Maruti Suzuki continues its march in October; Brezza, Grand Vitara SUVs play big

Maruti Suzuki on Wednesday informed it had sold 177,266 units in the domestic market in the month of October, an uptick of 21 per cent over figures from the same month of 2022. Once again underlining the growing popularity of its relatively new crop of SUVs in the market, Maruti Suzuki especially pointed towards the persisting success of models like Brezza sub-compact SUV, Grand Vitara mid-size SUV and Fronx. The automaker sold a total of 59,147 units in the utility vehicle segment last month, significantly up from 30,971 units registered in the same month a year ago. Sales of the automaker's passenger vehicles in the first seven months of the current financial year too witnessed a massive surge to 10,41,154 units, up from 934,887 units sold during the same period a year ago.

Maruti Suzuki has clearly swayed away from its smaller offerings for a more intense focus on a varied yet robust lineup of SUVs that now also includes the Jimny. The company credits its recent performances to the faring of each of these individual models even though sales of its smaller vehicles have tumbled in recent times.

Alto and S-Presso, for instance, aren't quite selling as much as both these models used to in times gone by. Sales combining both these two models in October 2023 were 14,568 units, down from 24,936 units recorded in October 2022. Last week, speaking to reporters, Maruti Suzuki Chairman RC Bhargava had explained that he does not expect the overall small car segment in the country to reach previous highs for another two to three years. “Unless the government cuts taxes, which I don't see happening, or unless income levels rise faster than increasing cost of cars, the revival will take time," he has said.

But the continuing dominance of SUVs in the passenger vehicle market puts Maruti Suzuki in a comfortable space despite the showing of small cars. The country's largest car maker drove out the five-door Jimny earlier this year while the Fronx also made its global debut and has fared extremely well. Fronx is a Baleno-based SUV that also gets a turbo-charged petrol engine option. In July, the company launched Invicto, its most expensive model ever here. The Invicto is essentially a rebadged version of the Toyota Innova Crysta and pricing starts at around ₹25 lakh before taxes.

Also watch: Maruti Suzuki Invicto MPV: First Drive Review

The company also informs that wait periods for all of these models is coming down because the semiconductor shortage issue is normalising.

In the compact segment where Maruti Suzuki sells models like Baleno, Celerio, Dzire, Ignis, Swift and WagonR, the automaker registered 80,662 units last month, up from 73,685 units sold in October 2022. Ciaz, the automaker's only midsize sedan on sale registered a drastic slump in sales numbers last month, with only 695 units sold compared to 1,884 units recorded in the same month a year ago.