Note gets more than an award

Nissan has announced that from 1 September 2007 the NOTE, voted best Supermini MPV in the Auto Express New Car Honours for the second consecutive year, will change its line up to mirror the QASHQAI grade structure of Visia, Acenta and Tekna. There are some additional features including fully body coloured bumpers, Bluetooth phone operation and an MP3 auxiliary jack socket.

The move to this new grade structure aligns the two models that cross between traditional segments; NOTE – super-mini and small family car, QASHQAI – small and medium sized family car. This means the S becomes Visia, SE is now Acenta and SVE changes to Tekna.

All models will now have colour coded front and rear bumpers, an MP3 auxiliary jack plug located on the top of the centre instrument cluster, the aerial is now located to the rear of the roof and there is a choice of two new colours: Emotion Red and Urban Silver. Aztec Yellow has been discontinued.

Visia price remains unchanged at £9990 OTR (1.4 petrol) and for a further £380, a new Safety pack which adds curtain airbags and active head restraints can be specified.

Acenta now includes Bluetooth phone operation with steering wheel activated controls, plus a change to the colour of the combi-meter display, now set in a silver background with orange indicator needles. On-the-road price increases by £100 to £11340 OTR (1.4 petrol) and the options choice list now has rear privacy glass, standard on Tekna, for a further £120.

Tekna gets the same spec and price treatment as the Acenta making the 1.6 manual £13390 OTR. The 1.6 auto now has ESP as standard, the same as the manual version.

Even without these recent changes Auto Express has voted NOTE as ‘The best Supermini MPV’ for the second consecutive year in their recent New Car Honours awards for 2007.

"The NOTE is the supreme example of brilliant packaging,” said Auto Express Editor-in-Chief, David Johns. “It is small but very flexible for family motoring. It’s also very economical and cheap to run. And crucially it is incredibly reliable.”

Sales Director, Kevin Butler collected the award from Auto Express Editor-in-Chief, David Johns and Fifth Gear’s Tiff Needell.