Business Car Manager verdict
Pronounced ‘Datch-Ya’ and comparable as a brand to upstarts Easyjet and IKEA, the Romanian national car-maker only traces its origins to 1966 and only ever made last-generation Renaults under license, so it was no shock when Renault bought the company in 1999.
Demand for its original Logan saloon was so high in western Europe, quite apart from the emerging markets it was intended for, that a right hand drive model has taken over a decade to materialise. When it did, Renault wisely promoted the compact, Duster SUV, and only then the Sandero, the Stepway crossover, and now the Logan MCV.
So a Logan MCV for business use? It doesn’t get caught up in styling issues and ironically ends up looking the best in show from Dacia – square and honest, a bit bluff perhaps, not unlike a Vauxhall Vectra, before the Insignia turned everything curvy and life-styled.
Within the Dacia Logan line-up (‘MCV’ simply stands for Maximum Capacity Vehicle), there are three trim levels. While the entry-level ‘Access’ is a steal at £6995, we’ve tried it and reckon that you’ll quickly tire of the underwhelming 1.2 litre petrol engine.
Going up to Ambience, you can option Renault’s excellent 90hp TCe 3 cylinder petrol unit, but we still reckon that the smart money is on that hugely acclaimed and by now thoroughly familiar gem, the four cylinder, 1.5 litre turbo-diesel unit. This is only available on the top two trim level Logan MCVs, Ambience and Laureate. It pulls hard with 220 Nm of torque but still gets you out of VED, right down into 14% company car tax, and right up into 70mpg+ economy potential.
The only real conundrum centres around equipment levels between Ambience and Laureate. Frustratingly, you have to go up to Laureate to get air con and access to the optional MediaNav, 7 inch screen.
Many business buyers will want to do this, but it tips you over the symbolic £10k mark, the Laureate starting at £10,795. That’s no disaster of course, but it’s less true to the ‘shockingly affordable’ Dacia credo and puts you into some attractive ‘nearly new’ deals for better established brands with higher equipment levels.
That said, the Ambience comes with a full complement of safety kit and Bluetooth as standard.If you can cope with no air-conditioning we reckon it’s the one to go for.
Our only real criticism is that the good steering and turning circle are let down by the emerging-market biased flexible beam and coil suspension set-up. It’s perfectly adequate but a bit bouncy and nowhere near as good as a current generation Clio – just to stake out the differences here in case you thought you really were buying a Renault in disguise. You are, but you’re not.
Dacia is a diffusion brand in all but name, just as the SEAT Exeo was briefly a hand-me down from Audi. For all that, it will appeal very greatly to cost-conscious business users and brilliantly does away with all the frilly nonsense common to the premium sector, with a simple list of options and rock bottom pricing that makes Skoda suddenly look pricey.
