Top Highlights for January 2025 for car sales in India!

Awesome sales of 4 lakhs + for the first time ever.

Highlights

1. Mahindra is the undisputed No 3 now. Growing at over 17% this Jan YoY compared to a 5%+ drop for Hyundai, the writing on the wall is clear. Expect major upsets this year.

?2. Tata suffers the maximum damage of over 10% fall in sales over last January

?3. Sales cross the 4 lakh mark for the FIRST TIME EVER. Though the growth YoY has been around 2%, this is an event to be celebrated. Trailing 12 months sales are now at 4.3 million.

Sales in January over the previous decade

Market Share in January

For Maruti, this is an all-time high dispatch of 173,599 numbers. Let's analyze how this entire increase over last January pans out

Their Wagon R shipments have dramatically increased by 35.6%. Other winners are the Grand Vitara which is up by 17.46% and the Swift which is up by 11.13%.

I will watch these models specifically over the coming two months at least to see how they are performing, since their average sales have been under a lot of pressure in the past months, both of them being hatchbacks which have borne the brunt of falling sales volumes for many years now.

?Swift annual volumes over the years

WagonR annual volumes over the years

The sudden ramp-up in their volumes is surprising and volume monitoring over the next few months will have to be done

Overall Scenario across OEMs, Body Types ,and Form Factors

Top 15 Models by Growth

Bottom 15

Mahindra Tops in weighted average growth with a fantastic individual growth rate of 17.63%. Other top OEMs that contributed to the growth story are Maruti, Toyota, Skoda (thanks to the launch of the Kylaq), Kia, MG (Thanks to Windsor’s stellar performance), and VW. The OEMs that pulled down growth have been Tata’s down a whopping 10.37%, Hyundai down 5.45%, and Honda down 29.7%. Renault and Nissan continue to worry with degrowth of 27.34% and 16.03% respectively. Citroen needs a serious rethink on their India strategy with a degrowth of 27.69%. Their Stellantis stable mate, Jeep is down another scary 21.72%

?When sees from the lens of the body types, all but SUVs have degrown. India is surely and quickly getting to be SUV country. Despite all that Maruti is throwing at the scenario with their massive increases in shipments of WagonR and Swift this month. ?

Sub Segmental or Form Factor analysis shows that the Creta segment grew the maximum at 29.19%. This is also because of the launch of the Creta EV whose sales sadly are not being shown separately. The Baleno segment is going down now and with a slowdown in EVs for Tata, the Punch has also shown a degrowth of 9.72%. In a very fast-growing 4-meter SUV segment which is dominated by the likes of the Nexon and the Vitara Brezza, the Nexon is down 10.39%. It is again in my honest opinion (due to lack of available data) due to the EV slowdown. The Large SUVs have also fallen thanks to Tata’s dismal performance with the Safari and the Harrier down 46.49% and 43.34% respectively. It's heartbreaking but they need to get their heads together and analyze. The XUV700 on the other hand has grown at 16.56% and the Scorpio-N at 8.04%. The 3XO (growth of 75.5% ) and the Thar Roxx seem to be rocking. It's truly sad that Mahindra stopped giving separate numbers for the Thar and the Thar Roxx especially since the platforms on which they are built are completely different despite a common facia.

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Of the total of 2.05% that the Indian car markets grew YoY in January, Mahindra’s contribution to this has been 1.93%. Had these guys not been around, we would have been flat.

In the Form Factors/Sub Segments, it's the Mid-Sized SUVs that have grown the highest. The Electric SUVs need to be taken with a pinch of salt given that Tata does NOT share its EV numbers separately

Analysis by Price Segments

Though this is based on a good industry understanding on my part, it will not be 100% accurate due to complete lack of VAHAN data at the model/trim levels across states

It's astonishing to see the maximum growth in the industry coming in the 15-20 lakh segment with the lower-priced segments showing serious degrowth. The sheer rejection of the consumer to the sedans and hatchbacks has taken its toll.

Top 10 models sold in January

With the launch of the Creta Electric, the model stands No 3 in the sales charts. Other surprises are the Scorpio-N whose average ticket value will be north of the 20 lakhs bracket.