Peugeot 5008 long-term test review

• The car Peugeot 5008 Puretech 130 Allure
• Run by Jim Holder, editorial director
• Why it’s here To discover if real life can find any holes in the armoury of our favourite seven-seat SUV
• Needs to Make family life easy with a touch of flair and deliver low running costs across the board

Price £28,780 Price as tested £29,885 Miles covered 5232 Official fuel economy 54.3mpg Test economy 31.3mpg Options Metallic paint (£525), Black Diamond roof (£280), 19in alloy wheels (£300)

28 November – Spacious and versatile

I’m a great believer that the only limit to the size of your Christmas tree should be the size of the car into which you have to squeeze it, but so commodious is the Peugeot 5008 that I was recently forced to reel in my enthusiasm for fear of puncturing the ceiling.

That the 5008 is big should be no surprise - it is, after all, a seven-seater and, rearmost seats down, it has 822 litres of space, a headstart over what most rivals offer and enough for pretty much any everyday eventuality. Even so, in tree terms it’s never going to carry more than a sapling simply because it is high and wide rather than long and thin in shape.

Remove the middle seats and space expands to 2506 litres, again large for the class. But while the space is exceptionally for when you are carrying bikes, a huge amount of shopping or perhaps a washing machine, again it’s no so good for carrying a long, narrow tree.

But there is another option, and one that is particularly appealing if, like me, you have two kids who want to be there choosing the tree with you: making use of the ability to split the rearmost seats 40:20:40.

Because the front passenger seat can also be folded flat, it opens up the possibility of opening up a vast load space along the length of the car should you require it (and I suspect buying a Christmas tree, fencing or perhaps if you need to carry a pole vault are the only times you might).

And that, of course, is where I needed to curb my enthusiasm, because any tree that is more than eight-feet tall can surely only belong in a Premiership footballer’s home? The solution? Well, buying a smaller tree, of course, and then using it to separate the kids by dropping the middle seat in the middle row.

The morale of this story is that the Peugeot 5008 load space isn’t just big, but it’s also hugely versatile, giving it an edge over many rivals. Now I’ve just got to work out how to get the pine needles out...

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