Mini Cooper S Clubman offers lots of fun, a little bit of space, and a premium price

2023 Mini Cooper S Clubman ALL4 vs. 2023 Mazda CX-30 Turbo AWD with Premium Plus: Fun with a little room for the family.

This week: Mini Cooper Clubman

Price: $44,400 as tested, including $4,900 for Iconic Trim and $2,250 for Mini Untold Edition.

Marketer’s pitch: “Six-door sophistication.”

Conventional wisdom: Car and Driver likes that it’s “more fun than your average station wagon,” with “chic styling, posh cabin environs,” but not the “stiff-legged ride,” that it’s “missing Android Auto,” and “it may be a wagon, but it’s a small one.”

Reality: Fun drive, more room than the standard Mini, sad sound system.

Catching up: The Clubman and CX-30 last crossed our test track in the 2020 model year, so I put them to the test again.

What’s new: Mini’s answer to the extra small SUV gets just a few minor tweaks for the model year.

Competition: Besides the CX-30, it matches the Volkswagen Taos, Chevrolet Trailblazer, Hyundai Kona, Kia Soul, Subaru Crosstrek, Mercedes GLB, Audi Q3, to name a few. (The extra small SUV category is heavily populated.)

Maxi love for Mini? Mr. Driver’s Seat’s first test of a Mini Cooper Convertible many years ago cemented a desire to own a Mini someday. Not all the models engendered devotion so strongly over the years, so it’s not a given that the Clubman will score a hit again.

Up to speed: The Clubman is a little hot rod. The 2.0-liter turbo creates 189 horsepower, and though it takes a second or so to get going, it still has a lot of oomph available for country roads and zipping through town. It gets to 60 in 6.6 seconds, according to Car and Driver.

Shifty: The power comes more quickly when drivers work their own gears, and Mini makes this easy. The joystick for 8-speed shiftable automatic transmission looks and acts a lot like parent company BMW’s, and parentage goes a long way to making this little brand as fun as it is.

Drivers who like to pay attention to the hills and dales and operate the transmission themselves will be rewarded with the best experience. Also, the exhaust sounds seriously cool.

What’s more, the Clubman still comes with a 6-speed manual, and Mini clutches are forgiving and easy on aging knees.

On the road: The Clubman offers all the sportiness one should expect from the Mini line. It feels like a racer, and country-road handling is a delight. The All4 system means all-wheel drive, naturally; this test featured more stable handling than the front-wheel-drive 2020 model tested.

Highway driving is better than expected, probably thanks to the dynamic damper control that’s part of the Iconic Trim package. The bumpy Route 202 wasn’t terribly enhanced as I expected, although some of the huge ruts around Newark airport really hurt.

Unfortunately, testing in the Clubman was a bit limited; I broke a tire on a pothole after about 70 miles of driving, then the vehicle sat for 5 days before the replacement tires could come. (I cried while staring out the window a lot that week.) Still, we rounded out the test with a 100-mile drive to Newark airport, so fun was eventually had for all.

Driver’s Seat: It’s a Mini, and here’s where one pays the price. While the Mini Yours Leather Lounge black seat is comfortable and supportive, the close-in windshield and flat dashboard really make everything feel quite compact.

But the gauges have a pretty retro quality and the buttons and toggle switches also keep the old days alive.

Looking around: The rear barn doors harm visibility as badly as expected; the rearview feels like peering through a Mattel Viewfinder from the 1970s.

The rear camera is a further disappointment. Despite the huge, round display standing proudly in the center of the dashboard, only a letterbox measuring a snug 8.8 inches diagonally is allotted to the rearview camera. The rest is taken up with volume knobs, various buttons, and the hazard light switch.

Play some tunes: The small 8.8-inch display area is also what’s available for the infotainment touchscreen, a further disappointment. Fortunately, Mini also has the BMW knob and button controls as well.

Sound from the Harman Kardon system is only about a B. I was brought back to my 2003 Mazda Protege5 — not the greatest concert hall.

Friends and stuff: You knew that cavernous space for the whole family was never going to be a selling point. Rear seat space is snug for one 5-foot-10 guy sitting behind another — legroom is economy class, foot room and headroom are tight. The seat is nice, though, and a middle passenger shouldn’t suffer too much.

Cargo space is a snug 17.5 cubic feet behind the rear seat, but a snugger 47.9 cubic feet with the seat folded.

Keeping warm and cool: Dials control the temperature and fan speed, and buttons handle the air source.

Fuel economy: It’s nice to average 28 mpg while having all this fun. But you’re going to have to pony up for premium fuel, ouch.

Where it’s built: Oxford, England.

How it’s built: Consumer Reports predicts the Clubman reliability to be a 5 out of 5. And it’s been 4s and 5s since 2018, which is astounding, considering the Mini reputation had been less than stellar.

In the end: Fun to drive, available stick shift, and now great reliability? Sign me up.

Next week: We compare the Mazda CX-30.