Look, you may not know it yet, but you want one of these.
It's time to spread the gospel of the minivan,
because there's way too many car buyers out there
who are too vain to consider the Swiss Army knife of vehicles
when this is the best class of vehicle out there.
And let's start with the sliding door, which I just opened.
You may notice it has an enormous rectangular opening,
which is very easy to get in and out of.
This is a thing that no other class of vehicle
seems to offer, because I don't know why.
And you know what else is really cool about sliding doors?
Little kids can't slam 'em into other cars.
This thing just moved out from the car by only about six inches.
So if you're parked next to another car,
you don't have to worry about your kids doing something silly.
You know what else is cool about having a powered sliding door like this?
A lot of minivans -
I have to find the mark, it's here somewhere.
It's right there.
A lot of minivans like this one.
You can just do this.
Just give it two kicks and it closes the door.
So if you're carrying a whole bunch of stuff
like, say you're walking up to the car,
so long as you've got your key in your pocket, you can just be like,
"hey, car," boop boop, and it opens the dooooor.
You can't do that if you don't have
an electronic actuator to open the door for you.
But here you can and you may notice.
Okay, let's take a look in here.
Again, super easy to get in and out of.
Most minivans like this one
offer you the ability to slide the seat forward and back.
This one even gives a ridiculous range of motion.
Lookit-
Look at that! You can't even see me!
This is just where my legs are.
But, let's put the seat somewhere a little more reasonable.
Right?
Driver's seat is set up for me to drive the thing.
I've got plenty of room back here, both headroom and otherwise.
And let's take a look at the cargo area.
By the way, I'm running out of time,
so apologies for using my camera's terrible
autofocus, but notice I've left the left side door open.
It's not sticking out from the car hardly at all.
In fact, let me open the right side door,
which I will do again without using my hands.
Oh, look at that.
The door just opened.
But let's take a look at the cargo area, because this is where
minivans really shine.
I forgot where the button is.
I have the rear seats disappeared.
That is extra important for a couple of reasons, but I want you to notice
how low this load floor is.
It is so easy to get stuff in and out of a minivan,
because the load floor is incredibly low down.
And look at how much space there - you want trunk space?
There's your trunk space.
We got trunk space for days here.
I can - I can almost lay down with the middle row seats where they are.
This is an enormous trunk.
But what if you have to carry more people with you?
Well, here's the thing, right?
Here's the thing.
Now you're going to learn about the pit.
Because where are the third row seats?
They're right here in the pit.
And what happens is you put them up.
Oh, that was loud.
And now
the load floor is barely off the ground.
And this is the thing which I feel like not enough
people know about minivans: because of this,
when you have the second row seats up.
Sorry, the third row seats up.
Even with all of the seats in place, this is an enormous trunk.
It's not very deep, but it's incredibly tall.
So if you have this thing loaded up with seven people
and all of their luggage, you can just keep stacking their luggage up.
You can put, gosh, if you had like carry on bags,
you could probably fit seven of them back here quite easily.
That's the beauty of the pit.
If I don't know how well you can see it from the camera, but
it's hanging underneath the back of the car
and it is.
It's just... my foot's way down there.
My foot is on the floor.
It's - the pit is amazing!
Now here's where things get even better, right?
Watch this.
I'm going to get in the third row.
Now remember, this seat was set up for me to sit behind myself comfortably.
Because of the captain's chairs, I can very easily just back myself into the third row.
And look at that!
I have still a couple inches of legroom, so me
sitting behind myself driving had a couple inches of legroom
and now me sitting behind myself, sitting behind myself,
I still have a couple inches of legroom.
I can put my head all the way back.
I still have headroom,
and the floor is low enough that my knees aren't up in my chest
like they are in many three row vehicles.
This is a third row which can actually accommodate
adults comfortably, even big adults like me.
I am nearly six feet tall and growing
in other dimensions right now, unfortunately, but
this is an actual third row
that you can actually fit adults into.
And when you have captain's chairs, as I showed,
you can get back here super easily.
But if you had a minivan
with a bench seat now, they're not all going to be like this.
But I do want to show with the Sienna,
I had this all the way back just so you could see me.
But the other thing with this party trick is when you fold the seat,
the bottom cushion can move up and then
slam that up against the front passenger seat.
The other seat does this as well, but now it's very easy
to get into the third row like that.
So if you had a Sienna with a bench in the middle.
I don't know offhand if that bench folds 60/40,
like if the two sides move independently.
I don't remember, but it can do this.
You can get in the third row very easily.
Personally though, I think in minivans
when you have the option to have captain's chairs,
you might as well take it, because no matter which row
you try to fit three adults across, it's gonna be a little tight.
