What are your favorite aspects of your CX-5?

Way off topic, but Orchard Park. NY where the Bills stadium is located about 15-20 miles south of the Buffalo city center, is now up to 6 1/2 ft. of snow over the last two days! I'm about 25 miles north of downtown and we have 1" on the ground, expecting 6" today. Holiday Valley, a ski resort about 50 miles south of the city center, is running their snow making machines today.

While 4 - 7 ft. is spots is highly unusual, record breaking in some spots, narrow bands of lake affect snow off of Lake Erie are not unusual, in this case 20-30 miles wide swinging a bit north and south over the last two days.

Yep, all familiar to me. I used to live in Hamlin NY, about 1/2 mile from Lake Ontario west of Rochester, and storms would come off the lake and penetrate a mile or two inland with blizzard conditions. I would drive a few miles south and the sun would be shining.

And then there was "the storm that never was," I believe in February or March '77. Despite the dire predictions, it never came far enough east to affect us.

Yesterday they said the wind direction was "perfect", going the entire length of Lake Erie. Tug Hill, considered the snowiest place east of the Mississippi, is on the east side of Lake Ontario. They "only" got about 4 feet or so yesterday.

I'm in the Finger Lakes south of Rochester, about 40 miles south of Lake Ontario, so we get very little lake effect here from either lake.
 
To me it is the handling first, how well the engine/trans work together secondly, and looks for third. I remember when it first came out in 2012, Car & Driver did a comparison test with Honda CRV, Toyota Rav4, and others. The CX-5 came out on top, and the main reason they said was that, "It not only handles like car. It handles like a good car".
I remember on my first test drive (I did 2 before final decision) I wasn't 60 seconds down the road and remember thinking " damn, I like the way this thing drives , maybe I'll end up buying it". About 5 hours later after taking care of the paperwork and turning in my trade, I took it home. It was a great Sunday. Went out for late morning coffee with a swing by the Mazda dealer along the way to 'check out a few' before they open (to avoid sales people) and came home with the car. And even though the CX-5 has been refined, I still feel Mazda did an impressive job with design, simplicity and styling on this Gen 1 model.
 
definitely a "turn back and look at it" car. no supercar by any means, but it definitely bucks the trend of the ubiquitous boring compact suv, let alone ubiquitous boring car. non-turbo engine plenty powerful for most situations, and i'm coming from a forester xt (250 hp etc.). transmission is very good, though the gearing may make the engine seem weak in certain gears and situations. i think a lot of the complaints are probably from people who equate n/a inline 4 and their sound with weak engine. if it sounded like a V6 or I6, i don't think many would be complaining. cabin looks and feels luxurious. plenty of cargo room for my needs. handles too well for a compact suv, even a sedan for that matter. exterior looks too good for its own good. paint job could be better, though the red color is to die for (hopefully not literally). GT package is just about perfect for me. Most of the premium package features i wouldn't need, though i might use them; power passenger seat, memory driver seat and heated rear seats are more for families than for a single, childless guy like me. i've had heated steering wheel before, but don't really miss it so far. never had heads-up display before, though i've heard it's very good.
 
Messing with the alert features that make the CX5 one of the safest cars on the road can lead to disastrous results. It may be better to adapt yourself to the car. That said, the crash sensing and auto braking can scare you and car behind you to death.

There have numerous times where the car I was following was turning into a driveway and I had plenty of space between to clear it but the car felt otherwise. Small braking episodes will startle you and your passengers will holler “what the hell was that”. The near lockups will shake you up pretty good.

If I wrecked my car tomorrow, I would buy the CX5 again. I also love how quiet my 2019 is on the highway. I couldn’t hear the radio of my 2014 Mazda 6 whereas I can now listen to music and have conversations with others even with the OEM tires.
My comment was more that I would not disable a safety feature. However I now allow more space when passing a turning car. Though I am confident that I have enough room, I adapted my driving to satisfy the car‘s distance system. I now slow down more to let the other car complete his turn and/or move farther way from it.

I tried changing various distance settings but I haven’t hit the holy grail of near/far settings that makes me happy. This includes the Blind Spot beeps when returning to the lane of the car I just passed.
 
The other thing I liked about my car was it wasn't popular. I like not seeing my car everywhere I go.
Little did I know the very year I bought my car, Mazda sales were set to really take off and today I see more of them then I do CRV's.
 
