A decade since its resurrection, the affordable branch of the Nissan brand has called it quits once again. The compact and affordable models which were produced for markets in Nepal, Indonesia, India, Russia and our very own roads have come to an end – Datsun is dead once again.
Nissan India announced that it would no longer produce Datsun cars in its Indian factories since the Japanese automaker wants to realign their strategy to the future, with electrification at its core. Their limited portfolio which consisted of ageing cars or badge engineered models exported to countries like South Africa has come to an end.
It isn’t really a surprise, the crudely made GO and GO+ models which were the only Datsun models sold in our own market have enjoyed moderate success over their several year lifespan. Their formula was simple; offer a basic model to a developing market with limited amenities and questionable build quality at a considerably low cost price. Mobility was the focus.
While there was some initial interest, it’s fair to say that buyers wanted a little bit more than the bare bones offering of a steering wheel and pedals. The emergence of affordable but moderately equipped models like the Suzuki Swift, for example, have meant that buyers would rather outlay a little bit more cash for a greater list of features.
Inferior build quality with exposed wiring and tatty plastic interiors led to a poor public perception but that wasn’t the only issue that plagued the affordable brand. Perhaps more alarming than this was the reputation of the locally sold GO model which received heavy criticism for dismal Global NCAP tests that had the compact hatch fold unfavorably in accident scenarios. This is not a pretty sight for a modern car, no matter how affordable it is.
All of this, coupled with the Ghosn scandal which brought the parent automaker into disrepute and new leadership that had a different vision to the Brazilian-born Lebanese businessman spelled the end of the 91 year old company for the second time.
That being said, there was some good to come out of it with limited success enjoyed by the brand over its 9 year renaissance with the Chennai produced Datsun Redi-GO which in its year of launch (2016) accounted for 75% of Nissan’s total sales in the Asian country.
We unfortunately never received this CMF-A based Renault Kwid sibling in our market and no official comment from Datsun South Africa has been made as of yet. Their website does still list both models for sale but knowing Datsun is dead, we’d wait for official comment on a dealer network before purchasing one.
