Wow, that looks both adorable and very brown.
Yup, that's the none-more-brown Dacia Duster Essential, a new limited edition model that will kick off a whole line-up of Essential-badged Dacias. There's nothing mechanically new here - just that rather pleasant 'Chestnut Brown' paint, some new alloys and standard equipment that includes body coloured bumpers, Bluetooth, central locking and a USB stereo input. Dacia says that it will be 'competitively-priced', but then of course it will - it's a Dacia.
Anything else?
Just the expansion of Dacia's EasyR automatic transmission to its diesel engine range. The six-speed electro-mechanical gearbox made its debut on the petrol-fuelled 900cc Sandero late last year, but now it will be available too on the diesel versions of the Sandero, Stepway and Logan. Dacia saw the need to point out that the gearbox both creeps forward when you lift off the brake and can hold the car steady on a hill - presumably because the word-count for the press release was coming up a bit short.
Both brown Essential Duster and the EasyR for diesel will be on Dacia's sensibly-priced Geneva Motor Show stand this week.
Neil Briscoe - 1 Mar 2016