Will the festive boost to sales final?

Even as they hope to maintain the momentum in the market, with new launches and related measures, automotive corporations are cautiously optimistic about the demand situation in the post-festive season.

It is estimated that greater than 2.7 lakh vehicles had been offered in October, helped by the pent-up demand and festive season sales. Companies stated this was exceptional, as three months again, nobody may forecast that the market would bounce again to this degree. However, they’re sceptical about the outlook, for the subsequent few quarters.

“We are cautiously optimistic right now in terms of demand outlook, because it is pent-up demand, mixed with some people buying vehicles for different reasons, including physical distancing,” stated Santosh Iyer, vice-president (sales and advertising), Mercedez-Benz India, whereas taking part in the third Conversation, organised as a part of the ‘Tamil Nadu Smiling’ marketing campaign of The Puucho Group. The matter of debate was: “Will the automobile sector regain its mojo this festive season?”

Mr. Iyer was of the view that producers with new merchandise or refreshes of their portfolio would nonetheless have the opportunity to excite the market and get some alternative demand in. “We are seeing that in the case of GLS SUV, priced at over ₹1 crore. It was launched in July. Even now, we have three months’ waiting period for the car, in these times. And these are good three-digit numbers. Thus, new models clearly excite the market and we will continue to do that,” he added.

On authorities help measures, he felt there had been oblique measures to help the auto sector, in contrast to in another international locations, the place interventions had been direct to stimulate demand instantly. Measures reminiscent of scrappage coverage will spur good demand, he stated.

N. Sundararaman, head of promoting at Bajaj Auto, stated there was a necessity to pep up client sentiments, which had been depressed due to components like the well being disaster and discount in earnings.

He added that there was no massive surge in sales due to private mobility, as cited by projections. Bajaj Auto’s personal analysis indicated that lower than one third of the individuals acknowledged the purpose as private mobility.

“I think the introduction of new launches has been good for us. But in the overall pie, we are cautiously optimistic,” he added.

“There is definitely a good revival from a disbursements perspective. We are expecting that this festival season will bring in a little more demand. In our business, almost 90% of our moratorium customers have started paying their EMI. This was in September, and we saw further improvements in October and November. I think the recovery is coming,” stated D. Arulselvan, government V-P and CFO, Cholamandalam Investment & Finance Company Ltd.