Special discounts to Govt staff lift Maruti, Hyundai sales

New Delhi, Dec. 23 India’s top two compact car makers have been able to more than double their sales through their special schemes for Government and public sector employees.

Since October, Maruti and Hyundai had launched discount schemes to lure Government employees to buy cars. The strategy to harp on sales to Government employees was also considering the fact that overall car industry has been on a slow lane with banks being stringent in lending.

“Normally we sell 3,000 to 4,000 cars to Central Government and public sector employees. But in October we sold 10,000 cars to Government staff,” Mr Mayank Pareek, Executive Officer, Sales, Maruti Suzuki India, told Business Line.
‘Wheels of India’

He said that since February, when the implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission was announced, Maruti had launched the “Wheels of India” campaign. It was aimed at offering higher discounts to Government employees than what was applicable for ordinary car buyers.

For example, this month Maruti is offering almost Rs 50,000 as discount on Wagon R to Government employees and for non-government employees, it comes to about Rs 47,000. Similarly, for Alto the discount for PSU employees is at Rs 28,000 as compared to Rs 25,500 for non-government buyers.

Hyundai too could sell 2,000 to 2,500 more cars to Government employees through its discounts.

“In the first month we sold about 3,000 cars and in the second month, it increased to around 3,500,” said a Hyundai Motor India spokesperson.

Last month, Hyundai offered a discount of Rs 17,000 to Rs 22,000 on its hatchback Santro variants. However, for non-government employee it was insurance and a three-year warranty that was the lure. Similarly, Government employees were entitled to a discount of Rs 10,000 on its premium compact car i-10, Rs 22,000-27,000 on Getz and Rs 31,000 on its sedan Verna.

For non-government customers of i-10, the concession was reduced by almost half to Rs 5,000 and in case of Getz, it was between Rs 4,000 and Rs 8,000.
Encouraging signs

While the numbers appear small when compared to the estimated 55 lakh beneficiaries of the Sixth Pay Commission, industry officials still look at it as encouraging considering the current industry scenario.

“Although Government has announced the revised pay scale many of the employees are yet to get the benefit. So demand has been relatively lukewarm. Moreover, this being a year-end, customers prefer to wait to buy next year’s model. But we hope demand to pick up from January onwards,” said Mr Prem Bagga, President of Automobile Dealers Association of Delhi, who also has dealerships for Bajaj and Maruti.