Despite a 7.2 per cent decline in the sales of Alto and Wagon R, the two best selling cars in the mini segment, India's largest car maker Maruti Suzuki posted its best ever monthly domestic sales figures at 1.25 lakh-plus units for the month of July, an increase of around 14 per cent from the year ago period. There was also a 4 per cent increase in the sales of compact segment that includes Swift, Ritz, Dzire and Baleno. Maruti said it sold 50,362 units in this segment in July this year compared to 48,381 units sold in July 2015.
Overall, Maruti posted a 12.7 per cent increase in its total sales in July which translates into 1.37 lakh units as compared to 1.21 lakh units in July last year.
Maruti said sales of its compact sedan Dzire Tour declined by 9.2 per cent during the month under review at 3,059 units as against 3,370 units in July 2015. Sales of mid-sized sedan Ciaz rose two-fold to 5,162 units during the month.
Sales of utility vehicles, including Gypsy, Grand Vitara, Ertiga, S-Cross and recently launched compact SUV Vitara Brezza surged over two-fold to 17,382 units in July this year from 6,916 units in the corresponding month last year.
Sales of vans - Omni and Eeco - rose 24.1 per cent to 14,748 units in July this year as compared to 11,887 units in the same period of the previous year.
Exports during the month rose marginally to 11,338 units as compared to 11,307 units in July last year, MSI said.
For the first quarter of this year (April-June 2016), Maruti saw a 2.1 per cent increase in the saler of cars translating into the sale of 3.43 lakh units that included 3.22 lakh units sold in the domestic market. Maruti said it clocked a growth of 5.4 per cent in the domestic market. "The growth in the first two months of the quarter had been 10.2 per cent but the unfortunate incident of fire at a key vendor of the Company resulted in lower sales in June 2016. The Company hopes to recover the lost sales during the course of the year," an official statement by Maruti said.
Company's first quarter results had exceeded the street estimates as Maruti posted a 23 per cent year-on-year increase in its net profit at Rs 1,486 crore helped by higher sales and lower material expenses that offset impact of unfavourable foreign exchange rates.
BW Reporters
Ashish Sinha is an experienced business journalist who has covered FMCG, auto, infrastructure, tourism, telecom among several other beats. Ashish has keen interest in the regulatory scenario impacting different sectors. He writes on aviation, railways, post and telegraph, infrastructure, defence, media & entertainment, among a wide variety of other subjects.
