END OF MARUTI ZEN

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A few months ago, Maruti Udyog quitely decided to shut down production of its once best selling car - Zen. Sales of Zen had gone down to less than half of its previous year level, and Maruti probably did not see a point in continuing with it. As someone who liked the car, I pondered what exactly happened with it.

The decline in sales probably started after the Zen was redesigned and given a new look some time in the end of 2004. Was the new look bad? Not really. in fact, they had done a good job with the looks, and the new car looked contemporary. But when they undertook this major change in Zen, they did not look at anything beyond changing the external looks and adding some fancy accessories such as chrome finish gear levers or the fog lamps that never get used.

The zen did not really need a change of engine or gearbox. It had an excellent gearbox, and the engine performance matched its counterparts. But users of Zen had some long standing complaints: first, about the low road clearance which often caused problems in our bumpy roads, and second, the height of the car. To give an example, a friend of mine who was slightly above 6 feet was looking for options of buying a car. He tried out a Zen and figured that his head nearly touched the roof when he was sitting in the driver's seat, so he had to abandon it. As they were anyway going for an overhaul, Maruti could have considered looking into these problems. But they did not seem to have listened to their customers.

Another problem was with the variants in the new look Zen. The no-frills version - LX, which did not have power steering, central lock or power windows was not exactly in anyone's favour. The next version, LXi, which had all these accessories is what most people would have gone bought, but it had its quirks. It did not have some really essential things - such as the left side rear view mirror and rear window wiper. And the mirrors were not internally adjustable. Such irritants did not make the buyer happy. And if the buyer wanted these things he had to upgrade to the top version - VXi. VXi had many unnecessary frills such as chrome gear lever, fog lamps(chrome handles?) and such things that no one would ever want, and costed a whopping 30,000 more than LXi. That made it prohibitive. So a buyer had to give up on essential accessories or pay through the nose, which suited no one. I know two of my friends who were die hard fans of Zen and wanted to buy a Zen and only Zen. They were deeply unhappy though they eventually bought the top model, but you will not see many people that loyal.

So most buyers probably did the next best thing - go for a parallel car like Wagon R or Santro, or upgrade to next level, which could be the swift. But is Zen a car that Maruti can do without? I personally don't think so. Wagon R, the other car in the same price range is not a suitable alternative to Zen. So Maruti may end up sending out their customers to go and buy Santros. A few who can afford might choose the swift and another few who do not mind Wagon R may go for it, but my guess is that Santro would become the most suitable alternative for Zen. With Maruti having no immediate replacement for Zen in pipeline, they will only loose out an opportunity to sell an additional 3-4,000 cars every month.