[damodar]

Tata Nano sold 88 units in December 2018 the highest for the year. Other cars giving company to Nano are
Fiat 75
Ford Figo 7
Honda Brio 8
Nissan Sunny 39
Terrano 23
Renualt Lodgy 47
Captur 88.

[SJM1214]

Originally Posted by narayans80

Why is there such a huge dip in Baleno and Brezza numbers? year.

That same question arose in my mind. I did some digging and found that December is always a low-selling month for Brezza.

MS Brezza December sales:
December 2016 : 8971
December 2017 : 11541
December 2018 : 9667

That's true for almost all the Maruti Suzuki cars. Ciaz and Ertia 's number hike is due to their facelift. However, I am not able to understand the sudden rise in sales numbers of Celario and Alto.

[narayan]

Originally Posted by GTO

Manufacturers absolutely know - down to the last car - how many have been sold at the retail level each month. But they'll stick to factory dispatch numbers as it allows them to "game" the system of reporting.

Retail sales are based on actual demand. On the other hand, factory dispatches are based on predictions, dealer relations, inventory status at the factory, targets to meet, the manufacturer's mood (I'm serious) and a lot more.

Also, quoting dealer level sales numbers (or for that matter, variant wise sales) gives away info on dealer inventory and indirectly profitability of dealerships and a whole lot of business specific trade practices which is confidential.

Factory dispatches is required from a share holder perspective.

Since auto industry operates on cash and carry sales to dealers, I feel primary sales is a fair indication of manufacturer performance given that dealer inventory is a fairly steady state number ( except in the run up to peak season ) and averages out as you evaluate month on month or YOY performance.

Hence from a sales analysis perspective, I see little value in knowing secondary sales data unless we are talking of more granular info like variant wise or state/territory wise sales data.

[locusjag]

Originally Posted by GTO

Retail sales are based on actual demand. On the other hand, factory dispatches are based on predictions, dealer relations, inventory status at the factory, targets to meet, the manufacturer's mood (I'm serious) and a lot more.

Oh boy. Predictions (or rather forecasts) are so troublesome in manufacturing. Whoever performs the function of Supply Chain inventory forecasts based on sales, I would stand up, salute them and tell them "thank you for your service".

We've played the Beer Game in B School which seeks to simulate what can and does go wrong with forecasts for the Supply Chain based on sales numbers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_distribution_game). We play the simulation online in teams; each team is supposed to manage inventories by the month. Our wily marketing professors would randomly vary their purchases of beer crates from us in some months. The fun would then begin; we would invariably read too much into each variation in sales and either end up ordering way too much raw materials etc up the chain and end up with excess inventory or, we would do the opposite and end up with insufficient stocks...so you're either saddled with excess inventory (and spoilage and depreciation) or you lose revenue because the customer can't buy any from you.

I pity those in the auto industry (and in all industries) who struggle with their inventory forecasts. I have mad respect for those who have mastered it. When I was buying my TUV 300 in February last year, there was one particular dealer with excess 2017 stock like you won't believe! They were so desperate to sell them off with unheard of discounts. I felt sorry for them that the Bullwhip effect (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect) had wrought itself on them.

Inventory forecasts! Phew.

[Nav-i-gator]

Originally Posted by locusjag

Oh boy. Predictions (or rather forecasts) are so troublesome in manufacturing. Whoever performs the function of Supply Chain inventory forecasts based on sales, I would stand up, salute them and tell them "thank you for your service".

We've played the Beer Game in B School which seeks to simulate what can and does go wrong with forecasts for the Supply Chain based on sales numbers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_distribution_game).

Inventory forecasts! Phew.

I would say THANKS!! (I'm a demand planner ). And yes, that Beer game simulation is extremely good, a game everyone in any manufacturing/sales organisation should play at least once, to understand the supply chain complexity.

[tarik.arora]

Originally Posted by GTO

Manufacturers absolutely know - down to the last car - how many have been sold at the retail level each month. But they'll stick to factory dispatch numbers as it allows them to "game" the system of reporting.

You are absolutely right in saying that the OEM knows the retail numbers down to the VIN level. The data is real time in DMS and can be viewed anytime.

Apart form the reasons that you have mentioned for reporting wholesales, there is one more factor that stops the OEM's from talking much about retails. The retail data is not 100% accurate as dealers play a lot with retails. Dealer incentives are both wholesales and retails linked and this is where they play the game. On month closing (last day), most of the retails are punched in the DMS while the deliveries happen throughout the month. To achieve the monthly and quarterly targets, dealers are known to punch retails that may not have happened in real life (Ghost stock, as they say in the OEM world).

All OEM's have different ways of recognising a retail at dealer end. Some trust the invoice, while, for some the goalpost is insurance. It is a complicated and a dirty process and is best avoided for an OEM. They do keep a track of this to know the inventory levels but the accuracy is not more than 99% overall (Wholesales are 100% accurate). After all, retails are necessary for demand forecasting and production planning.

