First Drive Review
Can a celebrity CEO and a family sedan with wallflower styling help save Renault? We hopped aboard the completely new and totally revamped 2008 Laguna to find out for ourselves. Forget the funky lines common to cross-town rival Citroën, or the gaping grilles and massive chrome badges on every new Peugeot, Renault is playing things much safer.
Renault's turnaround rests with Carlos Ghosn, a veritable superhero of the auto industry who is as famous for turning around Nissan's fortunes as he is for attracting pop-star levels of media interest at every auto show. So popular is Ghosn in Japan that there are comic books devoted to him and his boardroom battles. Having revived Nissan—and earned the nickname "Le Cost Killer" in the process—Ghosn is now focusing on Renault, Nissan's parent company, and he serves as CEO of both auto manufacturers. Ghosn's plan is to win back customers, increase sales, and manage both tasks while honing a new upmarket brand image for Renault.
Blatantly Bland
Picking up our Laguna from Renault's headquarters in the southwest of Paris, we headed directly into the city center. Not yet officially on sale at the time of our test drive, the sober-looking Laguna still received a surprising amount of attention. Lots of craned necks and murmurs of oh, la nouvelle Laguna were common any time we found ourselves stuck in traffic or waiting at a red light. From the side and rear, the Laguna has chunky lines and a clean Germanic look to it. The LED taillights are especially cool at night, and our car's 18-inch alloys filled the wheel wells nicely. But to our eyes, the front end has too many lines and intersecting angles. Coupled with the robotic-looking headlights, the Laguna is just blatantly bland. In crowded parking garages, we did a few double-takes to make sure we were getting into the right car and not some other family-mobile.
Thankfully, once inside, the Laguna is as handsome as they come. The dashboard is simple and logical, representing a vast improvement on the previous model's dated design. Rapping our knuckles on the dashboard and door panels and tugging at various trim, we found that ergonomics and quality were a top priority during development. The leather-trimmed seats earned raves for comfort from driver and passengers. A steering wheel with a slight cutaway at the bottom is a sporty touch that ties in nicely with Renault's Formula 1 racing team. Based on the same platform as the Nissan Altima, there is ample space front and rear, although with five aboard, the middle rear passenger had better be small. Our only major disappointment was with the wide but shallow 16-cubic-foot trunk. At least the hatchback model makes loading bulky items easy. With the rear seats folded down, cargo volume swells to 49 cubic feet—useful when hauling furniture or extra-long French baguettes.
