[RahulNagaraj]

FADA has released the vehicle registration data of luxury cars for January 2024.

BMW has come out on top with 1,340 units sold, followed by Mercedes-Benz and Jaguar Land Rover, which have sold 1,333 units and 273 units, respectively.



Luxury carmaker sales for January 2024:

• BMW - 1,340 units, up from 932 units in January 2023
• Mercedes-Benz - 1,333 units, up from 1,322 units in January 2023
• Jaguar Land Rover - 273 units, up from 221 units in January 2023
• Volvo - 220 units, up from 194 units in January 2023
• Audi - 67 units (CBU), down from 184 units in January 2023

Team-BHP's detailed analysis of January 2024 sales figures.

Link to Team-BHP news

[pqr]

2023 Luxury car registration data | VAHAN dashboard data is redundant for luxury car industry analysis



After Mercedes and BMW’s car sales slump fiasco around 2012, luxury carmakers in India stopped sharing monthly data. Instead, they started selectively declaring quarterly wholesale or retail (whichever is higher) data based on their individual performance.

Another way to gauge the performance of the luxury car industry in recent years is to use publicly available data on the VAHAN dashboard, which is also published by FADA in its reports.



However, for now, VAHAN dashboard data covers only 1,356 out of 1,443 RTOs spanning across all states and UTs. A quick comparison between VAHAN registration data and luxury manufacturers declared sales data for 2023 shows a huge gap. Thus making VHAHAN data redundant for luxury car industry analysis in India.

Audi data: Audi assembles A4, A6, Q3, Q5, and Q7 at SAVWIPL’s Aurangabad plant in Maharashtra. These data are captured under SAVWIPL (2023 : 90,488 units). Rest all cars in the portfolio are imported under GSR 870E, and data reflects under AUDI AG. In the beginning of 2023, Audi imported Q3 (CBU) before it went into CKD assembly; thus, these imported car numbers look inflated in case of Audi.

Mercedes data: VAHAN data shows breakdowns for CKD and CBU products of Mercedes. Data for locally assembled CKD cars is captured under MERCEDES-BENZ INDIA PVT LTD, and data for CBU cars imported under GSR 870E is captured under MERCEDES-BENZ AG. Under the new sales process (ROTF), Mercedes in India directly invoices cars to end customers from late October 2021, facilitated by dealers for a fee, thus eliminating the wholesale stage. So the data published by Mercedes in India can be construed as actual retail sales.

• VAHAN dashboard link : https://vahan.parivahan.gov.in/vahan...portview.xhtml
• GSR 870E link : https://parivahan.gov.in/parivahan//en/content/additional-information-vehicle-manufacturer-importing-india-unused-completely-built-units
• TeamBHP 2023 luxury car sales data link : https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/indian-car-scene/262593-mercedes-bmw-audi-other-luxury-brand-sales-2023-a.html (Mercedes, BMW, Audi & other luxury brand sales in 2023)

[GTO]

7 years back, Mercedes averaged 1277 cars / month (2017 sales = 15330). All these luxury brands are stuck in the same old rut of 1000 odd cars a month. One reason is their overpricing.

But the real reason is the emergence of the 30 - 50 lakh car segment which really didn't exist this way before. Even the luxury brands have accepted that the Tucson & Kodiaq are being cross-shopped with their small crossovers, the Camry with their entry-level sedans etc. Cars like the Innova Hycross, Ioniq 5, XUV700, Safari, Camry, Kodiaq, Tiguan etc. are just too darn competent & frankly, all the car you need in terms of power, space, safety, features, size etc. They don't come with the headaches of German car ownership either.


It is the 30 - 50 lakh cars from mainstream car makers that have killed the growth of luxury car brands in India. Heck, forget anything else, the 50-60 lakh Fortuner alone outsells everything combined from Mercedes + BMW + Audi + Lexus etc. The German luxury car brands have dug their own grave in India with crazy pricing, stiff maintenance costs, cramped rear seats, eye-watering repair costs & turnaround times, delicate darlings that break over broken roads and lack of product innovation. The 30 - 50 lakh cars have developed at a far faster pace than the 50 - 70 lakh cars.

Coming soon, more executors of the luxury segment:

- BYD Seal sedan whose acceleration is on par with AMGs & //Ms

- Kia EV9, a full-size SUV (like the GLS), lovingly called the budget Range Rover worldwide

- Teslas

[Quicksilver85]

In the current day & age, the 30-40 lac segment cars get more features than these so called entry level luxury cars.

