Mercedes-Benz’s Santosh Iyer on how the Indian luxury consumer has evolved

In a conversation with Storyboard18’s Delshad Irani, Santosh Iyer, Managing Director and CEO, Mercedes-Benz India, said that the marquee German automaker is moving away from discount-led sales and towards experience-led marketing.

"In the past, festive campaigns used to be a lot about discounts. Now, even if Diwali is on November 11th, customers are already booking the cars in advance as they know it takes around two months to get a car from the time of booking," Iyer explained.

Iyer said that the company wanted to make the festive season more memorable for its customers, hence it is coming up with an experience with MS Dhoni, where 50-100 customers who buy a car during the festive period will get a chance to experience an exclusive evening in the Himalayas with the cricketer, and converse with him on cars, cricket, et al.

Iyer believes that more Indians will shift towards luxury cars because of low EMIs. Also, the company is planning to reduce the minimum down payment to Rs 10 lakh. “Customers can just pay Rs 60,000 a month and can get into the luxury segment,” he says.

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