Used luxury cars a big hit in India
new delhi — The demand for fancy foreign luxury cars is witnessing a steep rise, with buyers picking up Lamborghinis, Maseratis and Range Rovers that cost up to ₹15 million apiece — but all pre-owned.
Big Boy Toyz, based in Gurugram, Haryana, is one firm that specialises in selling pre-owned foreign luxury cars in India. It is perhaps the only one of its kind in the country that panders to the Indian buyers’ whim of owning a branded luxury car, but who are unable to cough up the price of a new one.
Jatin Ahuja, founder and managing director of Big Boy Toyz (BBT), hit upon the idea of selling preowned foreign brands in 2009, when he found that Indians preferred exchanging their used foreign car for a new one.
He started off initially in 2007 as Magus Cars, which would import new cars. But Ahuja found that most buyers wanted to exchange their used cars for new ones, which led to a range of used cars in his possession and he ended up with losses.
This led to the launch of Big Boy Toyz — and the focus on pre-owned exotic cars.
Ahuja, who focuses on pre-owned cars that cost between ₹5 million and ₹15 million and manages to sell at least one car a day, owns a showroom in Gurugram and a car studio in Sultanpur, New Delhi.
“I would like to focus more on cars in the bracket of ₹5 million to ₹15 million rather than the ₹15 million to ₹30 million segment [the super-luxury segment]. The volume of business in the first bracket is more than that in the ₹15 million-plus segment,” Ahuja said.
“I would like to do at least 75 per cent of my business in the ₹5 million to ₹15 million segment,” he added.
Big Boy Toyz gets orders for its exotic cars through its online portal, bigboytoyz.com. Ahuja says 30 per cent of his business — of buying and selling second-hand exotic cars — comes from Haryana, and the rest from across the country.
The company has a collection of 120 cars in both the showrooms — ranging from BMWs, Mercedes, Porsches to Land Rovers.
His company has already carved a niche for itself and Bollywood stars are among his clientele. The company aims for a sales target of ₹10 billion by 2020. “At the rate at which our business is growing, I find the target of ₹10 billion by 2020 absolutely achievable,” said Ahuja.
The company plans to open showrooms in other cities such as Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad, with demand pouring in from such cities, said Ahuja.
In 2016, Big Boy Toyz recorded
The November and December sales were a bit unstable due to demonetisation, but it picked up from January onwards Jatin Ahuja, founder and managing director of Big Boy Toyz
an annual growth of 40 per cent with a turnover of ₹1.95 billion, and aims to achieve a turnover of ₹2.5 billion to Rs2.6 billion this fiscal year, he said.
Every pre-owned car goes through 151 check points and parameters — such as age of the car, kilometres done, demand and its supply, maintenance — before BBT buys them.
The demonetisation move hit sales a bit, but things have since stabilised, said Ahuja. “The November and December sales were a bit unstable due to demonetisation, but it picked up from January onwards,” he said.
Ahuja feels that the Indian automotive industry has evolved a lot over the past decade and has huge scope. “The design of Indian cars is much better, but there is still room for improvement in terms of reliability,” he said, adding that through Big Boy Toyz he is attempting to change the negative perception among Indians of buying pre-owned cars.