IT is debatable whether the Nissan Qashqai was really the first crossover but there's no arguing that, more than any other vehicle, it helped popularise the family hatchback-meets-SUV concept that is today so popular, writes William Scholes.
Combined crossovers and SUV sales now account for more than a quarter of the total European car market, so Nissan was really on to something when the Qashqai arrived a decade ago - even if its Scrabble-friendly name gave some pronunciation problems.
In Northern Ireland we really like crossovers. The Qashqai is a fixture in the monthly top 10 registration charts, where it jostles for position with the likes of the Kia Sportage, Hyundai Tucson, Ford Kuga and Renault Kadjar - cars which follow the template Nissan first defined.
In fact, Nissan itself counts that 21 Qashqai rivals have been launched since February 2007.
Here are 10 other key Qashqai numbers:
1. 3.3 million – Qashqai examples have been sold globally, with 2.3 million of them in Europe.
2. 75,000 – the number of ‘continuous quality assurance’ tests Nissan engineers have carried out on the Qashqai since 2007
3. 45,000 – the estimated number of jobs in Europe that are supported by the Qashqai in Nissan itself and the company's suppliers.
4. 2,708 – parts in a Qashqai
5. 600 – number of days which the Qashqai’s audio system was played at full volume, to ensure it sounds crystal-clear all through the car’s life
6. 99 – countries where the Nissan Qashqai is currently on sale
7. 62 – seconds that it takes for another new Qashqai to roll off the production line at Nissan’s plant in Sunderland
8. 21 – months it took the second-generation Qashqai to sell 500,000 units. No other British-built car has reached that total so quickly.
9. 19 – countries in which the Nissan Qashqai has been voted ‘Car of the Year’
10. 1.5 – the size of the diesel engine, in litres, of the most popular version of the Qashqai. Mated to front-wheel drive and a six-speed manual transmission, and finished in pearlescent black in N-Connecta trim, it’s the top-selling version.
