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Honda woos villagers to build bikemaker reputation
Honda Motorcycle sand Scooters ( HMS I) is aiming to replicate its success in the scooter segment with motorcycles–an area where the Japanese auto maker has been lagging. Motorcycle sales makes up more than two-thirds of two-wheeler sales in India.
Honda Motorcycle sand Scooters ( HMS I) is aiming to replicate its success in the scooter segment with motorcycles–an area where the Japanese auto maker has been lagging. Motorcycle sales makes up more than two-thirds of two-wheeler sales in India.
In scooters, HMSI has a 59% market-share, but only 15% in motorcycles. It losses out to erstwhile partner Hero MotoCorp in the entry-level segment and Bajaj Auto in the premium commuter segment. But Honda is catching up. “Sometimes you are branded as a scooter maker. But from April to July the motorcycle industry grew by 9%, Honda grew by 14%,” said Yadvinder S Guleria, head of sales and marketing at HMSI.
“Though there has been a shift towards scooters, for a twowheeler company to be successful in India it is important to have a motorcycle strategy,” said Amit Kaushik, India head of London-based Jato Dynamics.
Guleria, who said that the ideal mix of scooters and motorcycles should be equal, feels lack of showrooms in the rural market has hurt Honda. Also, it is only in 2013 HMSI rolled out mass-market 110 cc models.
But just opening up showrooms isn’t enough. People thought Honda worked with Hero. “There was a lot of confusion… no one knew the wing mark of Honda,” said Guleria.
So spawned the marketing campaign “Honda ki pehchan, pankh ka nishaan”. Guleria saw sales of Honda Shine rise in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.
Honda also created street plays to educate villagers and roped in Bollywood actor Akshay Kumar as its brand ambassador. The result: Rural sales have contributed 28% to its India volumes this fiscal, up from 25% last fiscal. For Hero the percentage is 40%.
“It is important to have successful models in the entry-level segment in order to cater to the villagers,” said Kaushik. Honda has four products in the entry level segment. Guleria has plans to launch more.
At the same time it plans to open more showrooms in villages. It will add 800 dealerships by the end of this year, 90% of which will be in villages, to its existing 5,400 outlets. It will also have more zonal managers. For the youth it launched Navi – an automatic two-wheeler with Activa’s engine but lighter–which allows a lot of customisation. Half of Navi’s buyers are from the 13-18 year-old age group.
Also for the first time, India became the highest contributor to Honda two-wheeler’s global sales. The group sold 4.35 million units worldwide in the April-June quarter, with Indian sales accounting for almost 30% of the volume at 1.24 million units.
