2024 Acko Drive Awards: Maruti Suzuki Wins PR & Comm. Team of the Year

Maruti Suzuki won the top awards at our Communications Jury meet by bagging the 2024 Acko Drive Awards' PR & Communications Team of the Year (Car). Maruti Suzuki tackled a big problem regarding their image in a very effective way, winning the hearts of the jurors and the consumers. 

The Indian marque had a brand perception of being a small car manufacturer, with a focus on the masses and a stronghold in rural India and Maruti Suzuki wanted to change that. To address this, Maruti Suzuki launched four SUVs (Brezza, Grand Vitara, Fronx and Jimny) over a span of one year which helped it gain popularity in the SUV segment. To further its agenda of improving its image, Maruti Suzuki went out all guns blazing by having multiple media interactions, media drives at unique locations and showcasing the demand for Maruti Suzuki’s models in the international market. 

(Also Read: Acko Drive TOTM '24: Maruti Suzuki Jimny Is Offroader Of The Year)

The TOTMs is a unique award in the automobile industry as it is the only one to have a category dedicated to communications and marketing campaigns by OEMs. The objective of this category is to ascertain the best PR & Communications team which established a problem that they set to change through PR activities. Furthermore, the intent of the category is clear – the campaign should not be confused with marketing activities unless the PR team leads the initiative. This category saw seven participants in total, and of which, Maruti Suzuki trumped everyone else. 

A noteworthy mention to Volkswagen India’s PR & Communications team for being the runner-up in this category. The German marque wanted to establish the safety and build quality of its products in India and tackled this challenge with a four-pronged approach.