Maruti Suzuki and Tata Motors have severely skipped their discounts for pushing sales in the 3rd quarter of the financial year. Usually, this period is considered the best time of year. Mayank Pareek, managing executive officer (marketing & sales), Maruti Suzuki commented that at this time when they are making hard efforts for meeting the market demand, the discounts do not look like a viable option for boosting sales. Currently, Maruti is not able to balance with customer demand for 9 out of its dozen models. During the festive season until last year, models like Maruti Alto, Tata Indica, Maruti Wagon R, Fiat Palio, Hyundai Santro and Ford Fiesta were discounted for around 15-20% of their price.
It is altogether a different story this year. For example, during the festival season in 2007, Hyundai Santro carried a Diwali discount of over Rs 50,000. This discount fell to Rs 40,000 in 2008 and Rs 37,000 in the year 2009. This year, it is expected that the discount will go even lower. On the launch of new Hyundai i10 hatchback, Hyundai director sales Arvind Saxena said that there is no space for discounting when they are extremely trying all means for meeting market demand. Another example is of Toyota Innova. After the raised price up to Rs. 29,000 on its whole vehicle range, Toyota Kirloskar Motors is offering attractive Diwali discount of Rs 30,000 on its product Toyota Innova, this year.
Indeed there is an exception to this drive of cutting Diwali discount on cars. Honda Siel Cars India (HSCI) is providing freebies as well as discounts of around Rs 55,000 on its Honda Jazz hatchback. Apart from this, the company is also providing free insurance for its most popular model Honda City, Honda Civic and Honda Accord models this festival season. In the first 6 months this financial year, the car sales have raised over 30%. This has totally changed the market condition and has pushed long waiting periods on models like Hyundai i20, Ford Figo, Maruti Swift and Eeco, Toyota Fortuner, Volkswagen Polo and Tata Nano.
