Marketing review

Coke India's hot beverages model to go international
Coca-Cola has decided to take it hot beverages model to several other countries.

Coke India's marketing team is slated to help launch Georgia Gold in Bahrain and will support the test market and launch plans in Egypt and South Africa. Other places where Coke is planning to hold store trials for tea and coffee under the same model are Australia, the US, South Pacific Islands and Hong Kong among other countries.

Coke India entered the Indian tea and coffee market in 2002 with the launch of Georgia Gold, in partnership with McDonald's for selling beverages initially in Delhi and Mumbai. Today it claims to have developed India as a `Centre of Excellence' for this business. This is for the first time in the world that Coke has partnered with McDonald's.

After the hot beverage portfolio's success, the company entered the ice-tea and cold coffee market with its Georgia brand last year, again in association with McDonald's.

The model has proved a big success, with the company selling a million cases in 2004.

Besides tea and coffee, Coke's non-CSD (defence sales throught the Canteen Stores Department) portfolio also comprises powder soft drink concentrate Sunfill, bottled water Kinley and the fruit-based drink Maaza.

The non-CSD business accounts for only about 15 per cent of Coke's total business in the country at present but growing in double digits, unlike the CSD business.

Coca-Cola India loses Shripad Nadkarni, Sharda Agarwal
Coca Cola India's vice-president marketing, Shripad Nadkarni and director marketing, Sharda Agarwal have put in their papers and are said to be leaving to start a strategic marketing consultancy.

With Coke India for the past four years, Nadkarni has been associated with some memorable advertising campaigns including the thanda matlab Coca Cola campaign featuring Aamir Khan. Nadkarni will continue to be with the company to co-ordinate all the advertising and marketing campaigns for this summer.

Nadkarni is also credited with having successfully integrated this punch line with the five-rupee price point strategy Coca-Cola decided to promote over the last two years, again using Aamir Khan to convey this message to its consumers.

More Piramyd stores to open
Piramal Holdings (PHL), is planning to expand its in-house retail chain brand Piramyd Megastore, which currently has a presence in Mumbai.

Piramyd Megastore, will set up shop in Ludhiana and Ahmedabad by May and in Delhi by June this year. It will also put up two mega stores in Pune by October. Each Piramyd Megastore will be around 70,000-80,000 sq ft in size.

Other outlets such as the amusement brand Jamin, Piramyd Supermarket will also follow suit.

Crossroads, which houses other retail formats such as Piramyd Megastore, Piramyd Supermarket and Jamin, is the Piramal mall format.

The retail major has signed up 11 properties, of which, five will be launched in 2005, four in 2006, and two in 2007. The company is also eyeing five properties across Hyderabad, Gurgaon and Mumbai.

The company has also signed up with Singapore-based leading retail solutions provider JDA Software Group to develop merchandise management system based on consumer purchase history in last four years. This will be operational from October 2005.

Airlines adspend higher on TV than on print: AdEx
Domestic airlines spent more on television than any other media according to a report by AdEx India a division of TAM Media Research. Their spending rose from over Rs2 crore to about Rs6 crore in 2004, of which 96 per cent was spent by the state-owned Indian Airlines.

Spending on print advertising by airlines increased by a mere 7 per cent to Rs27.03 crore this year.

Deccan Aviation Pvt Ltd accounted for about 4 per cent of the total TV spending while the remaining 0.3 per cent was Jet Airways' share.

According to AdEx India, the increase in spends could be a result of the kind of action that was seen in the domestic aviation sector: entry of more players and competition on the price front, among others.

TRAI terms Tata Tele, Reliance, MTNL ads misleading
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has issued show-cause notice to Tata Teleservices, Reliance Infocomm and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam (MTNL), for `misleading' consumers by saying their fixed wireless phones are similar to mobiles.

This is on the basis of Tata Tele having positioned its fixed wireless phone, `Walky', as `Freedom of Mobility at Landline Rates', while Reliance calls such a service `Unlimited Cordless.' MTNL's Garuda fixed wireless is called `Mobile bhi landline bhi'. TRAI has given these service providers time till January 24 to reply to the show-cause notice.

TRAI said since the 'interconnect usage charges' (IUC) and the 'access deficit charge' (ADC) regimes treat calls from mobile and fixed lines differently, the operators need to advertise correctly what service they are offering. The regulator has said that if these service providers continued to claim the services as mobile telephony then it might have to charge the three operators the rates that are applicable for cellular operators.

BSNL, MTNL launch broadband service
State-owned telecom companies, Bharat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam (MTNL), have launched broadband services using their existing copper wire links.

BSNL's broadband service is branded Data One while MTNL calls its service Tri Band. The two companies have priced the services at competitive rates and hope that these will set the benchmark in the broadband market.

The service was launched simultaneously by BSNL in Chennai, Kolkata, Bangalore and Hyderabad and by MTNL in Mumbai and Delhi.

The two companies have adopted the latest ADSL 2+ (Asymmetrical Digital Subscriber Line) technology at very competitive rates and are targeting to rope in nine million subscribers by 2007 and 20 million by 2010.

BSNL is offering the service in 198 cities.

CNBC-TV 18 launches Hindi channel Awaaz
CNBC-TV 18 has launched its Hindi channel, Awaaz. Pitted as a consumer channel with mass appeal, Awaaz will focus on programmes related to personal finance, markets, careers, education and other such shows. It will be available on the Zee-Turner as well as Dish TV.

Apple unveils budget PC
After being a premium PC maker, Apple Computer has entered into the budget PC market by unveiling a very small computer for $499 onwards at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco.

The Mac Mini, which comes without a monitor, keyboard and mouse, has a 1.25 Giga Hertz G4 Processor, 256 MB RAM and a 40 gigabyte hard drive and a combo drive. A $599 variant comes with 1.42 Giga Hertz, 256 MB and a 80 gigabyte capacity. It also comes pre-loaded with Mac OS X (Panther) and iLife O5, the latest software for managing digital photo and music collections, editing movies and creating music.

Apple Computers also unveiled a sub-$100 digital music player, iPod Shuffle. Priced at $99, the stripped down version iPod Shuffle is based on shuffle feature, which randomly selects songs from the users music library or playlists. It has a 512 MB capacity and can store up to 120 songs. A $149 variant comes with one gigabyte capacity and stores 240 songs.

Toyota launches Corolla limited edition 2005
Toyota Kirloskar Motor (TKM) has launched a 2005 limited edition variant of the Corolla, India's most popular vehicle in the executive segment, which will be available in an additional dark red mica metallic colour. TKM is planning to sell 250 units of the 'Corolla Limited Edition 2005'.

All variants of the new Corolla will come with additional features like anti-locking braking system' (ABS), hood insulator and headlamp leveling switch.

Corolla sold 10,195 units from January to December 2004, a growth of 25 per cent over the previous year. Corolla has recorded the highest ever retail sales at 1,023 units in December 2004.

The 'J D Power Asia Pacific 2004 India APEAL study' recently ranked Toyota Corolla as the best quality car in premium mid-size segment. This result closely follows the results of J D Power Asia Pacific 2004 India Initial Quality Study where Toyota Corolla was ranked best quality car not only in the premium mid-size segment but also across all passenger car segments. It had also received the lowest ever problems per car which is the best ever recorded in the Indian automobile industry

— Compiled by Mohini Bhatnagar