Ambassador : Marketing Myopia

Brand : Ambassador
Company : Hindustan Motors
Agency : Mudra/ Equus
Brand Analysis Count : 326

Ambassador can be called as the first Indian car. Although the car has a

British legacy, it is considered as definitive Indian

car. Ambassador was born in 1958. The car owes its design and technology to a
British car model - Morris Oxford which was built by Morris Motor Co at Oxford
UK. Hindustan Motors launched the Indianised version of Morris Oxford as
Ambassador in 1958.

From 1958 to 1980's Ambassador ruled the Indian market. Infact there were only
two cars in the Indian market - Premier Padmini and Ambassador. The licence
raj, lack of capital and the unfriendly Indian economic policies ensured that no
automobile manufacturers entered the Indian market.

1983 saw the emergence of a new era in the Indian car market. Maruti Udyog Ltd
launched the Maruti 800. Soon Ambassador lost its leadership position to
Maruti. The family segment which is the largest segment in the car market
embraced Maruti. Ambassador was reduced to a marginal player within no time.

But Ambassador had some advantages over 800 which made it dearer to certain
segments. It was the only Indian car with Diesel option. During those times, there
was a significant difference in the prices between Diesel and Petrol. Second
advantage was the space and sturdiness of the Amby. These two factors enabled
the brand to become popular among big families and more importantly among
the Taxi and tour operators.

Amby was perceived to be a sturdy car ideal for Indian roads. The brand also had
a positive perception of being less expensive to maintain. These two were only
perceptions . Infact Ambassador was expensive to maintain and even though the
car looked sturdy and well built, the car lacked the quality and refinement.
Rattling sounds and rusting was common complaints .
But consumers bought the car because of the significant economy of diesel cars
which made consumers to compromise on other parameters.

Another significant market for Ambassador was the Government. Over 16 % of

the brand sales came from the Government. Ambassador was the first choice for
most bureaucrats . Ambassador used to be the Prime Minister's car till 2002.
That status was lost when the PM of that time Mr Atal Bihari Vajpai replaced
Ambassador with a BMW Limo.

Soon the officials also lost interest in the brand. With the emergence of new and
better models from other auto-makers, there was a significant drop in the orders
from the Government.
The fall of Ambassador from a leadership position to a marginal player is a classic
case of marketing myopia. For four decades, the brand has been taking its
customers for granted. There are many reasons that can be attributed to this
brand's failure. The fundamental issue was with the product and price.
If we look at the product, Ambassador never changed with times. The brand
made many cosmetic changes from 1958-2000 and three upgrades was made
which was named as Mark II, Mark III and Mark IV . There was no significant
value addition between these upgrades. The look and the built quality remained
the same. A major change happened when the brand introduced a 1800 Isuzu
engine. The Amby with Isuzu again lifted the sales of the brand. But the euphoria
was short lived.
The apathy of HM to offer product changes in tune with the times made the
brand stale. Second factor that failed Amby was the price. HM never bothered to
rationalize the price of the brand. Even now Ambassador costs more than Rs
4,80,000. At that price one could afford a more luxurious Indigo sedan.
According to reports, the HM plant had achieved full depreciation in 2000. But
the company did not thought of passing on the reduced cost to the consumer.
Had the company rationalised the price of Amby in 2000, the brand could have
survived the competition.
The nail in the coffin came with the launch of Indica. Indica took away the taxi
car market from Ambassador. Again the diesel loving individual consumers had a
better affordable modern car as compared to the ageing Ambassador.
In order to lift the sagging sales of the brand, HM launched a radically designed
Ambassador variant Avigo in 2004. Although the styling was radical, the
customer response was lukewarm.
Indian consumer is now spoilt with choices. The competition is immense and the
quality of cars has also gone up. Consumers now have new set of purchase
considerations like quality, brand, drivability, luxury ,cost of maintanence etc
In the value proposition domain, Ambassador is never in the radar of the
consumers. The narrowing price difference between petrol and diesel also eroded
the value in investing in an old dated Ambassador.
The company also has never invested in the brand. Without investing in either
brand or product, HM had sealed the fate of this brand .
The question that arise is could a brand like Ambassador maintain its position
Indian market despite all the competition?
In the brand management perspective, its suicidal not to continuosly invest in a
brand .Often heritage brands wait till it becomes dated. Once the brand becomes
dated, its virtually impossible to rejuvenate the brand. The task is to prevent the
brand to become dated. For that the brand has to go to the consumer for ideas.
Changes in product or promotions can sustain the brand even in the light of
emerging competition. Brands like Lux , lifebuoy, Surf has been successful
because of continuous investment in branding and product development.
Ambassador should have learned from Maruti 800. The brand is still surviving
because it made changes along with the changing consumer values. Also the
brand rationalised its price in the light of emerging competition which made
Maruti 800 relevant even in the current market.
I am not saying that Amby had the potential to become an Iconic brand like
Volkswagen Beetle. But the brand could have been relevant to Indian market as a
basic family car. It is a herculean task to bring Ambassador back to life. A price
below the price of Indica is the only option for the brand to keep its fortunes
alive.

