Around 5:30 a.m. on a February Sunday morning, four Nissan employees huddled in an empty parking lot alongside a camouflaged, all-new 2025 Nissan Kicks, shivering.
“We have high expectations of how our vehicles should operate”Post this
Each wore a light jacket and jeans, but no winter hat or gloves. Snow sat piled behind them, and with sunrise still nearly two hours away, no one had enjoyed even a sip of coffee or a warm shower.
For Nissan quality and development teams, this was another day at the office – and an example of the dramatic lengths taken to ensure the all-new Kicks was thoroughly prepared well before production began at the Nissan Aguascalientes (Mexico) Plant this summer. The vehicle went on sale in August.
“We have high expectations of how our vehicles should operate,” said Stephen Soley, senior manager of Marketability, Nissan Americas. “We’re working to ensure that we meet and exceed customer expectations.”
Years of global collaboration
In the years and months leading up to a new vehicle launch, Nissan quality and development teams – consisting of Research & Development and Total Customer Satisfaction groups, located across the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Japan – test every inch, relaying feedback to colleagues across the globe.
Testing begins years before production, and creativity is a must.
In 2022, the Nissan Research & Development team in Japan retrofitted a 2020 European-spec Juke. The Juke shares the same CMF-B platform as Kicks and – modified with early prototypes of the Kicks chassis, seats, electronics, and other parts – provided an early look into how Kicks might perform.
“That allowed us to gather early information on the powertrain and chassis tuning, which helps set us up for success as we go into testing the early builds,” Soley said.
Soon after, evaluations on early-model Kicks units began. In early 2023, the Nissan Americas Marketability team, which operates within the Research & Development group and serves as Nissan’s voice of the customer, put Kicks through its paces in Colorado.
In late 2023, the focus shifted to Canada, where the Nissan Canada Total Customer Satisfaction (TCS) team ramped up its quality testing. Canada is a proving ground for extreme winter evaluations, and a new initiative called “Project North” positions the country as the focal point for Nissan North America cold-weather testing.
And in February 2024, the torch was passed to Marketability and others for near-final evaluations in Quebec City.
Which brings us back to a coffee-less and shower-less morning.
Extreme evaluation
On that cold February weekend in Quebec City, the Nissan Americas Marketability team first tested the Kicks’ new Intelligent All-Wheel Drive system in a variety of extreme wintry scenes.
Sunday, the focus shifted to the HVAC system.
Though the heater warmup evaluation is complex, the goal is simple: validate that the HVAC system warms the car and its passengers appropriately.
The test begins before sunrise to capitalize on what is typically the coldest part of the day. Each participant must stand outside for 30 minutes with minimal winter clothing. No coffee or showers are allowed, as either could alter body temperature and disrupt the process.
“We’re looking at the human feelings of it,” said Adam Fox, a Marketability specialist and heater warmup evaluation participant. “That’s why we have multiple people involved – to provide different perspectives of the same situation.”
After 30 minutes, team members hop inside the car and blast the heat on high, and the driver and three passengers rate how cold 10 different body parts feel, on a scale of -3 (coldest) to +3 (warmest).
Once the car warms up slightly, the team begins driving, stopping every 10 minutes to document everyone’s heat level ratings and evaluate how they change with time and varied HVAC settings.
Simultaneously, a web of temperature probes, known as thermocouples, gathers objective temperature readings every 10 seconds.
And one car ahead, other employees test a competitor vehicle following the same criteria, providing valuable insight into how Kicks performs against the competition.
“Together, all of the subjective and objective data helps us determine what, if anything, needs to be addressed before production,” said Soley.
Meticulous documentation, efficient solutions
Alex Bouckley managed the evaluation in Quebec. Sitting shotgun with Soley behind the wheel, Bouckley documented each passenger’s heat level ratings and constantly scanned every crevice of the vehicle’s interior.
About 30 minutes in, Bouckley noticed heat coming from the defroster even though it was turned off. He diligently took note.
A couple weeks later, Bouckley joined a team of HVAC engineers at Nissan’s Technical Center in Michigan to evaluate the issue in a wind tunnel. Together, they found a solution – well before production of customer cars began.
“We’ll find issues as small as a capitalization of a word on a menu, or as big as a wireless charger not working,” Bouckley said. “Our job is to find these issues and get them resolved in a timely manner.”
And after multiple years of extreme testing and global collaboration, Kicks is ready.
As one test ends, another begins
“Right about now is where the lack of coffee really starts to hit,” Soley said, as the sun began to rise over Quebec City.
Fortunately, sunrise signaled the completion of a successful heater warmup testing, and coffee was on the horizon.
With several all-new models to be launched in the U.S. and Canada next fiscal year, the Nissan quality and development teams will need all the energy they can muster. And that’s just fine with them.
“We have the coolest jobs,” Soley said.
The coolest – and the coldest.
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