Mumbai: Bookings for Tata Motors' Nano got off to a brisk start in Mumbai on Thursday, with a steady stream of prospective customers queuing up to be one of the first to own what is billed as the world's cheapest car.
The profile of customers was varied from first-time buyers to those already owning more than two cars.
Their reasons for buying also varied: curiosity value, love of cars, affordability and ease of manoeuvrability on India's crowded roads.
In some cases children were looking to buy the car for their elderly parents, some of whom had never owned a car before.
But they couldn't actually drive away on Thursday. Rather, they were putting in an application to be among the first 100,000 owners, an order block that is expected to take more than a year to fill.
Sixty-three year-old Vijay Jadav, a retired government employee, wants to buy a Nano to add to the Tata Indigo sedan he already owns.
"It's cheap, it's small and it's good for short journeys for a small family like ours," said the head of the family of four from Alibaug, about 150 kilometres south of Mumbai.
Elavia H M, 67, has never owned a car before and wants to buy the Nano for her son, who commutes to work in a taxi now.
"It is so cheap and it looks comfortable," she said. The Nano, at 3.09 metres in length, is smaller than the Maruti 800 but is 21 per cent more spacious. It gets 23.6 kilometres to a litre of fuel, and its small turning radius of just 4 metres makes it easy to handle, especially in small parking lots and on narrow roads.
"I have experienced other foreign small cars, they are expensive to maintain and consume a lot of fuel. But look at Nano's mileage and we know Tata cars are cheaper on maintenance," said Denis Quadros, 42, who owns a Maruti Wagon R.
This year and next will see a host of small cars being launched in India, starting with Honda's Jazz later this year and General Motors small compact car, scheduled to be launched towards the middle of the year.
Volkswagen, Ford and Skoda are also planning to launch small cars for the Indian market starting in 2010.
Shares in Tata Motors were trading up 1.6 per cent, having earlier hit their highest in almost six months.
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