Why is Citroën celebrating the 20th anniversary of a major flop?

Car manufacturers like to celebrate anniversaries because they give them free advertising. Normally, successes are celebrated, but Citroën does it – of course – a little differently. The eccentric French brand remembers a big sales flop twenty years ago.

We’re talking about the Citroën C3 Pluriel, an open car described by a well-known British motoring magazine as “as useful as a chocolate teapot”. And although the Pluriel was absolutely impractical, it was very beautiful for that very reason.

Citroën C3 Pluriel with a beautiful roof construction

The model was produced from 2003 to 2010. Which is surprising given the meager sales figures. The problem lay in the strange roof construction, which was completely different from other convertibles.

In its press release, Citroën describes the C3 Pluriel as “a car to embark on an adventure for a day”. If only you could, because if you want to drive the Pluriel all open, there’s nowhere to place the removable roof arches in the car. And it’s such a shame to leave it on the side of the road too…

Roof arches cannot be properly transported in the car

The fabric roof of the special Citroën can be partially or completely opened. If you also want to remove the rear window, the roof construction in the trunk has to be folded away, which is not an easy task.

The roof arches can then be removed as mentioned, but they are so big that you have to leave them at home because you can’t take them with you. At least not in an elegant way. You could stow them in the back seat, but then they would protrude far beyond the cabin.

Pluriel Charleston as an ode to the Duck of the same name

A beautiful special edition of the C3 Pluriel is the Charleston, an ode to the duck of the same name. The model can be recognized by the color scheme in black and dark red.

Two Citroën study models as a preview

The idea for the C3 Pluriel came about more than five years before it was launched. Citroën gave previews in the form of the C3 Air Concept from 1998 and the Pluriel Concept from a year later.

They can be bought used for next to nothing

You can buy a used Citroën C3 Pluriel for almost nothing. At the time of writing, 25 examples are for sale on gaspedal.nl at prices between 1,000 and 5,000 euros.