Take for Example, BMW X1 petrol comes with a meagre ~136HP petrol! Heck even Seltos/Creta/Verna get 160 HP. Don't even talk about XUV700, it gets a mighty 200HP petrol motor. So performance goes out of the picture against the competition which are half the price.

Lets look at Interiors or Luxury features then. Many of these entry Luxury SUVs don't come with ventilated seats, 360 degree camera, ADAS etc. Normal brands are offering them nowadays and Heck Safari even gets 2nd row ventilated seats!

Democratization of the features has led to a point that, entry luxury cars look like they are missing out on so many features that it is not a value proposition anymore. And there is the cost of maintenance, which is like a sledge hammer waiting to hit an unsuspecting customer which has made an average joe to shy away from these expensive buys which offer nothing more than snob value and slightly better driving dynamics maybe. But, we are ready to compromise that much for the value proposition.

In the Future, the sales are bound to go down if there is no value proposition with entry level luxury cars. Maybe they need to relook at the pricing, but, they wont as they presume would DILUTE the brand. Interested customers of entry luxury cars might be restricted to who would purchase only for the brand value.

[car_aficianado]

Completely flat "growth" trajectory. The features provided by cars in the 20 to 40L range by the Korean (Hyundai/Kia) and Indian (Mahindra) brands have ensured a better value for money proposition. Ofcourse the snob value still is a proposition to consider.

[Shreyans_Jain]

Two factors stand out in bold and capitals for the stagnation/decline of the premium segment

1. Gross overpricing

BMW X1 was a 30L Rupee car 6 years back. It’s a 55L Rupee car today. C Class has gone from 40L to 65L. I remember checking out the S350 for 1.35cr on road, back in 2018. Its price has basically doubled now. A Class ‘Limousine’ for 50L with a 1.3 turbo petrol? Thank you Mercedes for insulting my intelligence.

Fact is that Audi is making a resurgence on account of relatively well priced cars which look like a steal in front of Merc and BMW. All the way from the A4 to the Q7.

2. Powertrain stagnation and degradation.

One of the most alluring aspects of premium cars were their powerful engines, head and shoulders above the rest. Not anymore. Both Merc and BMW have been selling the same 2.0 diesel engine as their bread and butter engine for over a decade, with something between 180 and 200hp. The car prices have doubled, but the engine has stayed the same. In meanwhile, similarly powered engines are being offered by the likes of Mahindra, Jeep, Tata, Hyundai etc. XUV700 AX3 provides a solid 185hp diesel + a well tuned 6 speed torque converter automatic for just 20L on road! Harrier and Hector lower models offer over 170bhp for just 18L on road. Then we come to the petrols, which have downright regressed. BMW has the audacity to offer the X1 with less power than a 15L Rupee Kia Carens, and ask for over 55L rupees for it. Mahindra’s 2.0 mStallion is the single best engine to be had under 50L today, and is head and shoulders above everything the premium brands offer. Well, you reap what you sow.

Again, Audi’s staple 2.0 TSi engine is far more potent than the 1.3 or 1.4 engines of Merc and BMW.

[TROOPER]

I recall watching Shumi from MotorInc ask the Ducati CEO whether they have any intentions of entering the lower CC segments, probably 500-650cc considering that's where the Indian market is headed in the near future and he was quick to say no. Similarly JLR have ditched the entry level segment and are open about their intentions of going after just the upper luxury segments (worldwide) with higher margins. It also reflects in their recent financial performance.

I guess soon enough Merc and BMW would need to make a similar call. Either swallow your pride and start competing with Toyota, Hyundai/Kia and VAG/Skoda, with price cuts and appropriate tech additions or ditch the entry level segments altogether. As GTO said, it's only going to get worse for them.

Just a couple years ago we would have been bewildered if anyone said people will be shelling out 30 lac+ on road for Tata/Mahindra cars. Won't be long before they break into the 40 lac+ barrier. Hell Mahindra already has the powertrain, just need to iron out the rough edges and ditch the funky designs for those segments.

Sometime later this decade the Germans will get a jolt when Hyundai/Kia, VAG/Skoda and Tata/Mahindra seriously start being a pain.

[GTO]

These guys are only banking on China & some other markets for growth.

The story is the exact same in USA, a top market for these guys. See BMW's annual sales figures. They are getting murdered by cars from the mainstream segments. What is the growth from 2015?


Cars from below are eating Mercedes' lunch too. Check out monthly sales figures (for some reason, annual sales figures for Mercedes not yet available on goodcarbadcar.net). Sales almost the same from 10 years back!


