This is the fifth time in current year the company has raised vehicle prices. PHOTO: FILE
It is for the fifth time in the current year Suzuki has increased prices of its cars. However, the company did not raise the price of Mehran, Ravi and Bolan, whose sales have gone down recently.
WagonR VXR variant will now be sold for Rs1,184,000 and its VXL variant will be sold for Rs1,274,000. Swift DLX and AT will be sold for Rs1,515,000 and Rs1,651,000 respectively.
Cultus VXR, VXL and AGS will now be sold for Rs1,380,000, Rs1,501,000 and Rs1,608,000 respectively.
“The price of Suzuki cars has been jacked up by 2.5-3.5%,” JS Research analyst Ahmed Lakhani told The Express Tribune. “The overall price of Swift has been raised by 9-10% so far in 2018 in the aftermath of several rounds of rupee depreciation since December last year.”
Pak Suzuki's Wagon-R now costs Rs1.194m
Meanwhile, prices of WagonR have gone up by 12-16% during the year.
On the other hand, prices of Mehran, Bolan and Ravi have been increased by 15%, 11% and 9% respectively during the year. Sales of the three price-sensitive — low-priced - cars dropped 23%, 21% and 34% respectively during the July-September quarter this year.
Lakhani added that the decline in sales of Mehran was anticipated because the company had planned to phase it out next year and therefore it was adjusting the production accordingly.
Pak Suzuki’s three-month profit plunges 43%
He added that United Motors and Master Motors were now gearing up to tap the low-priced segment that had previously been dominated by Pak Suzuki.
The rupee has weakened by nearly 26% against the dollar since December 2017. Since then, all auto companies have increased their car prices multiple times in order to pass the impact of increased cost on to consumers.
Roughly, cars manufactured in Pakistan have around 50% of their CKDs imported from abroad for which the companies pay in dollars, therefore, the cost of procurement rises as the rupee falls.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 1st, 2018.
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