Carmakers raise prices, cut offers on best-sellers amid strong demand
Kia Seltos, Mahindra XUV700, Honda City and Hyundai Venue amid continued strong demand.
While Kia India has raised prices of its newly launched Seltos, as well as multipurpose vehicle Carens, by up to ₹50,000 with effect from October 1, Mahindra's popular SUVs Scorpio Classic, Scorpio-N, XUV300, XUV700, Thar have become dearer by up to ₹81,000. Hyundai too has increased prices of its SUVs Venue and Tucson by up to ₹48,000. Prices of Honda Cars' City and Amaze sedans have also been increased, albeit by a more modest up to ₹7,900.
Some carmakers said a rise in input costs, which were not fully passed on to customers last year, necessitated the latest revision in vehicle prices.
Others like Hyundai held that product enhancements, introduction of newer features such as ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems), in line with market requirements, triggered the fresh round of increase in vehicle prices.
«Commodity prices have softened in recent months. But had gone up sharply post the pandemic. We had not passed on the entire cost to customers at the time,» Hardeep Singh Brar, national head, sales and marketing, Kia India, said adding, «We had announced introductory prices for the new Seltos.
And are hiking prices after a gap of 6-7 months.»
Shashank Srivastava, senior executive officer (marketing and sales) at Maruti Suzuki said while the automaker has not raised vehicle prices since April, it is closely monitoring the situation. «Input prices have softened a little bit but are still higher when compared with those seen three years back. For all carmakers, material costs are significant amounting to 75-77% of the cost structure of a vehicle.