But if you have to do that, it won't be as tight in a vehicle
where there is a bench in the third row just because,
sorry, there is a bench in the second row
just because in the third row, the sides of the vehicle
are coming in a little bit to accommodate
the hardware for the rear wheels.
The third row bench is not quite as wide
as the second row bench, but just wanted to throw that out there.
But yeah, you know, the other thing with this car
and this crazy sliding range
it's going to be hard for me to move...
Like you can.
You can have tons of legroom in the third row if you want it.
So long as someone small is sitting up here.
Yeah. The only thing I don't like about this vehicle's third row is
these windows are very small.
That's just for styling, though.
I don't know why they did that, but that's - that's what they did.
And that's what it's like.
Oh yeah, and also there is a loop you can pull down here
which will let you collapse and slide the seat forward.
So those in third row don't need to do that reach around that I just did - I just forgot this was there.
Right.
And I should show just because Toyota
engineered a pretty good mechanism for this.
When you want to fold the third row you literally just do this.
It's one step.
You yank on this thing,
and then they just fall into the floor like that.
Now they don't like - they kind of need some weight on them.
They have, they're spring loaded a little bit, and they kind of
want to pop up to make it easier to lift them back up.
But then you also have these flaps here
to make the floor
truly flat.
Pretty neat.
I'm packing up so I don't have my mic on,
but I'm sure my dad would love me to show you
his very dad-coded solution for making the cargo floor
even flatter, which was one of these office chair
roller protector things which happens to fit this vehicle pretty well.
Very dad-coded, but it works great.
And when it comes to the front seat,
it is a remarkably normal car driving experience
because minivans are not unnecessarily
lifted off the ground to make you feel superior.
Now, look, I understand this is all subjective.
I'm making this video simply because I think car buying
people do not think very hard about their needs.
And I am trying to embrace
or I'm trying to get more people to embrace the Midwestern mindset
of "think through your needs before you make a purchase,"
because a lot of people
are not buying minivans these days, and they're buying
three row crossovers, which try their best to pretend to be a minivan.
For instance, Toyota sells a vehicle on this same platform called the Grand Highlander,
and I know tons of people are buying them
because you see them all over the place.
But if you actually compare the Grand Highlander and the Sienna,
you're going to discover this is the better vehicle
in almost every way.
Here's some numbers that I saved for you.
Remember the awesomeness of the pit? That gives this thing
33.5 cubic feet of cargo room behind the third row,
the Grand Highlander,
which is a vehicle on the outside
which is slightly bigger than this thing,
only has 20.6 cubic feet behind the third row.
So a smaller vehicle (slightly) but a smaller vehicle
has more than 50% more cargo room
behind the third row, which I will remind you, is a third row
which can accommodate adults comfortably.
Behind the second row of seats. The Grand Highlander only has 57.9 cubic feet of cargo room,
whereas this thing has 75.2.
That's a lot more.
And if we count just the cargo room behind the front seats,
or I guess if we have all the seats collapsed
or folded or whatever, this has 101 cubic feet of cargo room versus 97.5.
The Grand Highlander is a lot closer to the Sienna,
I think, because of the fact that the second row seats don't.
They can't come out.
So if you're looking at a different minivan
where the second row seats are removable, or they
fold into the floor like the
Voyager, whatever
Chrysler is calling their van now, not Voyager, Pacifica.
That's it.
They're killing the Voyager - anyway.
If you get [gross mouth noise]
if you get a minivan where you can actually remove or fold away the middle
row seat, you're going to have even more cargo room than that.
But still, this thing has more cargo room behind the front row,
and the second row collapsed forward as much as it can
than the Grand Highlander.
So why are people buying the Grand Highlander?
Because they can't get over themselves
and don't want to be seen driving a minivan.
I recognize this is subjective,
but there are exactly two things in my mind
the Grand Highlander does better than the Sienna.
First, towing capacity, but again, barely.
This, despite being a minivan and a hybrid drivetrain, can tow 3,500 pounds.
Some versions of the Grand Highlander can tow 5000,
which is more, but it's not that much more and 3,500 pounds,
while it's not a huge tow rating by any means,
it's nothing to sneeze at either.
So minivans, even hybrid minivans like this one, are much more capable than many people seem to think they are.
The other thing
the Grand Highlander does better than this is ground clearance.
But here I am, being that frustrating midwesterner.
Do you actually need any more ground clearance than a minivan?
Because most of you out there don't.
I have never in my life been in a situation
where I needed more ground clearance than a minivan could offer.
Now, granted, I don't go off-roading or anything recreational like that,
but I don't just limit myself to public roads
or not public roads, but paved roads.
