The Fiat 500 has taken the Eyepro Small Car Award 2009 in the New Zealand AA Motoring Excellence Awards 2009, beating the Mercedes A Class, the Honda Jazz and the Holden Barina.

“The Fiat 500 1.4 is fun, chic, includes all the safety features modern drivers expect, has a fine design that makes the most of small package and imparts a distinctly up-market feel,” said the AA’s judges after exhaustive testing. “It’s exactly what people are looking for when they want to compromise the size of their vehicle, but not the joy of motoring. At N$32,990, the Fiat 500 1.4 Sport shows the way for small cars.”

The AA selected the Fiat 500 as a winner after 52 cars were scrutinized by six of the country’s leading motoring experts for six days at Taupo’s Motorsport Park to provide a truly independent assessment of new vehicles available in New Zealand. The Fiat 500 has collected awards from markets around the world, most notably the 2008 European Car of the Year.

“It is one thing for our products to win prizes in other countries and quite another to win at home and especially one as important as the AA Motoring Excellence Awards,” says a delighted Lawrie Malatios, General Manager for Fiat in New Zealand. “The judges have appreciated that the Fiat 500 is much more than a pretty face, with genuine depth in areas such as safety, economy and emissions, but it does so without sacrificing the joy of driving and ownership.”