a 90bhp engine and this is boosted to 115 for the Cooper version (John Cooper designed the sporty Cooper version in the 1960s and it was his car that gave Belfast man, Paddy Hopkirk victory in the 1964 Monte Carlo Rally). An S version is even more powerful.
The external styling is funky and solid and the front grille and headlights are appealing and cool. Inside, there is a great dash and dial set up, faithful to the original design. It is roomy enough but is still a Mini in terms of space. The boot is small and the rear seats are cramped. I haven't noticed too many families zipping around in the new Mini.
The car scored four from a possible five stars in the EuroNCAP crash tests with the car withstanding front and side impacts well. Impact forces on the chest were described as being on "the high side".
There have been some niggling problems. Some have been recalled for gear-change problems, some for tyre wall damage caused in the factory and some for problems with the front suspension system. These, though, have affected hundreds rather than thousands of cars.
There are different levels of equipment, depending on which version you go for. A 2001 Cooper model with everything from leather upholstery to air conditioning has an asking price of E19,950.
A similar 2003 model but without the leather is on sale for €23,750. The Mini, it seems is destined for very high second-hand values.