I know a man who smokes Rothmans. I know why he does this. Because in the days when cigarette companies were allowed to advertise their products, the man in the Rothmans ads had gold rings round the cuffs of his jacket. He was a pilot and back then pilots were very cool.

I smoke Marlboro Lights. I have no idea why, but having got through half a million of the things, I’m not about to change any time soon. There may be cigarettes on the market that are cheaper or made to a higher standard or more suited to my requirements but I am not interested in finding out. There is only one alternative to smoking Marlboros, so far as I’m concerned, and that is not smoking anything at all.

I have a similar sense of loyalty to my iPhone. I did not design it, and I have no shares in the company. But I get extremely angry when people say their Raspberry is better. It isn’t better. It has no touchscreen and no facility for playing paper toss and it’s for businessmen anyway. The iPhone is cool. I am an iPhone man.

I am also a Sony man, a Peroni man, a Diet Coke man — Pepsi is filth — a Sun reader, a Virgin frequent flyer, a Fulham boy and a Chelsea fan and I have a weird loyalty to Channel 4 News, even though all it does is read The Guardian out every night.

We are all brand loyal, but weirdly it takes only the slightest thing for us to switch horses. People moved to Primrose Hill because Sadie Frost lived there. People now fly Singapore because they get their own cabin. People went off Jonathan Ross because they didn’t like four of the 80m words he said last year.

I bet you have a favourite curry restaurant and you won’t even try any of its rivals. James May has a favourite pub. And Simon Cowell stays in the second best hotel on Barbados because, well, that’s where he always goes.

And cars. Oh God, the brand loyalty with cars is simply idiotic. Last time I checked, eight out of 10 BMW customers didn’t bother taking a test drive before buying a new car. So they’re spending probably £30,000 on something they’ve never even sat in. Madness.

I’m nearly as bad. I love the new M3 and the Z4 but I couldn’t actually have either because they are not AMG Mercs. I am an AMG Merc man as well.

This is where Lexus left me dumbfounded. Because it came along in 1990 with a brand that smelt slightly of Toyota and kicked Jaguar, BMW, Mercedes and Cadillac into the middle of next week. It’d be like a new football team smelling slightly of Stevenage coming along next season and nicking all the supporters from Manchester, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal.

Anyway, the point is that when it comes to cars there are only a very few floating voters. This means that if you have a Mini, unless your wife has an affair in it, you will buy another Mini next time round. You won’t even bother to look at the Citroën DS3 I reviewed three weeks ago, and for you that’s a pity. It’s great.

As a brand, though, Citroën’s a bit odd. Until quite recently its cars were weird. They had strange controls, super-fierce brakes, pedals that sprouted from the floor like mushrooms and seats that were squidgier than a fat man’s ****. Couple these to the roly-poly, oil-based suspension and it was like driving around in a cross-Channel ferry made from kapok and marshmallows.

By coincidence, I spent much of last week driving a 1989 Citroën CX Safari and I thought it was tremendous; it was so comfortable and relaxing to drive that I didn’t even get cross with the indicators that didn’t self cancel or the stereo that nestled in a vertical position between the front seats — so all the crumbs from your Pork Farms sausage roll go into the cassette slot. Or the bits from your Double Decker — a chocolate bar specifically designed to disintegrate every time you go near it.

I didn’t even mind the steering system, which only ever really wants you to go in a straight line. Moving it left or right is possible but only in the same way it’s possible to move Westminster Abbey left and right. It’d much rather you left it where it was.

Sadly, though, while these cars — and to a certain extent the XM that replaced it — were delightful and demonstrably different from anything else on the market, their appeal was limited, and as a result, sales were poor. Citroën was therefore forced to give up and start on a new tack.

So, it stopped making interesting cars and started making Peugeots in Citroën outfits. For the most part, they were fairly terrible, but they were backed by a new marketing strategy: price. For the past few years, you could buy an £11,000 Citroën and immediately be offered a discount of 50%, £50,000 for your old car, an £11,000 cash-back offer and the dealer principal’s wife for your delectation on the first Saturday in every month.

Unfortunately, it seems that this business plan was as wonky as the previous idea: making cars that no one wanted to buy. Which is why, now, Citroën seems to be going for design. That’s why I like the DS3 so much. Because it looks so good. And it’s not alone. There are many good-looking mid-range saloons on the market today but none can quite manage the perfect balance of the C5. The estate version is extraordinarily handsome.

So, as you can see, I’m having a Citroën sort of month, which is why I was very much looking forward to driving the C-Crosser 2.2 HDi Auto DCS Exclusive 4x4 that arrived with its snappy moniker in my drive last weekend.

The main reason, apart from the good looks, is that this is a five-seat car that has two occasional, foldaway seats in the boot. Perfect if, like me, you loathe driving a Volvo XC90 for the rare and short moments when the kids have friends that need taking home.

It gets better. The Cross-Dresser is fitted with an excellent central command centre, which has a music server that plays U2. I do not understand this but I did understand how the sat nav worked. And that in itself is a minor miracle.

There’s more. The boot lid is split in two, with the bottom half dropping down to form a handy seat you can use at point-to-points, and because you have four-wheel drive on tap, you won’t get stuck on the way out. This, then, seems to be a pretty good car.

But it isn’t. Because underneath it’s not a Citroën or even a Peugeot. It’s a Mitsubishi Outlander. Sure, it has a rather good French diesel rather than the terrible Volkswagen unit Mitsubishi uses, but I’m sorry, writing “Citroën” on a Japanese car that was designed and built in Japan is a stupid idea. Unless you are going to do the normal trick of undercutting everyone and offering the dealer’s wife as an incentive. Which Citroën hasn’t. The Cross-Dresser I drove costs £28,320. That’s around £6,000 more than you’d pay for a mid-range Mitsubishi original.

To make matters worse, it’s not very nice to drive. The ride is hard, the seats are hard and can we please stop putting instant economy gauges on the dash? What do they show? That you use more diesel going up a hill and while accelerating. We know already.

This, then, is not a car to buy. Mainly because for £28,320 you’re getting awfully close to the discounted price of a Volvo XC90. It’s bigger, yes, but it’s better than a Cross-Dresser. Most things are. So, whatever brand of mid-sized SUV you’re using now, stick with it. There’s nothing to see here.

The Clarksometer

Clarkson’s verdict; 2 out of 5

A Mitsubishi in an expensive outfit

Citroen C-Crosser 2.2

HDi Exclusive

Engine 2179cc, four cylinders

Power 154bhp @ 4000rpm

Torque 280 lb ft @ 2000rpm

Transmission Six-speed auto

Acceleration 0-62mph: 11.1sec

Top speed 123mph

Fuel 38.7mpg (combined cycle)

co2 192g/km

Tax band J (£425 for first year)

Price £28,320

Release date On sale now

Clarkson: And so I wanted to be a cross-dresser guy

As a brand, though, Citroën’s a bit odd. Until quite recently its cars were weird. They had strange controls, super-fierce brakes, pedals that sprouted from the floor like mushrooms and seats that were squidgier than a fat man’s ****. Couple these to the roly-poly, oil-based suspension and it was like driving around in a cross-Channel ferry made from kapok and marshmallows.