[PRADEEP KUMAR]

The tires- the rims are a full 1” larger and the tires are full 10% shorter to compensate for the rim size. So outer dia remaining almost the same, cheap- speedo parts remain the same, the unsprung weight of the tires reduces and the shorter profile of the rubber creates the illusion of a sharper handling vehicle. What gross cheating.

The tweaked engine and shorter profile 17” tires are the illusion of ‘phenomenal’ handling. Nonsense...


Folks,
A member has raised these questions? Is this in comparison with scorpio tyre profile.
Can GURU's throw some more light on this technical query please.

cheers

[teamveevee]

Originally Posted by rohitbagai

Why is Mahindra in such a booking mess?? I am assuming something.. When mahindra originally thought of developing this platform it wanted to take the 15lk ex-showroom price bracket with all the features that a 20lk+ SUV was providing. It was a good strategy. For that price segment a production capacity of 2000 units a month would have been sufficient. BUT something changed just before the launch. The Aria was launched in the same price bracket and was not even able to sell even a third of what they projected. After investing 4 years into the product Mahindra did not want itself to be in same situation. They lost all the confidence. So with all those features and bells and whistles they positioned themselves just below that segment for about 10lk - 12 lk to be safe. This segment has decent volumes per month and Mahindra's projections of volumes simply fell short hugely. Someone on this thread mentioned that they actually have 27000 bookings. This might be true its just that they are saving their face of mismanaging the whole launch of the product by advertizing they only have about 8000 odd bookings.

Again ... all above are just my assumptions

+1, If Tata failed with the Aria pricing (over priced), seeing the demand for XUV, looks like Mahindra also priced XUV incorrectly (under priced). They would have priced it slightly higher for better margin. Considering the features, it does not look like Mahindra is making lot of profit per unit, and hence probably dont want to sell lot of units before the imminent price increase. Depending on the price increase, there could cancellations and could affect the good will of M&M. That may be the reason they suspended the booking temporarily. This is again my thinking only. TM may not be worried about the features of XUV, but they may be wondering how M&M could sell these features at this price and make a profit.
If the cost of manufacturing (taking into consideration the development cost and various other factors) is exactly same for both Aria and XUV, MM need to sell ~5 times the volume of Aria to make the same amount profit per month.

[LastActionHero]

Whatever happened to the XUV booking thread? I can't find it. Posting the update from Mahindra that I got in an email sometime back even though I have a firm delivery date according to the SAP portal.. Now I'm worried...anyone else received this email?

14th October, 2011

Dear XUV500 Customer,

Subject: Your XUV500 Booking

This is with reference to your booking of Mahindra XUV500 with our dealership. We are very excited and honored to have you as a part of Mahindra Family and take this opportunity to thank you for reinforcing your belief in us.

We are pleased to inform you that we have received an overwhelming response to the XUV500 across the 5 cities (Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai & Pune) where we have launched. We have received over 8000 bookings within the 1st week of launch. We have presently closed any further booking.
This booking number is much higher than what we anticipated. Therefore, we have not been able to revert to you to confirm the date of delivery.
We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused and we assure you that every effort is made to deliver the XUV to you on time. We will revert to you soon and let you know the date of delivery of your XUV500.
We thank you again for your confidence in us.

Yours Sincerely,
for Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd.

Vijay Nakra
V.P. – Sales

[pawan_pullarwar]

I hope M&M will not increase the price, I stretch my car budget from 10 lakh to 12 lakh plus for XUV 500. Slightly increase in price and I wouldn't be able to increase it further.

[Behemoth]

Originally Posted by PRADEEP KUMAR

The tires- the rims are a full 1” larger and the tires are full 10% shorter to compensate for the rim size. So outer dia remaining almost the same, cheap- speedo parts remain the same, the unsprung weight of the tires reduces and the shorter profile of the rubber creates the illusion of a sharper handling vehicle. What gross cheating.

The tweaked engine and shorter profile 17” tires are the illusion of ‘phenomenal’ handling. Nonsense...


Folks,
A member has raised these questions? Is this in comparison with scorpio tyre profile.
Can GURU's throw some more light on this technical query please.

cheers

Hi,

This is not an illusion and actually having lower profile tyres improves road handling of a vehicle. Higher profile tyres are good for offroad use, but spoil the high speed handling characteristics of the vehicle. In case of the Scorpio, it was designed with higher profile tyres for more offroad / rough use. The XUV is designed for better handling characteristics in City use / higher speed and hence has lower profile tyres. Apart from the tyres, the suspension setup also makes a huge difference and handling and ride quality. By design, the XUV is built as a Crossover and for good City handling, which will anyway be 95% usage for most people.

Regards,
Behemoth

[teamveevee]

Originally Posted by LastActionHero

This booking number is much higher than what we anticipated. Therefore, we have not been able to revert to you to confirm the date of delivery.
We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused and we assure you that every effort is made to deliver the XUV to you on time. We will revert to you soon and let you know the date of delivery of your XUV500.

