[treadmark]

Welcome back GTO!
Ford's discount campaign with little more than a lakh discount had not saved All New Fiesta.
Duster's number are fading out steadily,
Again one another month of excellent performance by Maruthi and Hyundai with consistent numbers as usual.

[achyutaghosh]

Excellent analysis as always GTO, much appreciated. In tough times, VFM offerings sell most, as exemplified in this month's sales too- Ecosport, Enjoy, Swift, Amaze, Eon .

All of Chevrolet's recent launches other than Enjoy are plagued by quality issues, this might be a blow they cannot recover quickly. Important to note that one of the reasons the Cruze has been faltering is the fact that the new version launched has kind of dimmed the excellent value for money offering it was when it was launched. The LT model was available at around 11.5 lakhs ex showroom when it was first introduced in India, the current facelifted LT is priced at 13.9 lakhs. Features might have been added, but the low entry price for the most powerful diesel car in its segment was one of the pull factors for the car. Now it is in a price range where the other players exist too, through discounts and hence the possible decline. But on an overall basis, the entire D1 segment is disintegrating, and quite spectacularly so- YoY the segment has reduced by 40%.

The effect of the excellently priced Ecosport is felt on multiple segments- crossovers like Duster, and sedans in the C1 and C2 segments. I think even the mighty Hyundai Verna is taking a hit, as is Ford's own stablemate, the Fiesta Classic.

The City sales depend a lot on petrol pricing trends. July-August has seen 3-4 petrol price hikes, has that has an effect? Will be interesting to see which Hyundai among the i10 and the i20 suffers from the launch of the i10 Grand- my pick will be the i10, too long in the tooth anyways.

Sad state of affairs for Mahindra. The Verito Vibe was an uncalled for effort, they should stick to UVs. Speaking of which, 6 months back the Quanto was doing an easy 1500-2000 units, where have the buyers suddenly vanished? Did all prospective buyers suddenly wake up and realized how horrible it looked, and moved to other choices (Bolero, Sumo). it seems to have done well on the quality front though, remember seeing the latest JD Powers after sales satisfaction index in which Mahindra is ranked 3!

[Hatari]

Ford losing out on EcoSport sales. Have they underestimated demand?
5300 only for the month.

[Oranger]

Fiat seems to be back in the game. Happy to see slow and steady growth in sales figures. The freebies and advertising campaigns seem to have bought some results. Surprisingly, Chevrolet sail sedan and hatchback(petrol) have outsold their diesel variants and that too at a time when petrol prices are touching the sky.

[kiranknair]

thanks GTO and Parrys for the most awaited thread of the month!!

So finally Duster is starting to feel the heat. Wonder what will happen when Nissan Terrano also goes to booking as it would eat a significant chunk of Duster. Might be a 4 wd option can prop up the sales a bit.

Doesn't look good for Skoda either. Sad to see a wonderful car like Rapid fall down to 834 pieces.

[dZired]

Aha! Now the sales analysis looks complete. I really missed your "special comments" GTO.

The Automobile Industry is one of the most severly hit industries due to the depreciating indian economy and absence of any steps by the Government to revive it. And hence majority of the manufacturers are carrying YoY losses.

If we exclude the best sellers (Alto, Swift, DZire, WagonR),even the leading manufacturer Maruti Suzuki is struggling to get numbers from its vast portfolio. Its high time that a-star is discontinued and SX4 makes way for the much anticipated YL1.

Its really sad to see Tata Motors slipping off every month. Looks like even the Horizonext program failedto attract customers to the dealerships. I just hope the guys at TML are soon able to revive this Indian manufacturer.

[SaurabhSaran]

Very well complied report with analysis GTO!

The two newbies in the market Amaze and EcoSport has added new stable entrants Honda and Ford respectively to the top 10 selling cars chart which were hardly seen here earlier.

Delivering good products based on understanding consumers needs and expectations has made this possible for Honda and Ford.

-
SS

[Parth46]

Thanks for the great analysis. Really helps the buyers make informed decisions month after month. I hope Honda does not stop taking bookings for the City MT in a few months.

Hope the government takes some concrete steps to revive the slowly dying Indian auto sector and removes the few useless regulations to provide breathing room to manufacturers. The next few months seem to be full of uncertainty though.

[vindrider2626]

The only way car sales are going to go up is a price reduction by at least 10% on all models by the car manufacturers.The indian consumer just wants four wheels and a car which gives good mileage,nobody cares about power or other features which is justified by the lack of interest in automatic cars here.With the cost of petrol and diesel going up the sales are going to affected much more.The manufacturers have been taking the consumers for a ride here for ages and they cant reduce their pricing models in a hurry for the fear of losing out on margins,the recent launch of the bmw1 series is a classic example .The govt also needs to give out a helping hand by reducing duties.

