Higher demand from the rural market help Maruti to arrest the fall in market share
Total sale of vehicles across categories registered a growth of 12 per cent; Picture used for representational purpose. (photo: PTI/file)
Hyderabad: Maruti Suzuki India plans to sharpen its focus on India’s rural market to boost its sales in one of the fastest growing passenger car markets in the world. The company also wants to focus on the first time buyers to cash in on the pent-up demand in metros.
“We have launched Rural 2.0 in FY13-14, where we took on a mission to reach out to one lakh villages. We managed to achieve sales in over 94,000 villages (nearly doubled from FY12-13). Going forward, we would like to double the villages from one lakh to two lakh in the current financial year,” Maruti Suzuki chief operating officer Mayank Pareek told this newspaper.
In fiscal 2013-14, India’s rural market contributed over 31 per cent to Mar-uti’s national sales as aga-inst 3.7 per cent in five years ago. “Our rural str-ategy helped us offset slowdown. Especially in times when top ten markets or the metros were posting muted sales,” he said.
A higher demand from the rural market also help Maruti to arrest the fall in market share and crawl back to over 45 per cent. In an attempt to further penerate into the rural markets, he said Maruti is rolling out a new sales format rural outlets.
“We currently sell our cars in 94,000 villages of India and we have set a target to reach two lakh villages in 2014-15. There are almost 6.5 lakh villages in India. This is only tip of the iceberg as they say.”
Speaking about the revival of buyer sentiment after the formation of new government, he said that “Sentiments have certainly improved post May 3rd week. Typically entry segment buyers who are also the first time buyers were postponing sales. There was pent up demand, which translated into sales in June.”
( Source : dc correspondent )
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