[arakhanna]

Just curious, do the OEM's solicit views of the reviewers? Is there a questionnaire that the reviewers fill in post the event?

Pricing seems to be one of the key aspects in our market. Are rough figures brandished and are the OEM's interested in feedback on the same.

How mature are the PR agencies with respect to negative reviews? Given that Team BHP is unbiased and articulate, it would not escape their attention.

Happy to note that material freebies are not accepted.

[SchumiFan]

Wow! Reading this makes me want to give more respect to the newbies for the official reviews S2, Crazy Driver, nkrishnap.

By no way I am saying it is easy for the regulars but to dedicate the same amount of attention to details while doing all these in the limited time frame requires commitment and interest towards the community.

At the same time, a big thanks to the regular mods/founders of the forum. You have managed to set the bar and raise it high over a period of time that a lot of painstaking effort needs to go into each review just to emulate it, let alone better it.

Finally, makes it even more proud to be a part of this forum.

Great job guys! Keep going strong!

[AZ911]

Wow. Never knew there were so many facets involved in this. Great work being done there.

When you say that there these events are sometimes handled very well by some agencies and sometimes poorly, does that vary from brand to brand? For example, brands like Audi, Merc, BMW etc. always deliver high quality events or it's a one off thing where it can go wrong for any manufacturer?

[i10]

Some irony that everyone is using a Toyota as the pilot :P

[akshayhonda]

Thanks GTO for giving us the insight. As you know I stay in Goa. Next time if possible do invite me for any such reviews/drives in Goa. I would love to meet the team behind who puts in so much effort to get us the best

P.S Missed out on meeting you guys during the Tata Zest review. You guys were in Verna Industrial Estate. The corner where you guys shot some lovely pics is the place where we practice cornering and do knee downs

[StepUP!]

Oh wow! Thank you GTO for this wonderful write up. Very detailed and informative. Just like your reviews.

I always wanted to and wonder now also, some day I will be on that side of the table, writing detailed reviews, flaunting my write up skills and knowledge, in turn helping millions to choose a car!

Kudos GTO for answering every possible queries like "which class do you fly for reviews?", "Do you stay in a 5 star?", "do you actually stick T-Bhp stickers on the new cars?", "Is it allowed?", "It must be exciting and cool job" etc.

And from the last part I just loved "What my wife thinks I do" picture! Bang on!

[Vid6639]

Thanks Rush for a wonderful insight into the review process. It's really not as easy as it appears.

Majority of the media drives are over 2 days and it's almost weekdays. That's because for full time journos they are working and a weekend drive event is them working on a weekend! Whereas we prefer weekends so we don't have to take leave from our regular work.

But those 2 days taking leave is still ok. It's the mammoth task once you're back from the review that you need to worry about.

Before I accept an invite for a review, not only do I need to plan for the 2 days leave for the drive but I need to make sure that my workload is lighter for atleast 3 weeks post the drive. This is the only way I can write the review after the drive.

Writing the review involves segregating photos which can take upto a week sometimes! Then the review itself which goes on in parallel. Once the photos are shortlisted, we then need to write the captions and formatting.

The review itself as Rush mentioned goes through several rounds of proof reads and checks before it goes live.

On the final review you see close to a 100-150 photos but in reality we will have well over 500 photos per review. Some journos think we are mad taking pics of every nut and bolt on the car. My reply is if I don't take a photo of every nut and bolt and a BHPian asks for the pic later on, I don't like saying we couldn't get a pic of that.

[Aditya]

Originally Posted by arakhanna

Just curious, do the OEM's solicit views of the reviewers? Is there a questionnaire that the reviewers fill in post the event?

Yes. A questionnaire is filled at the end of the drive.

Pricing seems to be one of the key aspects in our market. Are rough figures brandished and are the OEM's interested in feedback on the same.

Yes again. They do ask us for a rough estimate. It's generally covered in the questionnaire.

[racerme?]

Aren't articles like these the core reason why team-bhp is such a fantastic place to be and is so revered in the automobile world. No doubt, we are heading for team-bhp to be called the Bible of Indian auto!

