Marketing review
26 May 2005
Bose
India launches new music system
Bose Corporation
India has launched a `Bose Wave' music system priced at Rs29,900 —
the lowest-priced system in its portfolio in India. The company is also
looking at introducing more models within the Rs30,000-Rs60,000-price range
over the next six months.
The company says it is not reducing the price of its systems, but providing a world-class system at a great price.
In India, Bose owns nine exclusive stores and plans to add two more over the next six months.
German haircare brand C:EHKO's products to hit retail shelves
German haircare brand C:EHKO's from Gebr Ewald GmbH, which were available
only at salons until now, will soon hit retail shelves.
C:EHKO's products were test marketed in India in 2002 and the products were tailored to suit the Indian after the company received market feedback.
C:EHKO's is the fourth international haircare brand to enter the Indian market, after L'Oriel, Schwarzkopf and Wella. The Rs215-crore hair care market is growing at the rate of 15 to 20 per cent per annum.
Planet
Hollywood restaurant chain to set up first outlet in Mumbai
Said to be
the world's most famous theme restaurant, restaurant chain Planet Hollywood
International has signed a master franchisee agreement with Arch Millennium
Corporation to develop five Planet Hollywood restaurants in India.
The first restaurant is slated to come up in Mumbai early next year.
Planet Hollywood's promoters include Hollywood stars such as Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Demi Moore.
Planet Hollywood will invest about $15 million to set up the five restaurants by 2010. The chain will open one restaurant each in Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Goa and Hyderabad and plans to bring Hollywood stars like Bruce Willis and Sylvester Stallone to India.
The restaurants has a number of dishes named after Hollywood stars and some of the unique dishes that will be on offer at Planet Hollywood outlets include `Chicken Crunch', based on Demi Moore's recipe and `Banana Strudle', based on Arnold Schwarzenegger's mother's recipe. Planet Hollywood will also display and sell Hollywood movie merchandise.
Planet Hollywood restaurants have memorabilia from old and new Hollywood movies. The interior decor reflects various movie genres, including action, horror and Sci-Fi and the audio-visual system plays the latest movie trailers, clips, music videos and celebrity visits.
Dabur
launches mango drink with a `twist'
Dabur Foods
is planning to launch a new mango drink, Mango Twist, a new sub-brand in
its Real portfolio. Mango Twist comes in two variants — mango-orange
and mango-papaya — so that consumers can perceive the value addition
to the drink.
According to the company, the launch marked its entry into the Rs1,200-crore fruit drinks market. The company's Real line has so far contained only juices and nectars, a Rs200-crore category. Juices contain over 85 per cent of fruit pulp while nectars contain between 20 and 40 per cent. Drinks contain up to 10 per cent pulp.
Twist is available in a 200ml-pack priced at Rs10 and a one-litre pack for Rs50. The size of the mango drink category is estimated at Rs800 crore, making this the most popular taste.
Real has a 60 per cent market share of the Rs 200-crore market.
Fashion
Extravaganza at Shoppers' Stop — Buzz
A fashion
rendezvous "BUZZ", held in Shoppers' Stop recently saw top designers
Suneet Varma and JJ Vallaya coming together to present their collections
at Shoppers' Stop. This was followed by an open discussion on various elements
of fashion, especially prêt fashion, the future of prêt in India
vis-à-vis global fashion trends and the specifics for the current
and the upcoming season.
Suneet
Varma the couture king known for his dramatic bridal trousseau collections;
presented his prêt label, Le Spice. "The essence of my collection
is in the spirit of a woman, who is sassy and spicy. The fabrics used in
the separates comprising of blouses, skirts and trousers are in all the
hot colours and are embellished with elegant embroidery," said Varma
speaking about his collection available at Shoppers' Stop.
JJ Vallaya presented his the future of the past collection, which is a fusion
of contemporary and classics, based on the philosophy of modern royalty.
