Nissan gets going with Datsun

With redi-Go, the company hopes to finally break into the fast-paced urban hatchback market

Next month, when the first redi-Go rolls out on to the streets, it will be Nissan’s third attempt to crack the most fiercely competitive segment of the Indian car market, the small car or the urban hatchback market. 

The company’s Datsun Go and Go+ ply in the same category, but have received a lukewarm response thus far and Nissan is hoping to get third time lucky.

It has put its might behind promoting the brand, spending a large sum on a marketing campaign that will break around the time of the launch next month.

However, its biggest challenge will be beating the giants Maruti and Hyundai in this category.

Expected to be priced at around Rs 2.5 lakh, redi-Go will go up against Maruti's Alto and Hyundai's Eon.

Nissan’s partner Renault’s Kwid, whose success redi-Go is hoping to emulate, also shares the same space.

Nissan says it is targeting first-time buyers, who are looking to migrate to cars from two-wheelers -- they account for over 30 per cent of car sales in the category.

Redi-Go is being pitched as a fusion between the compact car and the urban hatchback, the company calls it an ‘urban-cross’.

It has been developed using  the Kwid CMF-A platform, which  has a localisation level of around 98 per cent.

With redi-Go, Nissan hopes that it can finally move towards creating a separate network of outlets for the Datsun brand in India, which currently shares space with Nissan’s brands.

But given that the going has been slow with Datsun so far, does Nissan stand a chance?

Currently, Datsun has just three per cent share of the entry level segment, which accounts for 25 per cent of the total market. According to industry sources, 75 per cent of this market is dominated by Maruti and around 20 per cent by Hyundai.

In 2013, Nissan decided to use the Indian market -- the largest small car market by volumes in the world -- to revive Datsun, which was at the time, a comatose brand.

It launched Go and then in 2015, Go+.

Neither managed to crack the category; experts believe it could be a combination of reasons, price, design and of course, the overwhelming presence of Maruti.

The company, however, believes that it did not do enough for brand awareness, a mistake, it wants to rectify. Guillaume Sicard, president, Nissan India Operations says that Datsun is still a baby brand in India.

The brand was relaunched around the same time in three countries including India, Indonesia and Russia and later South Africa.

In every country, except India, the brand had a legacy it could fall back on. “Launching Datsun in India was the biggest challenge.

With the right strategy, we will see benefits in the next 5-10 years,” said Sicard. He believes that the key to success here is providing ample value for the right price.

The company has 40,000 customers in India but it is looking at raising the numbers by going deeper into the hinterland with its sales and service centres as well as spreading awareness about the brand in urban and semi-urban cities across the country.

Market leader Maruti has around 1,800 sales and service points as compared to Nissan’s 217.

Currently Datsun shares Nissan's outlets, but it is looking at going beyond tier II markets through experimental Datsun points. In the coming years, Datsun will have its own network of sales and service centres.

“Datsun needs to be nurtured within the family for the next 2-3 years since it is a baby. We are already working on a five year plan, which is to split the brand,” says Sicard.

The ideal model would be to have showrooms with separate entrances for the two brands with a common back-office. For this to work, however, sales volumes have to go up which Nissan hopes to generate in the next few years.

The aim is to get five per cent of market share for both Nissan and Datsun brands together by 2020.

The campaign to be launched next month will position redi-Go as a car meant for the young, tapping into the generation’s fascination with travel and freedom.

The car beats the rest in terms of space, ground clearance, fuel consumption, maintenance cost and safesays Sicard and the ads will drive home these benefits.

Photographs: Kind courtesy, Datsun.