Mahindra XUV700 clocked record-breaking sales in October. We explain how

The XUV700 is the flagship model of the country’s largest SUV manufacturer, Mahindra & Mahindra. It garnered its highest-ever monthly wholesales at 10,435 units in October. This is also the first time that the XUV700 crossed monthly volumes of 10,000 units.
For an SUV priced between Rs 13.99 lakh and Rs 25.14 lakh (ex-showroom) to cross 10,000 units in monthly volumes is a significant achievement keeping in mind that relatively affordable models are the volume churners in the Indian car market.
Two major steps by Mahindra helped the XUV700 reach handsome volumes in October. The first was the launch of the mid-spec AX5 Select variant at a starting price of Rs 16.89 lakh (ex-showroom) in May. The second was the price cut of over Rs 2 lakh announced by the carmaker for the top-spec AX7 and AX7 L variants in July.
Following are the monthly volumes garnered by the Mahindra XUV700 since May.
As is evident, there was a gradual rise in volumes month after month.
During the post-Q2 results earnings call on November 7, Mahindra’s Executive Director and CEO, Auto and Farm Sector, Rajesh Jejurikar said: “When we took the decision we had said that we have seen benefits on commodities, but more importantly on the market-driven pricing of chips that we were buying earlier which had pushed costs up quite significantly in the shortage era. So, we were in a situation when we took this call, and that is where we started flagging this off from February onwards, that we did feel that we have to make the brand more accessible. Making the brand more accessible we did in two steps.”
He pointed out that the first one was to launch the AX5 Select, which kind of got into the Rs 17-odd lakh kind of price point. “But we knew that is not going to be enough, and it would need a second stage of actually making the attractive part of our portfolio very accessible, which was the two top-end versions, which are the AX7 and AX7 L,” he added.
Jejurikar noted that the AX7 and AX7 L variants were always about 75% of the mix, which had come down to about 50% of the mix. “So, when we took this decision, it was a combination of costs having come down. We expected that if you make the top two versions very accessible in price, the mix will go up and the total volume will go up, and all of this happened,” he explained.
So basically, the total volume went up from an average of about 6,000 to 8,500 units, and of course, in the festival season, it boomed way beyond that number or our imagination, Jejurikar said, adding that the mix has gone up back to the top two versions about 70-75%.
“So, the mix has gone up, the total volume has gone up, and actually, the top two versions are back on the waiting list,” he observed.