Want to drive the Lamborghini that Batman drives in his latest movie flick, Dark Knight? Well, Gujarat’s rich and swanky would have to wait for 18 months to get one in their driveway. Such is the demand of the car, that the company will not be able to make any deliveries of the Aventador in the country this year, while it already has a booking for 30 cars. The Gellardo, on the other hand, has a five to six months waiting.
Italy’s super sports car brand Lamborghini on Sunday made an entry into the Gujarat market with a day-long sales event. The company has sold two to three cars in Gujarat earlier, but that was through its Delhi-based dealership. While it will not come up with a dealership here immediately, but has started with the familiarisation process to position its brand amongst Gujarat’s high networth individuals.
Pavan Shetty, head of operations, Lamborghini India, said, “We are serious about making our presence felt in the Gujarat market, as we see reasonable demand here. We have already received some serious enquiries. We plan to travel to Surat next to showcase our brand.”
The company has sold 14 cars in the country last year, and has set a target of adding around 10 more to that this year taking the number to 24 cars. It has two dealers in India so far, in Delhi and Mumbai, and is scouting for one more partner in south. The national capital region (NCR) accounts for almost 40 per cent of the company’s sales. India, however, has a long way to go before it catches up with China, where Lamborghini sells over 350 units per year.
Shetty said that Lamborghini had not seen a single cancellation after the additional 15 per cent customs duty was imposed on completely built units (CBUs) sometime back. “Segments like these do not usually see a drastic drop in sales. We have sold close to 1800 cars globally last year”, he added.
Lamborghini has offered its entire global range for its Indian customers. It has two family of cars, the Aventador and the Gellardo, which offer several models and specificationss. While the Gellardo range starts at Rs 3.3 crore and goes up to Rs 4.5 crore, the Aventador ranges between Rs 5.5 crore and Rs 6.5 crore in India, Shetty informed.
Apart from the minute customisations (the customer can even choose the colour of the stitch on his seatcovers), these super sports cars are real mean machines, with a twelve cylinder 6.5 litre engine the Aventador can touch a top speed of 350 kilometers per hour.
