BharatBenz celebrated its first ‘kilometre millionaire’ – a 2523R heavy-duty truck clocking 10 lakh kilometer odo mileage with original engine and transmission – with a campaign trail “BharatKaBenz” Yatra spanning 10,000 kms over 36 days across the country. The tour engaged truck drivers and fleet owners along the way to drive home the brand’s promise of unmatched reliability and wondrous pride in owning a ‘Benz’ tailor-made for India.
Motorindians Dhiyanesh Ravichandran, Sarada Vishnubhatla, and N. Balasubramanian, who took part in the yatra, report their takeaways.
Early this decade, when Daimler AG scripted its plans to extend its lead in the global heavy-duty truck market by 2020, it turned towards the developing world to achieve the results. Hence came the DICV and its moniker ‘BharatBenz’ – a brand-new subsidiary that can play a key role in truck giant’s global sales figures, by tapping the emerging demand in the Indian market. Six years on since the debut, the brand has more than 75,000 trucks on Indian roads to its credit, along with a vibrant sales and service network of over 150 touch points – a formidable feat in one of the most competitive truck markets.
Lately, the Indian subsidiary has reached another milestone that adds quite a significance to its growth story. The first BharatBenz customer vehicle has distinctly accumulated 10 lakh kilometer in its odometer readings, remarkably with no history of any major repairs or overhauls to their factory-installed engine and transmission systems. The first BharatBenz ‘kilometre millionaire’ is a 25-ton, 6×2 rigid hauler that runs in the fleet of JSS Logistics in Nagpur (MH) for long-haulage of parcels between Nagpur and Salem (TN). It was accompanied by another customer vehicle which will be one of the next to hit the high mileage mark – a 12-ton medium-duty truck belonging to M/s Adyar Ananda Bhavan of Chennai.
Well, accomplishing 10 lakh kilometers, that too in just five years without any major repairs, is perhaps exceptional in Indian trucking scenario. BharatBenz wanted to share this success story with our trucking folks, and hence embarked on a 10,000 km pan-India tour with the invincible trucks to showcase the hallmark of its product reliability. The “BharatKaBenz” Yatra commenced at Jaipur in the last week of September, traversed through a carefully set route taking the shape of the letters B,E,N,Z on the map, to reach the final destination of DICV’s Oragadam plant in the outskirts of Chennai by November 1.
The yatra’s convoy also included the brand-new iterations of the kilometre millionaires – a MD 1414R and 3123R HD trucks – along with a peppy event management team. Throughout the tour, the convoy cut through 32 cities, 28 transport nagars, and 41 highway dhabas, engaging some 5000 plus audience including drivers, fleet owners, mechanics, and other influencers of the trucking industry through interactive games, discussions, and glance at the trucks. As part of one of the side-line activities during the yatra, BharatBenz broke the existing largest graffiti wall record of 7,500 sq.ft. in the LIMCA Book of Records by creating a new record of 10,200 sq. ft. wall! The team along with more than 3,000 participants, which included drivers, helpers, mechanics, fleet owners and individual owners, worked together for over 38 days towards completing the 1,700 ft. x 6 ft. wall (10,200 sq. ft.).
Besides the yatra, the campaign also included advertisements, videos and radio snippets spread over 3 months, with hashtag #BharatKaBenz and “Pride of Ownership” as the essential theme. The theme nostalgically cashed on the pride and honour associated with the ‘three-pointed star’ brand in India, especially in the collective psyche of Indian motoring. The Benz marque is identified as synonymous to classy and posh automobiles, offering cutting-edge technology and superior reliability. They are seen as a league above the ordinary.
By showcasing the kilometre millionaire trucks and the impressive reliability and lower TCO they promise, the campaign reiterated the claim that BharatBenz brand is the ‘Benz’ conceived for India, addressing the local truck market’s unique expectations and challenges. In other words, the ‘BharatKaBenz’ yatra demonstrated to the trucking communities that BharatBenz is the ‘right’ truck for the Indian market to hold on to, summed up on the same lines as the slogan of Mercedes-Benz marque – “Trucks you can Trust”!