The other thing I liked about my car was it wasn't popular. I like not seeing my car everywhere I go.
Little did I know the very year I bought my car, Mazda sales were set to really take off and today I see more of them then I do CRV's.
Back in 2014 when I bought mine I only saw about 6 CX-5's locally. With all of the Toyota's and Honda's (RAV 4's and CRV's) driving around it was nice to have something different. I got some positive comments about it at work and gave a test drive to a couple of people. A few asked me what brand and model it was. I'm seeing more each year.
 
Back in 2014 when I bought mine I only saw about 6 CX-5's locally. With all of the Toyota's and Honda's (RAV 4's and CRV's) driving around it was nice to have something different. I got some positive comments about it at work and gave a test drive to a couple of people. A few asked me what brand and model it was. I'm seeing more each year.
Still see more jeeps, subies, rav4 and trucks than the mazdas though. I do see more cx5 than crv though. Seems crv sales have fallen alot at least near my area .
For me the crv lacked power and had cheap interior so that could be reason for decline of crv.

And am seeing alot more cx5 on road than when I bought mine last year.
 
The other thing I liked about my car was it wasn't popular. I like not seeing my car everywhere I go.
Little did I know the very year I bought my car, Mazda sales were set to really take off and today I see more of them then I do CRV's.
I come at it from the opposite direction. The more units produced and the more years of the generation and drive train on the road, the more likely bugs will have been worked out.
 
And am seeing alot more cx5 on road than when I bought mine last year.
Maybe you're just paying more attention now that you own one.

Plugging the data from the following link...


...into a spreadsheet shows that CX-5 US sales from 2012 through Oct. 2022 total 1,314,515 units. Over the last year, Nov. 2021 - Oct. 2022, unit sales total 146,318, about 11% of the total.

Some have been totaled or otherwise junked in the last year, a marginal offset against new units.

Otherwise, a new dealership nearby or some localized viral phenomenon would have to be identified to account for it.
 
Maybe you're just paying more attention now that you own one.

Plugging the data from the following link...


...into a spreadsheet shows that CX-5 US sales from 2012 through Oct. 2022 total 1,314,515 units. Over the last year, Nov. 2021 - Oct. 2022, unit sales total 146,318, about 11% of the total.

Some have been totaled or otherwise junked in the last year, a marginal offset against new units.

Otherwise, a new dealership nearby or some localized viral phenomenon would have to be identified to account for it.
Yeah. Thats possible. Maybe just noticing them more.
 
No, that's not it. I mean maybe 5% of it.
North East Ohio has fallen in love with Mazda.
When I first bought my car, I was never seeing them in parking lots. Rarely on the road.
And believe me I was looking, Always. and it didn't happen right away. Bought my car in 16... every year after that I just see more and more and more. And more.
When I bought my car there were 5 dealerships within 100 miles of me. I kid you not, today there are 7. 2 more dealerships have opened since 2016. In this same geographic area.

Not to mention, re: overall sales. Man, we used to actually post about MONTHLY numbers in this forum. Mazda has consistently just broken it's own sales record after sales record.
And I do mean consistently:
Dateline Jan 4, 2022 -
Sales Highlights - Mazda achieved its best year in sales since 1994, with a total of 332,756 vehicles sold in 2021.
  • CX-30 sales increased 58 percent; achieving its best sales since launch with 60,185 vehicles sold
  • CX-5 sales increased 15 percent; achieving its best sales since launch with 168,383 vehicles sold
  • CX-9 sales increased 25 percent; achieving its best sales since launch with 34,493 vehicles sold
A big part of that happened here in NEO.
Denver likes Subaru? Cleveland and Akron like Mazda.
 
Did a quick search. Breaking records in 17...

 
No, that's not it. I mean maybe 5% of it.
North East Ohio has fallen in love with Mazda.
When I first bought my car, I was never seeing them in parking lots. Rarely on the road.
And believe me I was looking, Always. and it didn't happen right away. Bought my car in 16... every year after that I just see more and more and more. And more.
When I bought my car there were 5 dealerships within 100 miles of me. I kid you not, today there are 7. 2 more dealerships have opened since 2016. In this same geographic area.

Not to mention, re: overall sales. Man, we used to actually post about MONTHLY numbers in this forum. Mazda has consistently just broken it's own sales record after sales record.
And I do mean consistently:
Dateline Jan 4, 2022 -
Sales Highlights - Mazda achieved its best year in sales since 1994, with a total of 332,756 vehicles sold in 2021.
  • CX-30 sales increased 58 percent; achieving its best sales since launch with 60,185 vehicles sold
  • CX-5 sales increased 15 percent; achieving its best sales since launch with 168,383 vehicles sold
  • CX-9 sales increased 25 percent; achieving its best sales since launch with 34,493 vehicles sold
A big part of that happened here in NEO.
Denver likes Subaru? Cleveland and Akron like Mazda.
I was responding to a post about a perceived increase in the last year. The data speaks for itself on that count.

