How do you position something cheap ? The world's cheapest Car for example. In a market where two wheelers still pre-dominate the private vehicle segment and where cars are still seen as symbols of affluence; this may be an interesting exercise to undertake. With Tata motors launching Tata Nano just two days back, the whole Two wheeler market is in jitters.
The total number of registered two-wheelers and three-wheelers on road in India, as on March 31, 1998 was 27.9mn and 1.7mn respectively. The two wheeler population has almost doubled in 1996 from a base of 12.6mn in 1990.
Mr Ratan Tata, Chairman, Tata Group said that his insight into how a typical middle class Indian family travels gave him the inspiration to design and develop a "people's car" for India. The car costing just Rs.one lakh ( Rs.100,000) is the cheapest in the market and would give stiff competition to both two wheelers and other cars which are mostly the choice of first time buyers.
Though about 30 % of India's population is in the middle class, who have high aspirations and would like to have all the trappings of a successful life; I wonder how they will react to this new car. THough everyone would like to own a car, how would they like to been in the "world's cheapest car' ? Will it go well with the image that they have of themselves ??
I think this car will work more in semi-rural areas and towns more than cities; as people in cities tend to be more image conscious. While all the marketing pundits are re-writing their business plans keeping Nano in mind; i think one will have to wait and watch before jumping to big conclusions. In the meanwhile, Mr Tata and co. can bask in the glory of a job well done.
No comments:
Post a Comment