[kpzen]

Comprehensive report, as always. Excellent work, GTO & Parrys.

The quantity (1847) of i10 grand is the booking received by Hyundai ?
If i'm not wrong, the official launch of i10 grand was today, so how the quantity is being considered in Aug sales.

[srinath34]

Glad to see Fiat in the 1000 league. Ecosport and Amaze have become the best sellers for their respective companies. 952 units of petrol powered Ecosport in the last month. Wonder how many Ecoboost and 1.5 engines would they constitute.

[sapeco]

Wow GTO, thank you for your extremely surgical analysis. You are the undisputed King of the Analysis world! Am glad that you are back, missed your analysis for the last 2 months. Thank you parrys for the wonderful graphs and charts. A treat for the eyes indeed.

Looking at the figures i have to say i'm a bit suprised that the Ecosport has not managed to reach the 7k mark. Also it seems the Ford Mini SUV has not eaten into sales of the Hyundai i20 as much as was anticipated. The Eon is doing surprisingly well considering the fact it costs double than that of the other budget car the Nano. Speaking of which the sheer inventory of the Nano must be killing Tata Motors. I think the company should seriously consider a total management and product overhaul before its too late.

The Renault Duster is on the slippery slope downwards. After the Nissan Terrano launch i think it will settle down to average monthly figures of 1,500 units. Renault should consider a refresh before its too late. Also dealer attitude should change otherwise even a refresh wont help. Speaking of the Terrano, even with its updated styling i doubt the SUV will ever achieve let alone surpass the figures of the past glory months of the Duster.

Hyundai is the only manufacture aside from Maruti who is consistently bringing cars which have a potent combination of Styling+Technology+pricing to the market: a formula which we Indians Love.

The recent announcement of SBI to limit car loans to individuals having a family income of 6 lakhs and above will spell bad times for small & economy car makers. It will especially hurt Maruti the most. Its a well known fact that lower income and middle income groups put their faith on Maruti more than any other manufacturer when it comes to choosing their cars. This fact is reinforced more so in rural areas.

Lets all hope the festive season which is around the corner can bring much needed cheer to the industry.

[misquitas]

Originally Posted by GTO

Originally Posted by kpzen

The quantity (1847) of i10 grand is the booking received by Hyundai ?
If i'm not wrong, the official launch of i10 grand was today, so how the quantity is being considered in Aug sales.

One question, GTO. Shouldn't the i10 and the Grand i10 be considered together for the purpose of sales? Tata does it with the Indica+Vista and Indigo+Manza, so why shouldn't the i10 siblings be considered together?

If they had done so, their combined sales would have been 6017 (i10) + 1847 (Grand i10), making it a total of 7864 units dispatched for August, putting it three places ahead and right between Eon and Bolero.

[RSR]

Thank you for treating us to the most eagerly awaited thread of the month, GTO & parrys! It's great to have GTO's expert analysis back after a hiatus! A big thumbs-up to Team-Bhp

Originally Posted by misquitas

One question, GTO. Shouldn't the i10 and the Grand i10 be considered together for the purpose of sales? Tata does it with the Indica+Vista and Indigo+Manza, so why shouldn't the i10 siblings be considered together?

If they had done so, their combined sales would have been 6017 (i10) + 1847 (Grand i10), making it a total of 7864 units dispatched for August, putting it three places ahead and right between Eon and Bolero.

Please misquitas, let's not have any other manufacturer copy the bad practices of Tata Motors

GTO & parrys do not club together the Indica + Vista and Indigo + Manza figures. They are left with no choice because that is how Tata provides the numbers - they simply refuse to give the break-up. Let's face it, Tata Motors' PR/communications department found a way of hiding the Vista, Manza and (Sumo) Grande's low monthly sales numbers by clubbing them together with their predecessors right from the beginning, when these cars never really took off.

Providing separate figures would have meant that people would have been shocked by the low monthly numbers they manage, even lower than the previous generation products. Just like the Aria numbers! Tata would have loved to club them together with the Safari + Storme numbers, but cannot do so because the Aria is a completely different vehicle from the Safari (though it has a lot in common with the Storme).

Imagine how bad it would be for us if every manufacturer were to follow Tata's attempt at hiding poor sales. Ford clubbing together the Classic & Fiesta, Chevrolet combining the figures for the Spark & Beat and so on. Let's not give the other manufacturers any bad ideas by pointing them towards the badly potholed, crater and boulder laden, broken stretch of tarmac called the Tata Motors' "Club" Road, please!

[Jetta_Volkmann]

Thanks for the excellent analysis GTO. As many said the analysis is complete with your comments and summary (we missed it for some time).

Good to see fiat is gradually growing in the chart. Big surprise to me is, why the VFM Rapid is selling in very low numbers in spite that after sales service is improving now a days?

Indian Government should help recover the sluggish automotive sector sooner than later.