If insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, then the new Citroen C5 X is not good news for the firm’s management. It has been shown repeatedly that large saloons and estates from French brands – and by extension any brand that isn’t a German premium manufacturer – don’t sell all that well.
So at a time when buyers are flocking to SUVs and crossovers, and even Ford and Vauxhall don’t see the sense in developing a new generation of the Ford Mondeo and Vauxhall Insignia, here’s Citroën launching a new C5 – a model we thought had been permanently discontinued in 2016.
There is more to the new C5 X than the extra letter, though. First, if you look closely at its dimensions, you will see that contrary to what the name suggests, it’s not a direct rival for the Skoda Superb, Volkswagen Passat and Peugeot 508, or the now-discontinued Mondeo and Insignia. The new Citroën is a bit smaller than those, but bigger than the estate versions of the Skoda Octavia, Volkswagen Golf and Peugeot 308, thus carving out a niche for itself.
It’s also significant that the PSA Group, and now Stellantis, is a global company not averse to offering certain models in Europe because they are producing them for another market anyway. Europeans may have gone off cars like the C5, but the Chinese keep buying them, so the risk in putting it on sale over here is limited even if it doesn’t sell in huge numbers. It does also mean that this most French of cars is made in China.
