Don’t call the Carnival a minivan (although it is)

“Most of our buyers, when we did clinics, they seemed at it and they did not see it as a minivan,” Russell Wager, vice president of internet marketing for Kia Motors The united states, instructed Automotive Information. “Which is actually wherever we received the idea that [the Carnival] has an chance for better charm. It has better functionality. A minivan does not fully describe what this factor can do. It has the utility, the flexibility, [and] the style and design has a minor bit of that SUV angle. Which is variety of what we wanted to display in our communications to the buyers.”

The Carnival has the products to aid it enjoy in the minivan area, but the automaker does not want to website link the vehicle with a segment that has been declining for more than a 10 years.

Kia is considering broader, with an eye on snagging sedan proprietors who are all set for a crossover — only to uncover on their own intrigued by the Carnival and its SUV-like proportions.

The Carnival, which started hitting dealerships in March, could even entice some unpredicted eyeballs.

Wager reported one particular customer walked inTP a Kia retail store in Phoenix searching for the well-liked Telluride, the brand’s quick-providing eight-seater, but saw the Carnival and opted for that alternatively.

Matt Degen, editor of Kelley Blue E book and Autotrader, reported Kia was wise to give the Carnival a Telluride-like style and design. Technically, however, it can be however a minivan, Degen reported.

“No matter what you connect with this, if you are a spouse and children who wants seating for seven or eight and you want that ease of obtain and that flexibility, you are going to uncover this vehicle one particular way or the other,” Degen reported. “I assume it can be terrific that they’re executing this because the environment is shifting towards SUVs. Folks want people more ruggedized appears, or people blockier appears.”

Wager reported the Carnival is constructing on what Kia started off with the Telluride, Seltos and Sorento crossovers.

“It is really not that we are fearful of ‘minivan,’ ” he reported. “When we did the clinic, the buyers are stating, ‘Well, the exterior is in line with your Telluride and Sorento, so it can be just one more derivative of your capable SUVs that you have out there.’ We’re not striving to keep away from it the buyers have instructed us that that’s not what the vehicle is.”

Kia isn’t the very first automaker that has attempted to drop the minivan label on a capable spouse and children hauler or to adopt the time period MPV, which is typically used in other areas of the environment. Mazda bought a minivan that was actually called the MPV it was fortified with all-wheel push, which Degen reported gave it the credentials of a utility vehicle.