What is product line stretching?

What is product line stretching?

A company may lengthen its product line by stretching upwards or downwards or both. For eg. in the year 2008, TATA motors had launched their car price at Rs.1 lakh. Initially they had targeted the upper and middle class consumers for the models SUMO and Indica , the launch of NANO indicates downward stretching, where TATA extended its products to the lower class category of consumers. In the year 1983, Maruti Suzuki Limited had launched its first product Maruti 800, and in the year 1985, Maruti Gypsy which was costlier than Maruti 800 was launched. This is the case of upward stretching.