If you're going to compare to 2016 then clearly the majority of CX-5s have been sold since then as the data shows. And since the model was first released as a 2012, many of the older ones are still running, so there is a sizeable accumulation as the years tick by. Again, there is no plausible reason that you would see some relatively sudden increase except, as I noted, a new dealership opens near you or there's some viral phenomenon in northeast Ohio. If you moved closer to a dealership there's that too.

On the other hand, If you mean Mazda's in general, the sales numbers do not reflect as dramatic an increase since 2016 as you seem to indicate.


For 2005 - 2015, Mazda's average annual total unit sales in the US were about 271,000. For 2016-2021 the average was 295,000, only about a 9% increase. From 2005-2011, the years immediately predating CX-5, the average was about 254,000 units. This seem to indicate either non-CX5 models have fallen out of favor or CX-5 is cannibalizing sales of those other models, some of both I would guess, especially the cannibalizing, otherwise there would be another 100,000 units per year in the books.

PS: I bought mine at Classic Mazda in Mentor but you probably would not have seen it since I went 200 miles to get it. ;)

PPS: The more you think about this the more likely you'll see more CX-5s or Mazdas in general. Obsession kinda works that way.
 
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Why is it so hard to believe maybe in this part of the country Mazda's are more popular then in other areas?!? This discussion has gone off the rails.
I promise you Mazda's are more popular here then they probably are where you live. This is not because I am obsessed. They have gotten more popular since I bought my car HERE IN NEO.

7 dealerships... 100 miles... anyone else make that claim? 2 opened within the past 3 years.
How can ANY area support that many Mazda dealers if they aren't a bit more popular here?

Bass Mazda, Sheffield Lake
Classic Mazda, Cleveland
Mazda of Bedford
Brunswick Mazda (1 of the new ones)
The new Mazda of Kent (the other new one)
Cascade Mazda, Peninsula
Serra Mazda, Akron
Oh wait, I even freaking missed TWO?!?! LOL
Kempthorn Mazda
and Mazda of Wooster...

All within 100 miles of my address.
MAZDA IS POPULAR IN OHIO.
Can we move on?
:D :D

/edit/ Kempthorn might be more then 100 miles... but not by much...
 
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JFC I forgot about this one!!!!

PS: I bought mine at Classic Mazda in Mentor but you probably would not have seen it since I went 200 miles to get it. ;)

This dealership bought Montrose Mazda which in my list is the one I called "Classic Mazda, Cleveland". So same dealer, 2 locations. So that's 10 within 125 miles.

Do you believe me now?!?!? :D They are freaking everywhere up here. I literally cannot drive ANYWHERE, even 2 miles, without seeing at least 1.
 
Why is it so hard to believe maybe in this part of the country Mazda's are more popular then in other areas?!?
It is not hard to believe. As I said twice already, now a third time, what you may be observing is a new dealership nearby or a localized viral phenomenon. NE Ohio may be checking both boxes.

I use the term "viral" in the broadest sense, a phenomenon that existed before the internet and the use of that term. If one wants to call it "regional popularity", the cause of which is not easily identified, so bit it. The data does not bear out a national phenomenon to the degree you indicate.

You've already expressed your disappointment in seeing an increasing number of CX-5's or Mazdas in general, a loss of a sense of exclusivity. That's something you have to accept, so stop looking for them if it bothers you. I say the more the merrier. You'd be better off think those increasing sales are a confirmation of your good judgement. ;)
 
It is not hard to believe. As I said twice already, now a third time, what you may be observing is a new dealership nearby or a localized viral phenomenon. NE Ohio may be checking both boxes.

I use the term "viral" in the broadest sense, a phenomenon that existed before the internet and the use of that term. If one wants to call it "regional popularity", the cause of which is not easily identified, so bit it. The data does not bear out a national phenomenon to the degree you indicate.

You've already expressed your disappointment in seeing an increasing number of CX-5's or Mazdas in general, a loss of a sense of exclusivity. That's something you have to accept, so stop looking for them if it bothers you. I say the more the merrier. You'd be better off think those increasing sales are a confirmation of your good judgement. ;)
Im in the northeast US. There are several mazda dealerships near us. We have 3 dealers within 15 miles, 6 dealers within 30 miles and 15 dealers within 100 miles. Meanwhile we only have 3 Toyota dealers within 30 miles.

It would be interesting to see the yearly sales figures for our region.
Im guessing the figures are skewed towards the northern US.
 
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