The colour of your car says a lot. The small car players like Maruti Suzuki and Hyundai say the market for them is for whites, silver and other subtle colours. Arvind Saxena, Senior Vice-president, Marketing and Sales, Hyundai Motor India agrees adding, ?Indians still prefer to buy subtle colours because of the climatic conditions. 50% of the total sales of the industry are still for the perennial favourites, while red stands at 11-13%.? Agreeing on the same, a Maruti Suzuki dealer in Mumbai avers, ?The market reacts as per what is showcased in the television ads and offered on retail outlets. For Maruti it is all about silver, golden and white.?
Manufacturers point out, the colour ?red? signifies premium and prosperity and is winning hearts of the buyers, while car makers are finding it difficult to meet the delivery dates. ?Almost 50% of our orders for the new Superb are for Rosso Brunello (red offered by Skoda) and we are gearing up to meet the huge demand for the colour,? says Thomas Kuehl, Board Member, Sales and Marketing, Skoda Auto India. He adds the company is also seeing increasing demand for black colour, which till recently was not really preferred.
?Indians associate colours with different things. While white is seen as power, black is evil and red as prosperity,? says VG Ramakrishnan, Director, Automotive and Transportation, Frost and Sullivan, South Asia and Middle East.
Contemporary colours including chocolate and blue are getting popular too. Few attribute the popularity of bright colours to the target age of the buyers. Most feel what sells is what is shown. Today, large number of the car ads feature bright colour cars. For instance, the ads of Fiat Linea and Grande Punto, Skoda Superb and Honda Jazz, feature cars in red. Tarun Khanna, Head Marketing, Fiat India, says, ?Commercialisation of bright colours by car companies also plays an important role in determining the trends in the market.? Khanna shares that the maximum sales of Linea are for red, courtesy the advertisement showcasing Linea in Flamenco Red (wine red for Fiat India). Even Honda says that almost 50% of its sales are off-white and silver.