[arvi86]

Here are the top-selling brands and the top-selling cars in India for 2018. As mentioned in this post, India is probably the only market I'm aware of where such a monopoly exists. All car-makers must be scratching their heads here!

Source:

Anything-On-Wheels 1

Anything-On-Wheels 2

[jpcoolguy]

A look at the OEM Sales Volume and Market Shares in the past few years, starting 2010 -



1. MSIL has steadily increased their market share from 40.45% in 2012 to 51.76% this year - that's more than 10% increase in 6 years.

2. It's indeed surprising to note that only MSIL, Hyundai and Ford has achieved their career best year in terms of volume, Ford just falling short of that elusive 1 Lakh mark. However, in terms of Market Share only MSIL was able to achieve the best year which points to the complete monopoly of the market leader in India.

3. It's interesting to note that once Tata was running close Hyundai in 3rd place during the heydays of Indica/Indigo, however lost the plot from 2013-16 and then trying regain the lost market share in 2017/18. With the upcoming Harrier and other new launches, Tata may able to get that 3rd position back, however they have a tough job at hand with M&M XUV 300 launching this year.

[gurthvader]

Two things bother the hang out of me:


1 - Why & how does Toyota manage to sell Innova & Fortuner in such numbers which by the way are both grossly over priced vehicles and the competition barely manages to scavenge the dry bone left overs and don't even come anywhere near the zen master.


2 - Amazing resilience is exhibited by Skoda and its parent VW for purely existing in our market, they seem to have no goal and or agenda and don't seem to be going anywhere with their hot air balloon, Fiat too is not doing well on the vehicle side but on the engine side are doing well so that may be their reason for letting the world pass them by but for VW it makes zero sense to exist here, they are not even serious competitors to the rest of the lot.


---I hope I'm not being overly critical

[adi_gt]

Originally Posted by gurthvader

Two things bother the hang out of me:

1 - Why & how does Toyota manage to sell Innova & Fortuner in such numbers which by the way are both grossly over priced vehicles and the competition barely manages to scavenge the dry bone left overs and don't even come anywhere near the zen master.

I am more surprised that Why and How did Toyota manage to sell only 300+ units of Yaris ? It may not be a scorcher which neither Innova or Fortuner are but it has everything what a normal sedan user can expect at that price point (at least the lower versions). I think rather than a Corolla badge swap it will be good if Toyota can swap badge the Yaris with Maruti. I am very confident that it will sell more than Ciaz anyday. Just a food for thought.

[Simhi]

Originally Posted by adi_gt

I am more surprised that Why and How did Toyota manage to sell only 300+ units of Yaris ?

300+ is the dispatch figures. There were some rumors that Toyota had stopped production of Yaris in November to clear 2018 inventory. The year end discount of around 1 Lac was also good. So I am expecting some pick up in dispatch figures in Jan, though not very optimistic. Let us see if it touches 1K mark for Jan.

[volkman10]

Toyota Fortuner vs Ford Endeavour vs Skoda Kodiaq -King of the Road (2018) !




Link

[dark.knight]

Originally Posted by locusjag

Oh boy. Predictions (or rather forecasts) are so troublesome in manufacturing. Whoever performs the function of Supply Chain inventory forecasts based on sales, I would stand up, salute them and tell them "thank you for your service".

I'm an operations guy, and let me assure you, this works mostly on guesses/historic buying patterns etc.. the Beer Game is rigged to be a failure from the start, because basically you are putting water, fire, fuel and sand in the game, either the sand muddies the water, the water puts the fire out, the fire blows the fuel up or the sand puts out the fire.

You learn human mentality in O.R, because you are fine-tuning a supply chain like guitar strings and then 2 monkeys come play the strings randomly, affecting the overall efficiency/performance. Between marketing, engineering, r.m acquisitions, lead time etc, I've lived the perfect nightmare. Its a dreadful industry to be in to be very honest, I've had days when a full packet of smokes (20) won't do.

One can NEVER predict demand, our ultimate masters are the consumers.. the whole charade of marketing, H.R and finance are done for the consumer's amusement and they'll always manage to throw off our predictions. Anyone who got it right again and again is either riding a "consistent" demand wave for as long as he can milk it, or just got lucky.

[volkman10]

Toyota ends 2018 with an overall (Y-o-Y) sales growth of 9%, its MPV and hatchback leads the way.



Link

[chinmoysc]

I have been trying to find out as to how many vehicles Lexus has sold ? Does anybody know the numbers ? When I spoke to my Lexus dealer , he told me that the largest selling Lexus variant was NX-H . Then the ES . LX ,LS and RX are to be ordered specifically . He also told me that in last two months , Delhi dealer sold close to 70 units of various variants .