Dacia proposes an alternative to heated seats by subscription: hot water bottles

Access to equipment and functions of a vehicle by paying a monthly or annual fee is a sales technique that many manufacturers are considering or even putting into practice, as is the case with Mercedes-Benz or BMW. Faced with this not very encouraging scenario for the user who buys a new vehicle in the future, there are brands that take it with a certain humor.

This is the case with Dacia, which has proposed hot water bottles as an alternative to the subscription-based heated seats that BMW recently announced. The manufacturer of successful models such as the Duster, the Sandero or the Jogger, is giving away these hot water bottles, which they call “heated seat saviors”, with the brand logo.

Dacia proposes an alternative to heated seats by subscription: hot water bottles

To get a Dacia hot water bottle it is not necessary to be a customer of the Romanian company. Just go to one of the three dealers located in London, Manchester or Swansea (Wales) and claim your gift. However, this will not stop the sales team at these dealerships from trying to show you the benefits of Dacia’s range of new vehicles.

“Our ‘heated seat saviors’ are a bit of fun, but they do highlight the direction the broader industry is taking with regard to subscription-based feature access,” explains Dacia’s Luke Broad.

“Asking someone to pay to activate factory-fitted equipment is certainly not Dacia. We believe in simplicity and offer our customers technology that makes driving more convenient and comfortable with features included in the starting price of the car,” adds Broad.

Dacia doesn’t want drivers to sit on a hot water bottle to enjoy this feature. The company explains that it is enough to place the bag on the seat a few minutes before starting the trip and enjoy the residual heat.

Meanwhile, if you buy a new Dacia, you should know that several of its models are equipped with heated seats, either as standard on higher trims or as an option if you choose an intermediate version. This is, of course, a marketing campaign by Dacia to take advantage of the buzz created by subscription access to vehicle features.