Dzire largest selling car in May even as Maruti suffers on home front

New Delhi: For the first time in decades, a three-box car overtook India’s largest selling Maruti Alto in a month.

Maruti Suzuki India today reported dispatches of 17,265 units for Swift Dzire, the notchback version of Swift, in May which is higher than combined dispatches of Swift, Estilo and Ritz and higher than even standalone dispatches of the Alto.

So what led to consumer frenzy on the Dzire? The launch of Honda Amaze, which competes head on with the Dzire, spurred sales in this entry sedan category. Honda Siel Cars India has not yet declared its May sales numbers but the full year sales target of the Amaze is 50,000 units.

Even though year on year Maruti’s dispatches of Dzire were lower by 2.5% (it had dispatched 17,707 units in May last year), it was the single largest selling car in the country at a time when the passenger car market continues to be in doldrums.

Overall though, Dzire sales did not help much since Maruti’s total domestic dispatches were down 13% to 77,821 units against 89478 units in the same month in 2012. And the biggest culprit of this decline is Swift hatchback, where sales nosedived. The diesel and petrol variants of Swift, both fell out of favour with buyers and combined sales of Swift, Estilo and Ritz fell almost 30% or fell by a third year on year to 17,147 units against 24,290 units in May last year.

Though Maruti has been denying any company discounts on the Swfit, perhaps this is the right time to buy the popular hatchback because dealers are sure to offer discounts on the Swift now.

Combined sales of the M800, Alto and A-Star were up 5.1% to 31,427 units (29,895 units).

Even on the export front, Maruti fared poorly since exports declined over 27% to just 6,856 units (9,406 units).

But Hyundai Motor India, the country’s largest exporter of passenger cars, managed to generate growth of almost 5% in exports at 24,754 units (23,659 units). The company said strong demand from non-European markets helped boos the overall export number.

Its domestic sales were flat though, at 32,102 units (32,010 units). Senior VP, Sales and Marketing, Rakesh Srivastava said the company is improving operational efficiencies and conducting aggressive marketing campaigns in today’s challenging times.