Maruti Suzuki’s domestic sales have fallen for the seventh month in a row with a 13.4 per cent dip in December 2011 to 77,475 units. The carmaker has attributed the drop to maintenance shutdown at its plant in the month.
While sales in the premium hatch (Swift, Ritz, Estilo) and sedan segments (SX4, Dzire, Kizashi) grew, sales for its largest-volume compact segment (M800, Alto, WagonR, A-star) fell 16 per cent (38,593 units). Though they account for lesser volumes, sales in the utility vehicle and van segments have also dropped.
“The company was closed for its bi-annual maintenance shutdown for six days during December 2011, from December 26 to 31,” the company said.
Exports, however, rose 50.5 per cent in December to 14,686 units. For the April to December, 2011 period, total sales fell 16.5 per cent to 6.84 lakh units.
Mr Shashank Srivastava, Maruti's Chief General Manager for Marketing said that the lower sales in the month follows a slowdown in the auto market . Also, all car companies usually try to keep low production/stocks for the last month of the year.
"Our retail sales are doing very good, though wholesales were lower. We could have done even better volumes in Swift, Dzire and Ritz if we had more diesel engines available as the waiting is still quite high," he said.