Will Maruti End Up Like “Hamara Bajaj”?

It appears the pricing of Toyota’s Etios (around 5 lakhs) has shaken up Maruti Suzuki. It is reportedly downsizing  Swift Dzire to  cut cost by about fifty thousand.    

Being on the top of car sales over the years has perhaps made Maruti take its customers for granted.  For instance, Maruti’s popular Swift Dzire has been in the market for about three years. Yet, a top dealer in Bangalore does not have Dzire on display. Test drive is not offered in spite of repeated requests. They have very limited colours to choose. So a buyer is expected to make his buy looking at the brochure. Finally car is delivered in about three months after several false promises and commitments. Perhaps the lack of competitors all these years has brought about this lethargy among Maruti dealers.

I think most of us prefer Maruti because we believe its maintenance is cheap. It is a myth.  Now service centres have “replacement engineers” rather than “service engineers”. Tell them a problem, they will replace a part instead of repairing it. So you end up paying several thousands for “servicing”. A local mechanic would have done the same job for peanuts.

About a decade ago, Maruti owners were treated like kings at service centres. Car was polished and given a brand new look before handing over to the customer. Now the car, after servicing, looks more or less like a wet buffalo coming out of a pond with water marks all over the body.  They promptly make us fill their feed back forms. But their approach and attitude remains unchanged. 

Now market is laced with choices.  It would be interesting to see whether Maruti ends up struggling for space like Fiat or vanish forever like “Hamara Bajaj” scooters.