Maruti, Hyundai woo rival car owners

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Hyderabad, July 11:

At a time when domestic automotive manufacturers are wooing car-owners with loyalty programmes and retaining them with sops and upgrades, two recent ads from Maruti and Hyundai are directly wooing rival car-owners with attractive inducements at 'lower EMIs'.

Within a day of Hyundai's ad saying "Let's go for Hyundai at lower EMI", targeting Maruti Alto owners in a bid to have them exchange their car for a Santro or the recently launched i10 (however, at a lower EMI), Maruti has shot back, offering Maruti Swift to Hyundai Santro owners.

To top this offer there is one more "one-time offer" of exchange of any old car, any make and any model, for Alto buyers. Even if the car, say, an old Fiat with all papers, is valued at Rs 10,000, with exchange bonus and other inducements, its value works out to Rs 40,000.

When contacted, Mr Saral Talwar of Talwar Hyundai, a dealer at Hyderabad, said "basically, we are offering Santro as a car as an upgrade or next-level car which is much roomier for Alto owners. In fact, this is an ad with a pan-India appeal, not so much for buyers in Hyderabad, as Santro outsells Alto here."

"By driving home the advantage of upgrades, that too at a lower cost, we expect to convince buyers to opt for a Santro," Mr Talwar said.

For instance, Hyundai values Alto at Rs 1,66,000 and with some discounts and exchange offers, the balance works out to Rs 1.55 lakh. The new car EMI is estimated at Rs 4,073 as against Rs 5,735 paid earlier for Alto.

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