I have been
writing about Vitara Brezza since its launch and wanted to see it in flesh, but
till yesterday I had been unlucky in seeing one on the road.
Yesterday
evening I was on my daily walk, enjoying the cool breez,when suddenly a red car
passed me by , it looked like Brezza , but I was not sure since the road was
dark at that spot, and the driver drove past me at good speed.
The only
impression I could make of the car in those few minutes was that it didn’t look
big, in fact it just looked like any other hatchback on the road, this confused
me more, was it really the much hyped compact SUV from Maruti which was such a
runaway hit that
it had dethroned the much capable segment leader Ford
EcoSport?
Well the
confusion was soon to end , as just half a km ahead I saw the same car parked
by the side of the road. It was again in a dark spot but now since it was still,
I could see it much better. The best part was that a Ford EcoSport too was
parked behind it, so I could compare the looks of them both.
The car was
brand new, still had the plastic cover on the seats.Color was nice dark red…looked
much dark… like wine red due to the low light. The roof was black and the
combination of red roof and black roof looked really good.
I came
slowly from the rear towards the front and took my time to let the design sink
in, from the point of view of a prospective buyer.
The rear didn’t
look distinctive , very hatch like. The boot didn’t look very big, I don’t know
if it would hold enough luggage for a long holiday for a family of four.
As I came
towards the side, the thing that impressed me was the high ground clearance,
and large wheels, but the car didn’t look very high, the stance was not very
SUV like. To tell the truth I was not very impressed and kept looking at the
EcoSport standing behind Brezza just to see if it really was a better looker
than the old leader.
I waited
there for few minutes looking at the side profile , and thinking if it was
really worth so much money when it looked just like any other hatch?
Btw …I had seen
quite a few Hyundai Creta, another rival of Brezza, and it looked very good….much
bigger and SUV like. At that moment
while looking at Brezza I mentally compared the image of two cars and I would
have immediately paid much higher price and bought Creta.
But there
has to be some design element which immediately catches eyes of the prospective
buyers when they walk into the showroom, which makes them buy that particular
car over others. As I moved towards the front of Brezza, I saw what had clicked
for Brezza in such a big way that it had months long waiting list, it was the
awsm front…the grill, the head lights, the fogs, the bonnet…all had that macho
look of a big SUV…which makes you fall in love with Brezza instantly.
It was at
this moment, when I looked at EcoSport, I knew the reason why it had lost its
number one position…it just looked too old when standing next to Vitara Brezza.
And to tell the truth Brezza’s front end looked better than Creta’s, which was
stylish but did not have that burly look which is so much more more SUV like. So even with bigger dimensions
than Brezza, Creta may loose out to that muscular front end of Brezza.
Brezza looked like a car which would be comfortable in the city, also good for occasional highway runs, but with its compact dimensions it surely didn't look like a mile muncher to me. ...Alok