Mercedes & BMW CEOs should look at how the steel industry was disrupted, and the theory of "the innovator's dilemma". I am seeing the same trend hitting them really hard.

[CoolFire]

The relevance of features they offer is an important factor. For eg. ventilated seats, one feature which is extremely useful in India is not offered on any of the German models less than 1 Crore on-road price.

At the same time, some very expensive features like auto reverse and auto parking, heated steering wheel and heated seats hardly add value here for most customers. Unless they can fine tune these type of market specific customisations, they will continue to loose customers. Especially these days when everyone is spoiled by features and luxury feel on much lower priced competitors.

[FAIAAA]

As a former luxury car owner ( E Class and 3 series) and who has extensively test driven other luxury brands /models over the years , I couldn't agree more with the points already made above.
There were 4-5 reasons why people bought a German /luxury brand -
1. Brand /badge appeal and snob value
2. High performance - 150/200 hp +
3. Features and luxury feel
4. Ride and handling
5. Engineering finesse

However these came at a price ( literally and figuratively) - high prices, Inconsistent reliability (barring BMW) / high maintenance costs, low resale value as GTO/others have mentioned. Then they have to ladder /tier their models and trims to make customers go for higher trims, models. That means robbing 50-60 Lac models /trims of features which you find on a 15-30 car today.

Barring 1, I would say the mainstream brands have come a long way and infact overtaken the luxury brands. Who would have thought a humble Verna would have more BHP and features than a BMW X1!
Even on 1, I would say aspirations and brand/luxury perceptions are changing. Market is evolving with the 30-50 Lac segment maturing. For any market /segment to grow, you need existing customers to add/upgrade while acquiring new customers. This is where the problem lies - many like me have moved to other brands after one or two luxury ownership experiences.

[shobhit.shri]

Originally Posted by GTO

All these luxury brands are stuck in the same old rut of 1000 odd cars a month. One reason is their overpricing.

But the real reason is the emergence of the 30 - 50 lakh car segment which really didn't exist this way before.

But the same should have happened in other countries too, right? After all, in that segment, most models are global.

I just got curious, and it seems that the price difference between the value- luxury and luxury is too high in India. That is not the case in other countries, so cannibalization is lower.

[Bhodrolok]

Originally Posted by shobhit.shri

it seems that the price difference between the value- luxury and luxury is too high in India.

That is a feature, not a bug. I don't think the big 3 Germans are looking for "growth" as such. If they were, they would price their cars much more competitively.
They are happy selling a steady number of vehicles at a high margin which would be easy for their HQs to justify their "premium" branding. This is similar to what Apple used to do with their products in India until recently they have started to care of "growth" and hence the steady stream of offers on their products.

The least expensive German big 3 car that really pulls on my heart strings is the 300Li which is close to 70L. So when someone is looking at a Kodiaq or Hycross or Tucson they are not comparing it with the X1 or GLA, they have to look at a much higher price bracket.

[androdev]

Our economy growth, infrastructure, traffic discipline and taxes during sales and service are so much worse than other countries, one not only needs to be an HNI but also an irrational car crazy person to buy a luxury car here. Even those who buy these cars, don't use them much preferring to have an Innova take all the abuse. Luxury car brands can't do much to grow their sales.

[FAIAAA]

Originally Posted by androdev

Our economy growth, infrastructure, traffic discipline and taxes during sales and service are so much worse than other countries, one not only needs to be an HNI but also an irrational car crazy person to buy a luxury car here. Even those who buy these cars, don't use them much preferring to have an Innova take all the abuse. Luxury car brands can't do much to grow their sales.

So True! Whether you are an adventure tourer driving through bad /no roads, narrow hilly roads or an urban dweller driving through narrow lanes or crowded roads in the city, you need to have a lot of patience ( to deal with unruly traffic and congestion) and courage ( to live with dents and scratches) especially if you are a luxury car driver.
Just today I was driving through a busy narrow lane and felt sympathetic for a 6GT and an EV6 which were struggling to manoeuvre through traffic and causing a jam.

[siren373]

I strongly feel that the number one reason for the stagnation is crazy costs around maintenance and repair. Indians are suckers for snob value and would pick the germans over xuv 700, features be dammed. However, the term hathi mat paalo applies very well here and no one wants to keep up with the headache of spending lakhs on service plus potential repair.

I’ve owned a Mercedes and will be moving to the ioniq 5 next since i much prefer a no nonsense easy to maintain and run car that doesnt make me worried about repair costs in case some idiot bumps into me.