Tata Motors Bolt hatchback and Zest compact sedan were expected to be the company’s comeback cars. However, dismal sales reports in the past few months are clear indications of their failure to appeal to buyers in their segments.
In the past year of Tata Motors launched Zest, and in six months since Tata Bolt has made its way into markets. But sales have been well below expectations. August sales of Bolt stood at just 722 units while sales of Zest stood at 2,006 units. With Tata Motors Zest aiming to compete with Maruti Suzuki DZire and Honda Amaze, its sales came nowhere even close to Maruti DZire of which 19,716 units were sold in July 2015, while 4,589 units of Amaze were sold during the same month.
Tata Bolt Sport Concept on display at 2015 Geneva Motor Show.Tata Bolt was introduced as competitor to Maruti Suzuki Swift and Hyundai i10. Maruti Swift sales in July 2015 stood at 18,870 while Hyundai i10 sales touched 8,691 units. Besides comparing with the two market leaders, Tata Motors Bolt could not even compete with Volkswagen Polo of which 2,583 units were sold in July 2015.
Taking into account April to July 2015 period, Bolt notched up sales of 2,240 units while Tata Motors Zest sales stood at 7,177 units.
Conversely, in the same period, sales of Maruti DZire were at 71,652 units while Hyundai Amaze sales were at 17,984 units while Maruti Swift sales were at 71,822 units, i10 sales were at 36,565 units and VW Polo sales stood at 11,024 units.
Tata Bolt sales were even lower than Tata Nano with the new GenX Nano accounting for sales of 6,671 units during July while 3,118 units of Indica were also sold in the same period.
Analysts contend that Tata Motors needs to modify pricing and positioning of its products while enhance focus in markets where they will appeal to customers.
