Mid-sizers slow down

Mid-life Crisis

India is a big hatchback market. But India has never been a ‘big’ hatchback market. Big hatchbacks that mustered up enough courage to tread into territory dominated by three-boxes have never had it easy. The Getz, for instance, has found the going extremely tough because it is priced very close to the Ford Ikon and the Hyundai Accent. Because no one buys a ‘small’ car for more than five lac rupees when one can buy a ‘big’ car with a ‘big’ boot.

Big boots, of course, translate into ‘prestige’, ‘position’ and ‘oh-he’s-got-somewhere-in-life’ (I wear size 13 boots, but it does not seem to help). Anyway, big hatchbacks translate into ‘oh-look-the-fool-went-and-bought-a-small-car-for-six-lac-rupees’.

A recent story in the Economic Times, however, points out that the mid-size segment is bearing the brunt of changing consumer preferences.

In this new segment are the likes of Swift and Getz, plus the relaunched versions of Indica, Wagon R Duo, Alto and the new Zen Estillo. These are now serious alternatives for buyers of the A3, or mid-size cars who appear to find greater value in the top-end compact cars than the bottom-end mid-size cars like Indigo, Esteem and Accent.

Well yes, the mid-size segment has moved slower than both the A+ and the C- (if I may) segment this year. But I’d rather attribute it to two major reasons, rather than shifting buyer preferences.

One, one segment either side of the mid-size segment has witnessed a flurry of activity in the past year, while the mid-size segment models struggle with technology and styling a generation old. There are fully-loaded variants of contemporary hatches like the Swift and the Getz priced very close to the entry-level mid-size segment. And there are stripped-out, bare-basic variants of the Fiesta and the Aveo waiting to nibble into the Accent’s and Esteem’s market.

Two, last year’s budget was kind to small cars (hatchbacks, for all practical purposes). Import duties slashed on small cars meant that there was a mild rush amongst manufacturers to hatch their hatchback plans earlier than they had initially planned. Mid-sizers seem to be the ones to bear the brunt. The segment is on auto-pilot; it has seen almost no activity in the last year or so. The Esteem, Accent, Indigo and Ikon dog along. To live one more day.

Will things change? It depends on what the FM does this year in the budget, really. If the differential duty regime in favour of small cars is abolished, we’ll see a dash of contemporariness added to the mid-size segment, and us Indians will be back to our old love affair with cars with boots.