It’s official: we’ve finally reached peak Skoda. Or rather Peaq Skoda. Because, as you can read here, the Czech firm’s new flagship seven-seater will be called the Peaq. And it has, er, peaqed my interest, because I love a silly car name.
As car names go, this is brilliantly clever yet gloriously daft. It’s a ridiculously literal name for what’s intended as the peak of a brand’s line-up, but with a little letter-based fudging to make it unique and distinctive.
Skoda has previously given all its SUVs names ending with ‘q’, with the petrol ones starting with a ‘K’ (Kodiaq, Karoq, Kamiq) and the EVs an ‘E’ (Enyaq, Elroq, Epiq). And even if the Peaq title has ended part of that trend, it fits into the range well. Quite clever, then.
Except, of course, it’s also wonderfully silly. Which I very much like. Because why can’t car names be daft? And there’s a fine history of cars named after places or animals and all sorts of things, so why not the top part of a mountain?
In an era when so many cars are simply known by a series of letters and/or numbers and showrooms are packed with brands you’ve barely heard of, we should embrace cars with proper names that you will actually remember. And we should celebrate that Skoda never moved away from proper names as it moved into EVs – a lesson that sister brand Volkswagen has now learned.
With cars, there’s always a balance between the rational and emotional: people essentially buy a car to serve a function, but they also want something engaging. That might be in terms of performance, but it might also be styling or brand or, yes, a model name.
Is Peaq a good name? Well, that’s as subjective as a car’s styling. But in my view, yes: it has character, it has a bit of charm and, most importantly of all, it’s memorable. It’s in the pantheon of the Suzuki Jimny, Dacia Bigster, Renault Twingo and even the BYD Dolphin Surf: just silly enough to work.
And really, the names of our most beloved car are quite silly when you stop to think about them. If you sat down today to name a name for a new Ford supermini (we wish) from scratch, would you really think of Fiesta? The Volkswagen Golf? No way that would get past a naming search committee today. They sound perfectly normal only because we’re used to them.
The most important thing is that I won’t forget the Skoda Peaq’s name, which isn’t true of many of its rivals known only by a number. And there’s a warmth and friendliness to it that is a little charming.
Also, may I be the first person to suggest that Skoda absolutely, definitely needs to take on America’s biggest hillclimb event next year? Skoda Pikes Peaq, anyone?