Car sales around Diwali has fallen so low this year that dealers are staring at an all-time high inventory of 80-85 days which adds up to 7.90 lakh vehicles.
Car sales around Diwali has fallen so low this year that dealers are staring at an all-time high inventory of 80-85 days which adds up to 7.90 lakh vehicles worth ₹79,000 crore as a whole, according to an Economic Times report.
This is also partially because automakers had aggressively dispatched cars amid low sales, which had declined by 18.81%, as per data from the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (FADA).
Car sales saw a slowdown since this year’s May, with inventories rising since then.
Interestingly the slowdown was seen even for cars in the price bracket of ₹10-25 lakh. This is important because this segment was the primary driver of sales growth after the pandemic.
Extreme weather patterns have been attributed as one of the reasons for car buyers to postpone their purchases. This included a hotter than usual summer followed by heavy monsoons.
Another reason for the slowdown is the demand for newer models like the Maruti Suzuki Fronx and the recently launched Tata Curvv which hasn’t been affected too much by this lack of demand.
Top manufacturers like Maruti Suzuki and Hyundai have the largest dealer inventory left over, followed by others such as Nissan and Citroen.