[PrasunBannerjee]

India is a country where brands are directly associated with images. You'll find a lot of people who have Apple products just because they have a snob value, Maruti lovers because they still feel Maruti is truly Indian and most suited for Indian roads, and cheapest to maintain, people who feel Fords are still the most expensive to maintain, and Tatas are just Taxis (Dzires and Xcents as Uber and Olas anyone?). It has been a few years Tata, Ford, etc are trying really hard to change their image, its a tough battle for them. In that time, a relatively newer company gambles, and for worse of it. For most of the country, Renault doesn't have a too strong brand recall, be it positive or negative (related to product niggles). Something like this may damage their goodwill to a great extent. Unless they spend huge on PR and in turn charge their own customers for it by pricing the K/Captur 25 lac OTR and relatively bare-bones Duster facelift @ 20 lac OTR in coming times.

God bless Renault.

[deehunk]

Originally Posted by SandyX

Now some folks here are all out to fold the company for it. Sumit Sawhney is no saint, make no mistake but the decent vehicles they sell here do not deserve that bashing. So to say Renault got erased from minds of petrolheads due to this conjob is taking it too far.

Good job CD & given the unethical nature of its Indian operations due to its CEO, expect more such marketing level lies. But their vehicles are honest for the most part.

They sold decent vehicles once upon a time, replacing a faulty fuel tank is not a good job either. It was the fear of failure which forced them to voluntarily replace fuel tanks. Renault India lacks quality in all aspects design, sales, and service. They have been silent on some of the evergreen niggles like low quality brake pads, faulty fuel injectors, and cheap cost cutting of several components inside the engine bay. I myself lost 3 lakhs(post resale) after getting a faulty vehicle, another fellow member Sridhu is struggling with brake failure issue in his Duster.

See the thread link
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/offici...eview-378.html

One more thread where vehicle is plagued by poor quality components
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/offici...review-50.html

[suhaas307]

Originally Posted by Sutripta

A lot of marketing work is outsourced. This could be the result of overenthusiastic (but ignorant of cars) copywriters. (Remember Tata's and also I think Mahindra's using pictures of other companies vehicles on their company literature). ( Am a firm believer in Hanlons Razor).

Copywriters merely execute the brief handed to them. Of course, a lot of it is contractual, and that may either widen the scope of work or perhaps narrow it in accordance with the terms. Certain companies do give ad-agencies a wide berth to work with, but I am inclined to believe that a company like Renault would surely have had the opportunity to review the advertisement.

Originally Posted by Sutripta

But that does not account for the very deliberate change in (the spelling) of the name. If premeditated with malicious forethought ..

At first, I had insinuated (after putting two and two together) that the change from 'K' to 'C', was to bring 'brand Captur' into the market, and deliberately suppress the existence of the cut-price Kaptur. You know.. out of sight, out if mind.. you'd rather not have people conclude that it's a third world car for the third world market, especially when you're going to command a premium for it.

However, as it turns out, the reason for the change was something as simple as the Russian market's inability to comprehend the name 'Captur' with anything other than a K in its name.

[AbhiJ]

Originally Posted by Sudeep_Kimster

This is the most useless thread I have seen in Tbhp for a long long time, rather the first insensitive one.

I wholeheartedly disagree. For the last 6 years I am using the Renault/Nissan Scala/ Sunny and although I hate the looks and interiors, I love the car for its engineering and reliability.

That said, even if the Indian Captur is a BETTER car than the one sold abroad, even then it is ethically wrong to try and say its the same car and tell people that it has won the awards which it actually has not.

I am not debating whether the vehicle is good, bad or ugly, to each his own, but it is definitely not what they are marketing it as.

[Jas21]

Its such a sad state of affairs. Stooping to such low levels is not expected from a renowned manufacturer.

Just to understand their psyche here, I believe after Kwid's and earlier Duster's success (& of course failures of Sedans and Pulse), Renault has reasons to believe that what sells in India is only shape/ form factor (read SUV/ Butch styling), and everything else is secondary (read platform/ quality etc.)

True, this worked when there was only Duster out there in SUV space, but see where Duster is now in sales numbers. So much for milking a cash cow, and see where better quality products from competition are. Kwid is also losing out to Alto on one hand and Tiago on other; now that Novelty factor is dying down.

So, their Market Intelligence notwithstanding, here goes a free advice (because why not?) to Renault :

1. True, shape and form factor are very important and you are right in believing that it contributes to attracting customers, but what it will not do is maintain sales for a long period of time, if you won't upgrade your products and improve quality at the same rate, as competition.

2. Whether you like to believe it or not, almost everyone, even somebody in a remote village, would google and compare products if he/she is spending 15 big ones. You must be knowing Smart phone penetration level and democratization of 3G/4G Internet in India. So, false claims will not only get caught, as you have just experienced; but also reach potential customers, as valuable insight.

3. I read a book by Rama Bijapurkar, about 10 years back, in which she illustrates that Indian customer wants 'This as well as That'. To give relevant examples; its like 'feature loaded' and 'competitively priced'; 'awesome looks' and 'good quality' and list goes on. So, if you are providing only one bit of the equation, you may not succeed for too long.

4. There are multiple price-performance points for practically all product categories appealing to different consumer classes. Indian consumer is not poor (which is again a myth), Indian consumer is value conscious. This depends on your 'India strategy', what you want to sell here and to whom. Toyota India's high price-performance points must be a common case study in auto world parlance.

5. India is developing in its own way in today's globalized world and cannot be compared to what developed countries were during their developing stages.

