The newer offerings Renault Kwid, Ford Figo and Maruti Baleno make stellar entries in their respective segments showing promising growth.
This October, it was the new launches in the hatchback space that showed promising growth and are posing as capable challengers to established products. Case in point being the new Renault Kwid that sold 5915 units, coming in third in the entry-level hatchback segment. The Kwid has received instant popularity and closed in on the second best seller Hyundai Eon that clocked 6479 units. While the Eon saw a month-on-month growth of 40 percent, the Kwid’s aggressive pricing and strong demand are hard to ignore. The Maruti Alto continues to rule with 22,861 units sold and also saw a growth of 10 percent. The dull sellers were the Tata Nano and Datsun GO with minuscule numbers in this volume-centric segment.
Things were similar in the B-segment hatchback space where the new generation Ford Figo rolled off on a positive start, selling 3534 units in its first month. While the capable Ford is settling in, the established rivals continue to post strong numbers. Despite of a decline of 3 percent in sales, the Maruti Swift continued to be the best selling model with 17,669 units pushed out; followed up with the Wagon R with 14,734 units moving out of showrooms, a marginal decline of 1 percent. The Celerio also observed a significant drop in sales of 25 percent with just 6664 units moving out last month.
The very consistent Hyundai Grand i10 continued to impress in October 2015, witnessing a hike of 25 percent in sales and the same applies to the Toyota Etios Liva that clocked 1984 units last month, a healthy growth of 30 percent. The Tata Indica is a steady seller with 3438 units sold, given the strong popularity amidst cab operators; whereas the newer Tata still isn’t living up to expectations with the Bolt clocking only 972 units, but did better by 17 percent over September 2015. The remainder of the list of slow selling hatchbacks included the Chevrolet Beat, Honda Brio, Nissan Micra, Chevrolet Sail U-VA, Renault Pulse and Mahindra Verito Vibe that clocked triple digit numbers respectively.
The premium hatchback space saw the most excitement with Maruti finally introducing its much awaited Baleno. Given the hype, it didn’t come as a surprise that the hatchback garnered 4229 units in its opening month, matching up to the second best selling Honda Jazz that pushed out 4496 units. However, the Honda saw a drop of 5.59 percent in sales when compared to September 2015. The segment continued to be led by the Hyundai Elite i20 with 11,019 units sold but saw numbers drop by 6.17 percent. Enthusiast favourites the Volkswagen Polo and Fiat Punto Evo generated positive month-on-month figures with the Italian showing a promising growth of 45 percent. Abarth effect? We hope!