"revert" most abused word in Indian english The constant abuse of "revert" - Priyank Sharma

[saabasheer]

Originally Posted by zteg

A price hike of 1 lac will not make any difference to those looking at 17-20lac bracket. But think of those looking at 12-14lac bracket. Wouldn't this number be more than the former?
A couple of months ago, i couldn't even think of buying a brand new Scorpio SLE. But today I am considering a W8 FWD. I have pushed my budget to the extreme. A price hike of 1lac and XUV is out of my list

If Mahindra raise Price by Lacs.., They would feel the punch as Most of the Xylo E8/Scorpio Sle/Safari Lx bookings are now converted to XUV bookings... With the price rise a Common man's Stretching limit will exhaust and XUV will be out of reach...

[_raVan_]

Originally Posted by tsk1979

If Mahindra can get "reliability" right, it will also hit the Innova along with Fortuner, Endy and the whole clan of CBU SUVs costing 20 lakh.

Very well said TSK! If I remember it right, you had posted a thread on Scorpio too couple of years (?) back

Mahindra really needs to up their strategy now. Eg: giving separate treatment for XUV owners during servicing. They are already doing well with the handling of prospective customers currently. Also, hope that the electronics in the vehicle dont fail.

[RGK]

Originally Posted by GTO

+1 to that. In fact, most people who are normally used to driving sedans adapt very quickly to the Innova.

Absolutely. Occasionally I drive Innova and never need to do any major adjustments in my driving style. Just make the mirror/seat adjustments and the maneuverability is awesome. XUV500 seems to be in the same league.

I never had this confidence in Scorpio's & Sumo's.

[sahakar]

I have been seeing quite a few XUVs on the road on the way to work and back and for some reason all are white.

IMHO please stay away from the white. It really doesn't suit the XUV and the front end really looks hideous. I hope other colors are better.

The more I see it, I don't really find the excitement that many others here have expressed. I actually find the other mini SUVs much more eye candy than the XUV.

However, nothing beats it on the price and that's what is its primary USP.

I have a feeling after the initial rush, XUV should settle down nicely with Scorpio sales of around 3/4k units a month.

If Mahindra ups the prices, all the sedan converts (and they must be the majority of the bookers till now) will go back to the sedans. They need to resist the temptation big time.

Cheers

[barua]

One of my friend got lucky, he on a spur of a moment, walked into a Mahindra showroom in mumbai suburbs and booked the XUV 500 using his credit card with Rs.50,000 on the 9th of Oct and he just got confirmation that he will get delivery before diwali !

[zteg]

Originally Posted by sahakar

IMHO please stay away from the white. It really doesn't suit the XUV and the front end really looks hideous. I hope other colors are better.

Putting my thoughts here. White is something that goes well with most of the cars. White doesnt fade as much as the other colors do. Also, minor scratches dont stand out as it does with other colors.
White looks best when dirty. Also the swirl marks made during car wash is more prominent in other colors than white.

Originally Posted by sahakar

If Mahindra ups the prices, all the sedan converts (and they must be the majority of the bookers till now) will go back to the sedans.

Agree with you on this

[ramkya1]

I quote own thoughts to this XUV Hysteria... many others have echoed them and some concerns of a price raise.

Gauging from the waiting for Fortuner & Innova there's a market out there waiting to lap SUV's up, reportedly the actual number of bookings for XUV5OO is between 10-15 K!!!

A colleague who wanted it was told yesterday he'd have to wait till March 2012!! M&M has a big problem here to manage customer expectations on delivery & service expectations after delivery. Even if they scale up production can their service support lines satisfy customers? No way... based on present evidence.

It's hard for people who have stretched and booked, but there's a queue out there for this car. If it's for me to take an executive decision on pricing, I'd hike price by 50K immediately, see the reaction, re-open the bookings and take a decision to hike it again.

This price is going up for sure..

-Ramky
====

Originally Posted by ramkya1

Spikey,
I'm in marketing for 30+ years, a game of demand a supply and making a profit whenever you safely can. When demand goes double the supply, the thumb rule is to raise the price, by how much is the tricky decision M&M will have to grapple with. As things stand, IMHO, they can safely take the floor price up by 1 lac.

I only hope they would invest the profit in training the front end staff who make or mar the brand in the long run. I've seen a lot of competence building going on for the technical guys on the floor and there is visible improvement there, but the Front end / Customer Service sucks big time!!

The XUV5OO is a Golden Opportunity to become a big glocal SUV player; it's a brilliant product which fills a void and an awesome value for money proposition. They can deep-six many competitors if they handle this right by scaling up production fast, keep the price reasonable and treat the customers with respect.

--Ramky
======

--Ramky

[sahakar]

Originally Posted by zteg

Putting my thoughts here. White is something that goes well with most of the cars. White doesnt fade as much as the other colors do. Also, minor scratches dont stand out as it does with other colors.
White looks best when dirty. Also the swirl marks made during car wash is more prominent in other colors than white.

Yes definitely, white is the low maintenance color of choice.

I still drool whenever I see a white Punto or Linea and even the fortuner with aftermarket smoked alloys.

But for the XUV, I think white is not the way to go. I think people who have booked should not opt for the white and make their XUV look stylish rather than plain jane in the white.

Cheers

[mak10]

Is anyone able to access the SAP system now? I haven't been able to access it for nearly a week.