I have taken minivans on gravel roads
and off the beaten path plenty of times.
Unless you're doing trails and stuff like that,
you probably don't actually need any more ground clearance than a minivan can offer,
and your kids are going to appreciate having a vehicle
which is lower to the ground because it's easier to get in and out of,
and your elderly relatives are also going
to appreciate having a vehicle which is lower to the ground,
because it's easier to get in and out of.
Everything about a minivan
is better than a three row crossover,
and the only reason people do not buy them
is because they don't want to be seen in a minivan.
And I am telling you, you need to get over that
because life is so much better when you stop caring about what
other people think, and you care about your needs
and how best to meet them.
This three row minivan is getting 34 miles per gallon over its life.
Its EPA rating is 35 combined, so it's missing it by just a hair.
But still, 34 miles per gallon is incredible for a vehicle this big.
My first car was a Honda Civic.
It was a coupe, even.
That small car was rated for 36 miles per gallon on the highway.
But if memory serves only 25 in the city,
and I would say on average I got maybe 28 out of that thing
unless I was on a long road trip.
So the fact that this much bigger, much more capable vehicle,
which can carry seven adults in reasonable
comfort and six adults in complete comfort,
is more fuel efficient than my tiny coupe is remarkable.
That's why it's - it's awesome!
But I don't want another car with an internal combustion engine.
I am over them.
So as much as I think this is the pinnacle of minivans,
I would not purchase this.
What I would purchase in a heartbeat is if somebody at Hyundai/Kia
decided to put the E-GMP drivetrain in the Carnival.
I would buy that tomorrow, but actually fitting in a battery pack
into the architecture of a minivan is fairly difficult.
So I understand why that hasn't happened yet.
And I do know about the Volkswagen ID buzz.
I was initially very excited about that car, and I kind of still am.
I think most people
speaking of things that people don't think about with their needs,
the ID buzz is being maligned
because it doesn't have that great of a range
by today's electric car standards,
but by my electric car standards, it's got plenty.
It's got more than plenty, and road trips would be a little more difficult
than in my car, but honestly, not that much more difficult.
So everybody out there who's writing articles about the ID buzz
saying that like, oh, it can't do the classic road -
Oh, the lights just went off.
Well, see, this is why it's Connextras.
Turn the lights back on, please.
Thank you.
They're on a motion sensor.
Anybody who's writing articles that are like
the ID buzz is not actually good at road tripping or whatever.
I mean,
we can argue about that, but
the ID buzz is I have been in one.
It's actually bigger than I think many people realize.
It's about as wide as a minivan like this, but it's really tall.
It's really tall.
Anyway, I would love an electric Kia Carnival
if they can make that happen.
But if you are not like me and are happy to keep using gasoline,
you should probably want a car which doesn't use more gasoline
than it needs to because gasoline costs money.
So maybe you should be looking at hybrid drivetrains.
And if you think this car has a very complicated drivetrain,
you should check out that video of mine which I made on the main channel,
talking about hybrid cars
and how nobody seems to understand the point of hybrid cars.
And I can tell that because
everybody has wild opinions about them.
But anyway, you should embrace the minivan
if you have the need for a large ish vehicle.
If you have to haul, if you have a big enough family to haul around
more than two kids or three kids if you want, whatever.
If you have the need for a larger vehicle,
you should be looking at a minivan.
Now, I do know that as of late,
these have not been as crashworthy as some of the other cars.
And if that's something that you are concerned about, I understand.
But I also think there's a reasonable argument to be made
that minivans are less likely to get into collisions
just because they're minivans.
I was going to say the worst thing about driving
a minivan is other drivers, because what happens
routinely when I'm on a road trip in this thing with my parents
is I'll be cruising along at keeping up
with highway speeds, and then I go to pass somebody
because they're not keeping up.
And when they realize they're being passed by a minivan,
oh, suddenly they hightail it and don't let me pass them.k
That's the most annoying thing about driving a minivan.
It's other drivers.
Otherwise you really should be looking at a minivan.
They are the Swiss Army knife of vehicles.
They have sliding doors which are easy to get in and out of,
which your kids can't bang into other cars,
which are often power assisted.
I think in the US market, I'm not sure
there are minivans for sale to have manual sliding doors
except for like commercial variants.
They're all powered now.
They're just great.
They're great vehicles.
If I had a need for one, I would be getting a minivan.
And honestly, like I said, if there were a fully electric minivan,
I would probably daily drive it because these vehicles are awesome.
And anybody who doesn't think that is - they just can't get over them.
Anyway, that's all.
Enjoy.