What happened to Chevrolet India and how its exit fares, one year down the line.
Last year, Chevrolet woke up to the decision of eloping the Indian market altogether, without considering its consequences. A year later, let’s see how the events stack up today. Ever since Chevrolet took this abrupt decision, many social platforms and journals have talked about it. Very few of them I assume, are automobile enthusiasts with a Chevrolet as their first car crush. I still remember when I as a 13-year-old child cried in a showroom, because dad wasn’t buying the Chevrolet Aveo.
In May 2017, Chevrolet officially announced its exit from the Indian market slated to happen in December 2017. What possibly went so wrong that caused Chevrolet to take such a sudden and bizarre step? Well, it was quite evident that the company was performing very poorly in India. 1 year down the line, it feels like GM India just couldn’t keep up with the pace of market trends unlike other car manufacturers.
Every time Chevrolet was playing catch up with the trends in the Indian car market, it went adrift. Eventually, I guess it was just too late for a comeback, they had to give in to the circumstances and exit the Indian car market. None of us expected Chevrolet to take such a outlandish step despite their downfall in the Indian car market.
It’s been almost a year now that Chevrolet left the Indian market. Prevailing customers are getting their services from the automaker. Finding spare parts also wouldn’t be a problem for quite a long time since Chevrolet’s Talegaon plant still manufactures cars for export and spare parts as per requirement. However, the downside is that the resale value of Chevy cars has tanked considerably.
While the only thing coming closest to us Chevrolet fans’ hand are the MG Motor cars, a unit of GM’s partner company, SAIC. Coincidentally, MG Motor has taken over GM India’s Halol plant. So there’s some waiting as for now and that one ray of hope that maybe, just maybe, Chevrolet might announce its comeback someday but it does seem very unlikely.
Chevrolet India Exit
– Chevrolet’s India exit completes a year this month
– The brand’s performance was poor in India
– MG Motor takes over GM’s Halol plant
