Woman Power

Like it said in the previous post, women have a bigger share of car buys over in the United States. But now women in other parts of the world are getting a bigger piece of the car pie!

Times in India
Shalini Sengupta,TNN

Kavya Madappa (29) was always fascinated by big machines and even learnt driving a jeep. Six months ago, when the entrepreneur bought a steel grey Hyundai Terracan, it was a dream come true. To personalize her car, she fitted broad tyres with stronger grip. "Nothing gives me more pleasure than cruising in my SUV," she says.

Call it women's emancipation, or economic mobility, women are driving automobile sales on their own force like never before. All those men labelling women as bad drivers be damned. For almost all car makers, women form a small but significant segment purchasing their wheels of desire and the numbers are climbing.

Big car segment players like Honda too are seeing a rapid growth in women buyers. "In 2005, women accounted for only 5% of our sales which shot up to 12% next year and this year it's almost 24%," said Jnaneshwar Sen, senior GM, Honda. With women increasingly becoming financially independent and disposable incomes soaring, the propensity to have more than one car in a family has risen sharply over the past two years.

Automobile companies are now shifting focus to this breed of young professional women through more direct advertisements and innovative EMI schemes. Hyundai Santro and Chevrolet Aveo featured Preity Zinta and Rani Mukerjee alongside Shah Rukh Khan and Saif Ali Khan — and not as damsels in distress, but women who controlled the wheels with equal chutzpah. The Tata Indica Xeta advertisement (which shows four young girls looking for some fun by the beach) helped double Xeta sales.

Earlier this year, Hyundai had announced options like low EMIs exclusively for women. General Motors hired women engineers and designers for their plants to help innovate and increase the number of women customers. Most car showrooms also have women as salespersons to cater to prospective women buyers.

Research shows that women buy differently from men. While men look for lines and accents of the exterior, women are more keen on the interiors. And while speed — how to boot from 0 to 60 km/sec — is a turn on for men, women are more concerned about getting past the truck that's blocking the way. When it comes to safety, men check for anti-lock brakes and responsive steering, while women ensure the car has passenger air-bags, reinforced side-panels and drop-down engine. While men rarely steer away from blacks, greys and reds, women are adventurous and dabble with purples, pinks, oranges, yellows, blues, greens and metallic tones.