While the Maruti Ciaz has been the largest-selling sedan in the C2-segment, its popularity took a major hit last year with sales dropping from 50,759 units sold in 2018
Launched in 2014, the Maruti Ciaz has been the most successful C2-segment sedan from the country’s largest carmaker by volume to date. The Ciaz was launched as the successor of the mildly popular SX4, after the latter replaced the dud-seller Baleno in 2007. Not only this, the Ciaz is also responsible for bringing the dominance of the Honda City to an end.
However, in spite of the segment-best demand, sales of the Maruti Ciaz took a huge hit last year as the annual retail numbers plummeted from 50,759 units in 2018 to 29,706 units last year. This corresponds to a whopping 41 per cent dip on YoY basis. The drop in the demand is due to multiple reasons.
First of, the Indian car market faced one of the worst slowdowns ever last year, with almost every car manufacturer reporting a dip in demand for many of its models. The sedan segments have been in far lesser demand than comparable SUV segments, and last year led to even a poorer show by most cars of this body-type.
More importantly, back in August 2018, Maruti launched the mid-life facelift of the Ciaz, which commanded a pretty huge premium over the pre-facelift model. While most of this is justified owing to the advent of more features and bigger 1.5-litre petrol and diesel engines, the steep hike in the pricing seems to have disturbed the car’s value quotient to an extent.
Currently, the Maruti Ciaz is on sale in a price range of Rs 8.19-11.38 lakh. It’s being sold through the company’s NEXA retail chain and is available in four variants – Sigma, Delta, Zeta and Alpha. It is available in three engine options- 1.5-petrol, 1.5-diesel and 1.3-litre diesel. However, the production of the base diesel variant has been axed and it would be no longer available with the drying of the stock.
This has been done as the Fiat-origin 1248cc oil-burner can’t be updated to meet BSVI emission norms. This will also see the discontinuation of diesel variants of Swift, Baleno and Dzire. However, the 1.5-litre oil-burner of the Maruti Ciaz is a BSVI-ready unit that will be updated to achieve compliance with the stricter norms in the coming weeks. The company has already launched the 1.5-litre petrol variant in BSVI-compliant guise.