Hyundai Creta drives past 250,000 sales mark in India

The Hyundai Creta, the second-best selling SUV in the country after the Maruti Vitara Brezza, has notched a new sales landmark – 250,000 sales. The latest milestone comes seven months after it surpassed the 200,000 unit sales mark (25 months) and a year after it drove past the 150,000 mark. 

Launched on July 21, 2015, the popular Hyundai SUV has till end-February 2018 sold a total of 248,582 units – 172,226 diesel and 76,356 petrol. This is 1,418 units short of the 250,000 mark. For the first 11 months of fiscal year 2017-18, the Creta has sold a total of 87,847 units, averaging 7,986 units a month or 266 units a day. This effectively means the SUV would have surpassed the 250,000 unit sales mark in the first week of March 2018 itself.

Highest sales in July 2017: 10,556 units
Thanks to the GST-driven price reductions in July 2017, the Creta hit its highest monthly sales with 10,556 buyers driving home the Hyundai SUV.  The Creta is available with a choice of one petrol (123hp, 1.6L) and two diesel engines (90hp 1.4L / 128hp 1.6L.

Within eight months of its launch, the Creta had received over 100,000 bookings and a waiting period of up to 10 months, enough to make Hyundai ramp up capacity by 30 percent for the model. To mark the model’s first anniversary, Hyundai rolled out a limited-run First Anniversary Edition as well as newer variants of the Creta including a petrol automatic and a more affordable diesel automatic to further bolster its position as one of the best-selling SUVs in the country.

With its stellar sales performance, the Creta also became the second most sold UV in India in 2015-16 after the Mahindra Bolero, which ended the fiscal with sales of 67,484 units. Of Hyundai's total of 64,796 UVs sold in 2015-16, the Creta accounted for 63,836 units, helping the Korean carmaker overtake Ford India, Renault India and Tata Motors.

In 2016-17, the Creta sold a total of 96,899 units accounting for the bulk of Hyundai’s total UV sales of 98,498 units in FY2017. However, No. 1 position in the UV segment eluded it mainly due to the game-changing Maruti Vitara Brezza which topped the UV sales chart at 108,640 units last fiscal. 

In the current fiscal year, in the April-February 2018 period, the Creta has sold a total of 87,847 units including best-ever monthly sales of 10,556 units in July 2017.

As Hyundai Motor India completes two decades, it is now eyeing speedier growth in the domestic market. The company has announced plans to invest Rs 6,500 crore in new models and expansion of production capacity. 

In 2016-17, the company sold a total of 509,705 units in 2016-17 (+5.24%) and had a 16.73 percent market share in PVs and 12.93 percent in UVs. In the ongoing fiscal year 2017-18, the Korean carmaker has sold 488,232 passenger vehicles (+5.01%) and has a 16.34 percent market share. This comprises 389,487 passenger cars and 98.745 UVs.

The Creta continues to be a key growth driver for the company, a consistent No. 2 in the Top 5 UV sales chart albeit its sales have slowed down in the recent past. 

Also read: Winners and losers in the SUV market share game