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BUSINESS
It looks like the result of a one-night stand between a Volkswagen Beetle and a tarty English roadster. Stubby and wide-eyed yet flashy and full of buzz, it zips through traffic like a basketball point-guard bobbing and weaving among a herd of Shaquille O'Neilsized sport utility vehicles. 'It' refers to the new Mini, BMW's reinvention of the iconic British subcompact, which the company launched last year in Europe. This spring, the Mini debuted in North America, and BMW is betting big that the quirky brand will thrive in the US.
Small cars, however, are a departure for BMW, which for more than two decades has held tenaciously to its luxury-based business model after a brief and disastrous dalliance with lower priced cars during the 1990s. But the question remains-with American tastes tending toward spacious SUVs and minivans, is there enough demand for such a hiccup of a car?
MINI HISTORY
The Mini was originally conceived at a time when small cars were the rage in Europe. After World War II, gas remained in short supply, and the need for cheap, cost-efficient transportation was nowhere more acute than in Germany. Volkswagen had begun mass-producing the Beetle in 1946, and BMW and others had since developed even smaller and cheaper "bubble cars." The British carmakers had had their own successes, among them British Motor Corporation's Morris Minor, but in 1957, in the wake of the Suez oil crisis, the head of BMC worriedly told his top designer that in order to compete the company had to produce a better value. In other words, BMC had to build the roomiest, most fuel-efficient car out of the least materials for the smallest price to consumers.
The man charged with this mission, Alec Issigonis, a Greek emigre, had established himself as one of Britain's top car designers during the 1940s and 50s. He began envisioning what kind of car he could build that would compete with the Germans, and legend has it he sketched his first designs on the corner of a tablecloth.
The result was the Mini. Essentially, Issigonis created a box-ten feet long, four feet wide, and four feet tall. Its tiny ten-inch wheels were pushed out to the far corners, and the thirty-five-horsepower engine was installed...