Car sales take a break in the New Year

Car sales appeared to be taking a breather in the new year as high sales in December and  rapidly rising interest rate seem to have affected the demand.

While Maruti, the car market leader, continued to see healthy demand, companies like Hyundai, GM and Honda saw growth rates coming down to single digits. Maruti’s domestic market numbers were up 24% at 1 lakh units against 81087 units in January last year. The company’s small car portfolio grew at a similar pace as models like Swift, Alto, WagonR and Ritz saw healthy demand.

Hyundai, the second biggest car maker, however, could not maintain the tempo in January as its growth rates shrunk to 2%. The company sold 30306 units in the month against 29601 units in the same month last year. GM and Ford also had single-digit growth rates as their domestic market numbers grew by 6% each in January.

However, Japanese car maker Toyota and Ford saw numbers going strong on the back of their new models. Toyota, that recently launched the entry-level Eitons sedan, saw numbers go up by 53% at 9185 units against 5989 units in January last year. The Etios has proved to be a runaway success for the company and has already seen waiting list bulge to around 6 months.

Ford on the other hand, has been witnessing continued healthy demand on the back of the success of its Figo hatchback. The company’s sales in January stood at 10026 units against 2453 units in the same month last year. The company has said it will launch eight new models by 2015.

Company	Jan’11	Jan’10	Change (%)
Maruti	100422	81087	24
Hyundai	30306	29601	2
Mahindra UVs	16088	14443	11
Toyota	9185	5989	53
GM	9984	9421	6
Ford	10026	2453	309
Honda	6358	5983	6
Skoda	2825	1881	51

Referred From: Times of India

Posted in Indian car