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When a brand becomes the name/face of the segment it lies in, it becomes Iconic. And companies owning the brand take great pains to encash and maintain the iconic status. Anything that is bare bones, have a canvas top is still called a Jeep (not Thar - that is also called a jeep!) - And How FCA defends that! Same is with RE (anything macho, bare-bone with classic looks and that typical "gud-gud-gud-gud" Exhaust note is called a Bullet).

But then, some companies just let it go and die slowly. Usual suspect - Tata (with Sumo). Still today, in villages and small towns, anything that can seat 8, with a hard top, is called a Sumo (another matter that now it is almost invariably a Bolero actually). Tata let it fade away.

Unusual suspect - Maruti Suzuki. They have no plans for Gypsy (and none for Jimny as well) in India. What a pity.

In 2 wheeler segment, at least TVS is trying quite hard to keep it's Segment defining face - the Scooty, alive and kicking.

Yamaha have no plans to re-launch the RX100 sticker, Or Suzuki to consider Shogun. Would have been quite a success.

You are right. I also don't remember the exact bhp but when the 2nd gen City was launched, it did not have the 1.5 L VTEC engine from 1st gen City. I remember that it had non VTEC 1.5 L with 80ish bhp. When they launched the facelift City ZX in 2005/6, the top variant had the 1.5 L VTEC engine with 100 odd bhp. My father bought this variant and it was such a fun car to drive.

Wouldn't say so.

1. If recalled correctly Bajaj did try its level best to compete in scooters.

"Chetak 4 Stroke- Wave-Saffire-Kristal" were all 4 stroke Scooter attempts. The Kristal was still on sale when Rajiv Bajaj took the decision to quit "trying" to sell scooters.. quite simply because hardly anybody was interested to buy one from Bajaj.


2. I would rather say that the manner if which the "Discover" brand was (mis)handled is a classic case study of a Fiasco.

• Loosing the first mover advantage - Come to think of it the Discover was launched as a 125 cc much before the (now 125 cc leaders) the Honda Shine and the Hero Glamour.

• Loosing Focus: Even before it could establish as a 125 cc, Bajaj launched a 112 cc Discover.

• More Variants - more - and more - am at loss for words
  
  1. Discover 125
  2. Discover 112
  3. Discover 135
  4. Discover 100
  5. Discover 125 (Once Again)
  6. Discover 150
  7. Discover 125 ST (Mono Shock)
  8. Discover 125M
  9. Discover 100T
  10. Discover 100M
  11. Discover 150F
  12. Discover 150S
  
  Latest in the Discover Saga
  13. Discover 125 (One More Time)
  14. Discover 110
  
  PHEW

Come to think of it.. apart from the Puksar launch, the Discover did have one of the best launches

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovVMbq413FQ

Fiat India's case may go down in automotive history as one of the biggest and longest phases of self-destruction. While Maruti has used the 1.3 MJD from Fiat to the fullest, Fiat itself has shown nonchalance, indifference and apathy to a degree that is hard to be replicated anywhere in the globe. While automobile companies have committed gaffes, they have tried to compensate those. In the case of Fiat, there is only a 'one-way traffic' of blunders and neglect. Perplexed, to say the least.

Was it a Blunder??

Toyota knew the popularity of the Qualis would work against establishing Innova in the market! I would say it was a very brave move by Toyota to stop the best selling Qualis and introduce the Innova - and the rest is history we all know well!

Other BHPians seem to agree as well!

RX-100/ Suzuki Shogun in 4-stroke Avatars? Not completely sure how can that bring back volumes for these two companies in the fiercely competitive 100-125 cc segment. Relaunching them will only dilute the brand name without any corresponding benefits or reclamation of bygone ecstasy. IMO, let these classics remain etched in our memory as the hallmarks of passion, performance, simplicity and reliability.

I agree completely. Innova is arguably the better product compared to the Qualis, and they knew they had the golden egg with the Innova. Having the Qualis around would only harm them and possibly cannibalise the Innova's market share. I know people who swear by the Innova, back when it was 7-10 lacs and today when its pushing 25 lacs.

I think it is indeed a blunder since Qualis sales was doing very well till its end. If Toyota had launched innova by branding it as a different class of Car, another segment of customers would have got created for Innova.

More over, the luxury and plush of innova was not present in Qualis. Hence, definitely, it would have created another customer segment. But, now, anyway, it is a history :)

The Qualis sold in India (2000-2004) was globally sold as the third generation of Toyota Kijang (1986-1996). Toyota moved on to fourth generation in 1997 globally. However, we were still getting the old third generation platform with some drivetrain components being shared with the fourth generation Kijang (as per Wikipedia).


I think it was a good decision by Toyota to phase out an old generation car from our market and gave us the all new Innova in line with its global production.

:OT

Toyota's global policy doesn't allow Toyota Kirloskar to sell 2 generations of the same model side by side.

That's also the reason the old Innova too was phased out when Crysta was launched. Many had the same sentiments that the Innova and the Innova Crysta should have been sold together.

The Rover Montego and the even rarer estate version! Priced at over a million rupees those days, it was out of reach for most Indians. The company which brought that - Sipani, which also produced Dolphins, couldn't manage sales with Maruti 800 coming in and was out of business in no time.

For me, this one should there in the top 5! They did so much of market study, top officials from Toyota visited Indian homes to understand the Indian mindset, and if I remember correctly, had A.R. Rahman in their commercials/theme song. It was almost like Rahman doing a bad remix of a song from the 80’s. The car was instantly recognizable as a Soluna/Vios which I remember seeing on Bangkok roads back in 2001-2002. Brand Toyota took a huge beating with that move I believe. Back then if they had launched the Vios/Yaris instead, Toyota would have been up there with Honda and Hyundai in the respective segments. The damage is such that the Yaris which came in recently have no chance to survive.

I would have to agree with you. I had this scooter for over 5 years and eventually did about 40k kms, but it spent time in the garage for something called "compression leakage" almost every second month. I made it a point not to use to scooter whenever I was to go too far from the service centerlol:

One blunder i can clearly remember is the launch of Diesel Royal Enfield in the 1980s which if i remember correctly came with a 325 cc engine. Never really took off.

Then we at the same time had a Sooraj Diesel Motorcycle also being launched with fuel economy in the high 80s by a Saharanpur based company. There are still some floating around i believe.

Needless to say both these vehicles had no requirement of a horn.lol:

I suggest you to pay a visit to Gujarat. You can find a 'Chhakda' in every nook and corner of the state. The 'Chhakda' is nothing but a modified version of Enfield Taurus and sells at a premium cost of Rs. 1.5 to 2 lakh. There are thousands of these little monsters thumping all the roads and highways of Gujarat. Those are the real MUVs.