Exit Pareek, enter R S Kalsi: Maruti appoints veteran as new sales & marketing head

In choosing R S Kalsi as the successor to Mayank Pareek, Maruti Suzuki India has shown its preference for a veteran who has been with the company almost since its inception and who has performed varied roles including working on the shop floor. Kalsi will now be Executive Director for Sales and Marketing functions for Maruti’s domestic business even as Shashank Srivastava continues to head the international marketing function. Shrivastava was the only other contender for this coveted post in Maruti.

Besides being a Maruti veteran, Kalsi also has a close association with sales since he was heading national sales for the company till 2011 and is believed to be closely associated with Maruti’s vast dealer network. This skill would come in handy in his new assignment. Kalsi has served in various roles such as Vendor Development, Supply Chain, Parts Inspection and Engineering. He has earlier lead Maruti’s foray into new businesses like Maruti True Value, Maruti Insurance, Maruti Driving Schools and Maruti Finance.

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Kalsi comes in after Pareek’s shock resignation last week, which could not have come at a more inappropriate time for Maruti. For one, it comes bang in the middle of the festival season when car sales are at their peak and marketing acumen is the need of the hour in an otherwise dull market. Then, Pareek called it quits just after showcasing Maruti’s latest big car, the Ciaz, which is expected to go on sale just before Dussehra. Ciaz’s marketing and distribution strategies were Pareek’s handiwork till now.

There have been some internal murmurs within Maruti about rising sales expenses for cars - which means high discounts even when retail offtake had improved quite a bit in recent months. Though average discount per vehicle has been reduced from Rs 24,000 in June to Rs 16,000 in September, people say this is too much expense to push car sales.

But this could hardly have lead Pareek to leave a job where he was otherwise largely successful. Pareek was the man behind Maruti’s immense success in rural markets and also in devising targeted sales programmes based on professionals like doctors, teachers etc.

He is widely expected to head the passenger car business of beleagured Tata Motors. But can Pareek change the fortunes of Tata Motors, a company which has been suffering due to lack of new products and a distribution network which is in a shambles? Tata Motors does have the Zest to rev up its domestic passenger car business now and Bolt will follow in a few months.

Will Pareek, famous for reading the customers’ pulse and working non-stop even during prolonged industry slowdowns to get customers back to Maruti showrooms, be able to now entice customers towards the Tata stable?