Hype or not, Kia Motors’ latest offering Sonet SUV has stirred up the small SUV segment in India. And it is more evident now with the Kia Sonet’s October sales figures that has catapulted it to the list of 10 top-selling cars in India last month.
October was the first full calendar month of sales for Sonet SUV. After recording 9,266 unit sales in the month of launch, Sonet has crossed five figure sales mark only in its second month. Clocking an impressive 25 per cent jump in month-on-month sales, Kia’s third offering in India clocked 11,721 units in October.
However, the impressive performance was only as good as just breaking into the list of 10 top-selling cars in India. Despite a five figure sales mark, Sonet SUV ended up being at the bottom of the list, just below its rival Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza which also made it to the 10 top-selling cars last month.
The honour of the top-selling car in India remains with Maruti Suzuki’s premium hatchback Swift, which held its number one position with a growth of nearly 10 per cent against its sales figures in September. Maruti sold 24,859 units of Swift, recording a growth of more than 28 per cent compared to October last year.
In fact, all five top-selling cars in India in September were from Maruti stable, and all of them have held their positions strongly. Besides Swift, the other four models that feature in top four are Maruti Baleno, Maruti Wagon R, Maruti Alto and Maruti Dzire. Among the other four, only Maruti Alto witnessed a marginal drop of about 2 per cent in month-on-month sales figure. At number four, Maruti’s sub 4-metre sedan Dzire managed to improve its sales figures in September, but recorded a drop of nearly 10 per cent compared to October last year.
At number six, Hyundai’s flagship SUV Creta has consolidated its position as the best-selling SUV in India. Creta recorded more than 14,000 unit sales in October, up by more than 13 per cent since September and an astounding 92 per cent growth compared to October last year. In fact, Creta recorded the biggest year-on-year growth among the 10 top-selling cars last month, thanks mostly to the new generation of the SUV launched earlier this year.
Breathing down Creta’s neck is another Hyundai model – the Grand i10/NIOS. The premium hatchback also breached the 14,000 monthly sales figure in October.
Maruti’s Eeco is the only van in the list of 10 top-selling cars in October. However, Maruti Eeco has dropped one place below the Hyundai Grand i10 despite an 18 per cent jump in monthly sales since September.
Among surprise omission in last month’s top 10 list is Maruti Ertiga. In September, Ertiga was placed at number nine with 9,982 units sold. However, it lost its place to Maruti’s popular subcompact SUV Brezza as well as Kia Sonet.
In coming days, the race to the top promises to get more exciting as two new models are set to shake up things a little bit. The new Hyundai i20 and the Nissan Magnite SUV will enter fray and are expected to garner substantial attention.
