For all the noise, how is Fiat really doing?

In my opinion too, Fiat is very serious and TASS takes it very seriously too. I have felt this from every interaction I had with the TASS and Fiat. What has gone wrong in my opinion are

1. They launched Linea with just an adequate diesel engine and the least desired petrol engine when compared to competition. They of course priced very well accordingly, but still people will judge the car as per the car.
2. Linea had its shares of niggles. This generated a lot of negative feedback on the already dead reputation.
3. Honda City came with a much more powerful engine and both products being new launches, people had to compare the two leaving Linea to be less desired on this performance front and probably on space too. To add further awes, Linea came with very short gear ratios, which is good in some ways, but quite different from other cars. And those who test drive Linea will obviously try to drive it as one of those other cars.

This is in spite of a lot of good reviews about Linea by megazines and also a lot of good feedbacks on the online forums from the owners of Linea. Hope things change for the good once they launch the powerful engines early next year. But it will never be easy for Fiat, because there are a lot of other players, both established and unestablished, trying to outdo each other. What I expect from now on is a lot of good products from many more manufacturers because of this competition. In my opinion, none of them is going to die out.

IMHO, marketing plays an important role. When I told some of my collegues at work that I had purchased a Punto - they were not sure of what car it was !

Fiat needs to do some aggressive advertising to make it more prominent to the indian masses.

Also, too much is being out of low quality of plastics and interiors. Agreed that the interiors are not top notch, but they're notthat horrible either. There were some minor niggles and problems I faced but they were all fixed by the service centre when I took my car to them - so I'm happy.

Agreed Shankar. The advertising has to be a little more aggressive. I feel the current ad campaign is sedate.

Naveen

Was going thorugh the Verna vs Linea comparo in earlier posts.

I took a friends Verna diesel on the NICE road (in Bangalore) and took her to 100 kph. I had taken my Punto on the NICE road several times earlier to a speed of around 100.

There was a sea of difference in the ride/handling of the Verna vs the Punto. The Punto is infinitely more stable and reassuring at higher speeds. The light pedals/steering of the Verna and shaking steering did not inspire much confidence in me. One has to drive both cars to feel the difference.

Not that I'm trying to bring down the Verna here - It's got a very powerful engine and good a.s.s - but I wouldn't buy one given it's high speed handling/ride characteristics.

@Shankar

Thats really interesting observation. TFS.

Yes as mentioned in above posts the gear ratio of the Fiat Linea is different. One has to get really used to it to enjoy the car fully.

Fiat has to really really brush up on the advertisement front! May be what they are thinking that mouth word publicity is the best and the most durable one ...but then in todays competition one has to get people hooked to the product even before they get to see it or feel it.

all said and done,what worries me and what is simply not digestible for me is the fact that

in my place there several RHINO-sonalika cars plying,while mine is the only fiat car(leave alone linea),new rhino cars are being bought every month here,all this without a single advt in papers or tv,without promos,etc and with no sales or service network.

so,no reputation is better than bad reputation,i beleive

and i wonder if even PAL- RIO will suddenly become successfull like rhino!??

As I said the best publicity is by mouth word, Rhino seems a very good VFM car. The reviews by mouthword must be very good so it is pushing up its sales.

Market dont go at the will of one of two person. Too many things needed to establish someone in the market which presently fiat is not capable of. Soon or late.. they are once again be out of the scence.. I am sad for them. Though it will help TATAs a great way. People going to see Punto and Linea and buying Vista and Indigo and Manza. Even in some TATA showrooms, Punto is not at display in the showroom. It is standing in the backyards of the showrooms. In Jaipur I went to see Punto in two TATA showrooms .. and Punto was missing. The dealer said they will call me back as soon as they get punto.. No call I received from them. On the other side.. I have also visited Chevy, Hyundai and Honda... and getting repeatedly calls from them to have a test drive. So thats the difference. Tata is firing the gun on others shoulders. Nothing bad in it.. everything is permissible in bussiness, war and LOVE ofcourse.

I think Maruti and Hyundai people. after buying their cars, felt that there is nothing special in the cars. So they start bashing Fiat cars, to make them satisfied with their buy.
I was participating in a forum about features about their cars, since they cant list out anything started pointing fingers to my list.
I didn't have any issue with A.S.S till now. I have Alto also, i had more problems with dealer in this case than Tata.

I agree Maruti and Hyundai has built their reputation and now milking cutomers.

Post edited to remove reference/url that was unwarranted for.