Re: Team-BHP Car of the Year, 2024 | EDIT: It's the Thar Roxx Quote:
Originally Posted by gururajrv Hmm, Maruti / Hyundai never made it to COTY ever! They make best sellers.
What are/were they lacking? It still pricks my mind to think of it. Hyundai now caters to enthusiasts clearly. But, still fails to get into COTY awards. They've a wide range of engine, gearbox combinations too. Strange, they still fail to impress the customers despite being reliable, luxurious at the respective ranges. Maruti is comfortable living in the same mindset of producing lighter, frugal cars and I don't even want to talk about how boring their cars have turned out to be. Strangely, once known for being an enthusiastic favorite Swift, never got a true sportier version or even turbo petrol on offer.
Man, I'm so proud of Mahindra & Tata for bagging the awards time and again. Seeing the trend of companies bagging these awards have been providing for all type of customers especially appealing to enthusiasts with wide range of products of offer. Although, Renault dropped the ball after Duster/Kwid, they did bag the award. Whilst the sister company Hyundai failed to get one, Kia compensated for them. Seltos seems to be enthusiasts favorite car too. Mahindra has done a hat-trick with their recent launches. Wish to see some companies coming out of their conservative mindset and build better cars for everyone. |
You are right. Maruti and Hyundai has never won a COTY, but I guess for different reasons. Maruti being the leader, got lethargic, taking the Indian customer for granted and never released a car which deserved a place in the top 3 list even, with a clear exception of the new Dzire. Hyundai on the other hand, works in a slightly different fashion. They create pretty good cars, which has time and again come up on top 3 - Creta, Venue, Ioniq 5. but are focused on the mass market and not at the enthusiasts. And the 2 Indian players - Tata and Mahindra- have been going all guns blazing to create cars that cater to the heart and not to the mind. And they are winning at it- you can see their growth in numbers and market share in the past decade. And all of that have been carved out of Maruti's share.
But having said that, there is a HUGE section of the population who buys a car with their head, who looks at practical, cost-effective, no-nonsense, easy to maintain cars which can fulfill the basic objective. And thus, Maruti will always have an advantage, especially with their scale and service network. And Hyundai will keep on churning good cars with great feature list, which are a mix of practicality and fun. And Tatas and Mahindras of the automotive world will give us fun cars. Look at the list - 2 fords, 2 renaults, a bunch of Tatas and Mahindras and a rare Toyota. |