Due to low sales of vehicles in India, dealers of General Motors are cutting down their operations while some have even shut down their dealerships.
There are some automakers like Maruti Suzuki, Hyundai, etc. which are having a gala time in the Indian market after having so many hot-selling cars in their kitty while certain companies like Nissan and Chevrolet are having a really tough time when it comes to sales. General Motors has always faced challenging times in the country, first with Daewoo and Opel and now with Chevrolet. None of the cars from the Chevrolet stable are selling in even half decent numbers.
The company sells the Beat, Sail U-VA, Sail, Tavera, Cruze and TrailBlazer in the country. The Tavera is the only one which has some demand thanks to its excessive usage in the cab market while the others are not selling well. The TrailBlazer was recently launched and it remains to be seen how it fares in the market. The American automaker sold a cumulative 19,299 units from April – September 2015 which averages out to 15 units per dealership.
Dealerships are saying that such low numbers are really not feasible for their operations to sustain and many dealers have started surrendering their dealerships to the company while few others are continuing operations but on a very small scale. Earlier this year, the company had 280 sales outlets but now only 223 are carrying out operations. There are 253 service outlets too.
General Motors has stated that they will not be expanding their dealership network in the country any time soon but instead they will focus on the current set of dealers and make their operations more viable. The company will also work on providing a better experience to its customers. The dealers’ margins have been increased to industry-best standards and the automaker is more concerned about its long term operations in the Indian market. GM announced in July that they will invest Rs. 6400 crore and will launch 10 new models in the country.