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by Vid6639

But those 2 days taking leave is still ok. It's the mammoth task once you're back from the review that you need to worry about.

Before I accept an invite for a review, not only do I need to plan for the 2 days leave for the drive but I need to make sure that my workload is lighter for atleast 3 weeks post the drive. This is the only way I can write the review after the drive.

Exactly, there is a much tougher "After the Drive" part. This part is generally two weeks long on the average, where the wives can get very mad at losing all family time.

Originally Posted by Vid6639

Writing the review involves segregating photos which can take upto a week sometimes! Then the review itself which goes on in parallel. Once the photos are shortlisted, we then need to write the captions and formatting.

In case of fussy photographers like Rudra, Tanveer and myself, we do post-processing (PP) ourselves. Only the name plate screwing-in is done by the regular PP team.

I usually do non-review type events like RFC or Hybrid drive, where we have to make up new coverage strategies as we go along. Here we have to take whole lot more photographs, so that once we are back we can decide on how to write the story, whether it will be one or two separate stories. For example, once after landing in Japan, we couldn't check-in into the hotel right away because it was early. So we left the luggage at the lobby, had some breakfast and were taken to Toyota Museum to kill some time. We wandered around the museum tired, sleepless and jet lagged for 90 minutes before we could return. But I took lots of photographs like a typical tourist. Back in India, we looked at the museum photographs and realized there was an additional story (The Toyota Story : From Handlooms to Automobiles) we can tell, apart from the main story.

[newtonMeter]

Awesome insight! Just one query. How are mods selected to review which vehicle?

[mroptimist]

Originally Posted by Vid6639

Thanks Rush for a wonderful insight into the review process. It's really not as easy as it appears.

Sorry for going . So what exactly went wrong for Corolla Altis Media Review? Is it planning, you got busy after the drive? Just want to know when to expect the official review, a time frame would definitely help.

Why I am asking is, you have reviewed cars after that, much more recently launched ones.

I hope you will not take this post personally. I hope I won't get an infraction for requesting.

Cheers buddy.

Regards.

[arjab]

Very nicely put together narrative of behind - the - scene activities held at c ar launch sessions.

The problem in India is, apart from very, very few really knowledgeable journalists and reviewers, and we can unequivocally say Team-Bhp is topmost amongst that knowledgeable lot, there are precious few reviewers who actually does a realistic review of a new vehicle, the way the common car buying customer would understand.

Most of the reviewers scream about "power-redlines-free-revving-cam-busting-rpm" nature of engines et al , with very little awareness that such talk will make poor ole' Mr.Joe Public hardly any wiser!

Another odd thing i have noticed, specifically with respect to the TV reviews, that some of these journo's will take some low slung sedan or hatch off the highway, into some grassy, barren patch, drive round and round and then complain about "low ground clearance" etc ! And the converse is also true, when these same people take hulking, two - story high SUV's fling them through hairpins like a pseudo sports car and then complain about body roll !

I only wish to tell these reviewers that every vehicle has a design brief and intent, to which it subscribes to and within whose set of values it will perform the best.

And this is where T-Bhp scores. Our reviews, i deliberately use the collective noun, as i believe, every member and reader of this forum is a mini road tester, contributing directly or indirectly with their valuable inputs on their vehicles for others to understand. T-bhp reviews are crisp, clear, free of jargons and takes into account real world INDIAN scenarios when judging a vehicle.

Best forum to separate the wheat from the chaff. Keep up the excellent work guys. The entire forum is behind you in your efforts to provide us with automotive nirvana.

Keep revvin' and a very, very Merry Christmas to all !

[wild child]

Wonderful write up Rush! A perfect Christmas gift for us.

Wishing all BHPians a Merry Christmas and a Very Happy New Year!

Cheers !

[IronH4WK]

that really was an eye opener and a good thing - now everybody knows the effort that goes into brining them up-to-date and robust reviews. can't thank you guys enough for doing this for us

again, thanks for sharing, loved it!