The Studio Vallaya line conjures up images of Indian royalty treated in
a contemporary individual style. His line has a simple yet sophisticated
look and is for women who believe in timeless yet contemporary elegance.
"My passion for colour, fabric and surface ornamentation is reflected
in every piece I have created to dress the today's individual," said
Vallaya speaking about the essence of his collection.
BUZZ houses the latest collection of top designers such as Anshu Arora Sen, Ashish and Smita Soni, J.J. Vallaya, Priyadarshini Rao, Raghavendra Rathore, Rocky S, Rohit Bal, Shantanu & Nikhil, Suneet Varma and Rajesh Pratap Singh.
The price tags on the garments at BUZZ starts at Rs795 for women's wear and for men's wear at Rs1,295.
Maruti
launches Swift
Maruti Udyog
has launched its premium compact car Suzuki Swift priced at a starting price
point of Rs 3.87 lakh.
The Swift, which has a 1.3-litre engine, will be available in three variants with the most expensive and fully loaded variant priced at Rs 4.85 lakh.
While the base model is equipped with power steering and manual air conditioning, the most expensive model will have powered windows, automatic air-conditioning and air bags.
The company received 9,000 bookings for the Swift even before the announcement of the pricing.
According to company officials, Maruti initially plans to make 200 units of the Swift per day on a double shift basis. This would translate to about 5,000 cars a month.
Suzuki Motor Corporation had last year said it would make 2,50,000 units of the Swift per annum in four countries (including India) beginning this year.
SriLankan
launches attractive offers for frequent flyers
Srilankan
Airlines is offering its frequent flyers an economy-class return ticket
worth Rs 15,000 plus 5,000 miles to any of the three cities in Europe.
According to a press statement from the airline its offer is open for any of the following points in India - New Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Tiruchi, Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi and Kozhikode - to London, Paris and Frankfurt.
Members can also nominate any number of persons for this offer, so long as they have sufficient miles in their accounts.
Apart from this, the 'Skywards' frequent flyer members travelling to the Gulf can redeem double miles for travelling between Abu Dhabi and Bahrain or Doha till May 31, 2005. This applies for travel in economy as well as business classes.
John
Abraham is new brand ambassador for Yamaha
Yamaha Motors
India has signed up actor John Abraham as its brand ambassador for two years.
Yamaha Motors is also launching a slew of new models over the next few months having recently launched two models, Crux S and Libero LX.
The company says that it has found a celebrity in John, who truly fits in with Yamaha's brand image.
Cadbury
expands its presence in mouth fresheners with Clorets Bilkul
Cadbury India is looking at expanding its recently launched Clorets
Bilkul brand into more formats in the mouth freshener category. At present,
Clorets Bilkul (Rs2 for 5.4gm), a saunf- flavoured mini chewing gum
is available in the market, marking Cadbury's foray into the chewing gum
category.
Clorets, positioned on the mouth freshener platform, has been localised with an Indian name, Bilkul.
To cash in on the Indian habit of chewing mouth fresheners, especially after meals, Cadbury had introduced the saunf flavour to replace the traditional mouth freshener. This is not the first time that small mouth freshener-based gum pellets with an ethnic flavour have been launched in the Indian market. Dalmia Consumer Care has its Chabaaza brand, a tobacco-free pan-flavoured gum pellet.
Cadbury continues to extend its presence in pan kiosks and other small outlets, having tapped into the traditional big outlets.
The confectionery segment holds a big challenge for the chocolate major, in terms of distribution and reach.
Gillette
India looks at the mass market with VectorPlus
Gillette
India is looking at catering to the mass market with its brand VectorPlus
over the next few years.
At present the company has a user base of roughly 20 million and is planning to upgrade its own manufacturing set-up to meet increased consumer demand as well as scale down dependence on marketing of imported products.
VectorPlus is now a critical element in the company's current product portfolio, others being Mach3 and Mach3 Turbo. Gillette