6. Coming to Captur, I don't see it selling in large numbers, even if its priced slightly above Hyundai Creta. Why? Because a) Hyundai Creta is a very good Value-proposition in itself b) Imagine, someone paying premium for a Cross-overish and less practical sibling of once successful and cheaper Duster, just because you added features, and equivalently increased price. So, Duster would still be a better value proposition IMHO c) You have better perceived competitive products starting above Creta; read- Compass, Hexa, XUV etc.

[4x4addict]

Just shows that Renault is getting desperate in India for some bread crumbs. Guess when the Duster became a hit, they packed up their brains fell asleep at the wheel.

Before long, EcoSport, TUV, Brezza, Nexon, etc had overtaken the hare when it was sleeping.

[prakash_ajp]

I wonder if somebody lost their job in Renault India over this. I think there should be some heads rolling. Renault top management would know that had this happened anywhere in the Europe, they would be looking at lot of penalty. But in India, you can do anything and get away with it.

I think it might all boil down to the "chalta hai" attitude that is so common in India. People don't pay enough attention to details, they take unethical routes and short-cuts for very little gain. In this case, they paid the price.

BTW, great catch, CrAzY dRiVeR!

[C300]

Originally Posted by McLaren Rulez

For me, Renault has a serious management/culture issue with its Indian operations. It has been going on consistently for the last couple of years - from giving the Kwid smaller airbags to strengthening only the driver's side since that's the side that gets tested in crash tests and now this. This is exactly the sort of thing that is influenced by the values of the guys at the very top.

Shame, because the cars are actually nice overall packages but this kind of corporate attitude would make me very nervous about putting money down.

+1. This has Mr Sawhney's touch all over it. As always, they will push it under the carpet. Sad state of affairs.

Originally Posted by civic-sense

The Brezza at 10L is a lot better than the Duster at 15L. At least Maruti is honest about what it sells. It is funny that Renault could make customers shell out 15L for those bulging wheel arches. Make no mistake, many gullible customers would still fall for the Captur con job too.


S-Cross is definitely a much better car. It is based on a modern platform compared to the ageing Logan platform. At least it does not rust like the Duster, does it?

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian...all-india.html

Enjoy your ride mate
You have convinced me to keep adding MSIL to my stock portfolio

[veedub89]

I am not sure if I should ridicule Renault or marvel at their delusions of grandeur which led them to believe that they could pull something off like this.
I guess it is a critique on the average Indian car buyer as well.
"You may fool us if you try hard enough"

I wonder why auto magazines are not picking this up? At the very least I would expect Autocar to report on this. They have seen/driven the European Captur and the Russia-only Kaptur. I guess this throws the whole claim of unbiased journalism out of the window.

And for all those who still aren't understanding the issue here, you just need to think a little harder and look at the facts again.

Good going TeamBHP!

[Rehaan]

Comment from Jishnu Manohar via our Facebook page

Originally Posted by Jishnu

C'mon guys. Maybe its just a honest mistake.

I mean the Group's marketing team didn't even knew the difference between a Mercedes AMG GTR and a R35 GT-R.

So what about two cars that looks the same ! It'll be too much for the poor sods.

Additional source

[civic-sense]

This is one thread where I thought all people would be on the same side, and I was wrong. Guess brand loyalty is so high in automobiles, that we are ready to condone such frauds.

No justifications given here, how the Russians pronounce C, how Maruti sell substandard cars, how marketing teams can dish out ads without the management knowing, even merc has got the car names wrong, right down to "its an honest mistake", hold water.

Guys, they are trying to fool us. How can we pretend to not understand?

[gthang]

So what do we have here, a 2001 platform specifically designed as low cost (B0 Logan), and a 2012 "Supermini" platform, that both look almost identical.

So, is it a marketing faux pas? What about the product development team that thought of this first? And the CEO who approved this project?

Off the top of my head, I can't think of any manufacturer at any time passing of an older platform by making it look almost identical to the new one.

BTW, this is not an Indian only phenomenon. This is Renault's global product plan.

Ethics, what's that? Sorry, all out.
Will being largest and profitable do instead?

Cheers

[aviraj]

Other news agencies have caught this news from Team BHP website

http://www.zeebiz.com/companies/news...s-buyers-26612

[shashanka]

Originally Posted by C300

Absolute pathetic from Renault. I thought the airbag saga was a low but they have outdone themselves with this con job.
Lets not glorify Maruti. S-cross and Brezza are overpriced hatchbacks. I dont think they have even tested by gncap. Will pick up Duster/Captur/Terrano over these any day.

Neither should we glorify the Renault brand either. The captur/terrano gang are nothing but wanna-be's - largish hatchbacks looking for a free ride on the C-SUV band-wagon. The Duster just escapes the derogatory tag because it offers the AWD option. Maruti & TM (the new product line-up) are streets ahead in the VFM stakes - you get what you pay for.

Originally Posted by CrAzY dRiVeR

Why did Renault rebrand the Duster-based Kaptur to Captur to mimic their Clio-based European car?

To mislead people into believing this - ................

Terrific, CrAzY dRiVeR! Great sleuthing on your part & it reinforces my faith in T-BHP - that everyone on board is not dozing at the wheel And also indicates what I strongly believe - that you can no longer take the Indian market (at least this sector, cars I mean) for granted. After VW's emission-gate & M-B's recent controversy (Cama Motors & the Saraf fatality), now Renault has landed with a hot potato of their own making!

[Roy.S]

Originally Posted by civic-sense

This is one thread where I thought all people would be on the same side, and I was wrong. ...
.
.
.
Guys, they are trying to fool us. How can we pretend to not understand?

The guy who voiced his opinion strongly in favour of Renault worked there for 6 years and might have developed some sort of loyalty towards his former employer.
If you look at it unemotionally, it's fairly obvious that Renault tried to pull a fast one.