Labels: automobile brands, failed brands, Heritage Brand, marketing myopia

Monday, January 23, 2006

Bajaj Chetak (1972-2005) :RIP

Brand : Bajaj Chetak

Company : Bajaj Auto Ltd

The brand which ruled the Indian roads have been laid to rest. Bajaj has officially
stopped the production of Bajaj Chetak from December 2005. The stocks will last
may be upto March 2006. The company says that the product no longer have any
relevance to the customer. To quote Rajiv bajaj " Any one who clings to the past is
a failure".
I owned a Chetak: a gift from my father for having secured admission to MBA
program. It was in the year 1996. Later I exchanged it for a bike in 2001. Still
Chetak lingers in me ( or rather haunts me) in the form of " Back Pain".
The brand which was launched in 1972 virtually owned the two wheeler segment.
If reports are to be believed, Chetak was an unavoidable dowry in 1970's and 80's.
It had a waiting period of more than 10 years ( can you believe it ? ) and now here
I am after 34 years, writing the epitaph of this brand.
The brand which was named after the legendary stallion of the Rajput king
Maharana Pratap, was known for the reliability and sturdiness. The brand
thrived during the license raj with virtually no competition. It was during 1990-91
that the brand began the journey to the end.
Bajaj Chetak had a huge brand equity . The brand had the persona of a " work h

orse". With reasonable price and the low maintenance cost made
this product a huge hit among the middle class Indians.
Promoted along the base line " Hamara Bajaj", this was the Indian Family vehicle
- a position now owned by Maruthi 800.
But then How can a brand that was so popular and successful fail?
Frankly, I am not sure. But here is what I think about this brand...
The primary reason is that the Brand forgot the customers. Another case of
Marketing Myopia. The company failed to understand the changing perception of
the customers towards scooters. Rather than looking at the customers, the
company focused on influencing Government to block the opening up of
economy. Bajaj never did anything with the product. For 40 years Chetak had the
same look, same quality and style.
During the mid nineties the company realised lately that the segment has shifted
to motorcycles. Scooters were no longer the option. But did the company made a
mistake in discarding the scooter segment ? Looking at the way the share prices
are going, the market thinks that Bajaj Auto made the right decision. But I think

that th ey made a mistake in leaving the scooter

segment completely. Contrary to expectation, the scooter segment has not died. It
has only changed.
Chetak lost its identity some where during the nineties. What should be the
future of the brand : no body knew. It was only in 2004 that company made any
change in Chetak. In 1994 Bajaj introduced Classic another scooter with same
style as Chetak, but failed.
Bajaj never was serious about product development. The R&D spent for a long
time was a miniscule 1%. The average cycle time for the new product
development was 4-5 years compared to 2-3 years of Japanese competitors.
Even after the opening up of economy, the scooter segment did not witness much
competition.
The players like Vespa did not had much of success in this segment. Kinetic
Honda managed to carve a niche with its gearless scooters. Another segment
which was growing was the scooterette segment which was dominated by TVS
scooty.
Bajaj never seriously looked at customer perception about Chetak. The product
had serious problems like starting trouble and riding comfort. The " Tilting the
chetak to the side for starting " was a common joke. Did the company do anything
for that ? no
There was nothing wrong with the Promotion. " Hamara Bajaj " and " No one can
beat a Bajaj " were famous base lines. There was nothing wrong with distribution
and the pricing was very reasonable. The major problem was in the first P :
Product.
So without addressing any problems regarding the product , can you expect the
customer to buy the product ?
Bajaj was never a leader in technology ( now they are !!!). They never bothered to
and paid the price . Had Chetak pioneered Electric start, had it provided more
riding comfort, it could have survived.
Somebody have just beat the Bajaj........ the customer!

Labels: automobile brands, Bajaj, branding, failed brands, marketing myopia

Friday, July 04, 2008

Big Fun : Rest- in - Peace
Brand : Big Fun
Company : Gum India Ltd
Brand Analysis Count : 335

Big Fun was one of the hottest selling chewing gums during the Eighties. The

brand evokes lot of nostalgia in me and reminds

me of the countless fights that I had with my parents to buy this brand.

Big Fun was launched in 1985. At that time the bubblegum market was at the
nascent stage. It was this brand which initially created the bubblegum market in
India.
Big Fun was also one of the first brands in confectioneries to focus on sales
promotion as the core promotional strategy . The brand initially started by
offering the pictures of Disney characters to induce the kids . The brand was also
harping on the BIG bubbles that can be made with it.

But the real tipping point came with the 1987 Cricket world cup. Big Fun ran a
highly successful campaign focusing on cricket. The brand offered a series of
collectible pictures of cricketing stars along with the bubblegum wrapper.
Along with the pictures, there was also runs/wickets which the kids would collect
and keep score. At the end of the sales promotion, the kids can exchange the
scores with some gifts like comics and goodies.

The scheme was a super-hit. More than the goodies, kids started collecting these
pictures for the love of cricket. Favorite star's pictures was traded and kids began
to buy the product for the pictures ra ther than
the bubblegum.
Those were the days of Kapil, Viv Richards, Holding, Gavaskar, Vengsarkar,
Shastri .

Bubblegum during those times was not as sophisticated as today's. Big Fun was
hard rectangular shaped with a syrupy taste. One has to do a lot of chewing to
make it mellow and also to make the first bubble.

Picture courtesy : Kadalamittai.blogspot.com

I also happen to see the old ad of Big Fun from the blog of Soumya Dip : Cutting
The Chai.
The brand was cashing in on the cricket fever during those times. But in the early
nineties the brand died . I am clueless on the reasons behind the death of such a
highly popular brand. There is a possibility that the company ran into financial
trouble and together with the decline of the popularity of the entire bubblegum
category may have caused the death of Big Fun. The product also was not tasty
enough to sustain the brand once the sales promotions' effect is gone.

I was now wondering why companies were not running such promotions during
IPL. If a brand has done similar promotion during this era , will it create the same
magic that Big Fun has created 20 years back ?

Big Fun is yet another brand that has faded from the memory of consumers.
Another sad story of a home grown brand biting the dust.

Labels: confectionary, failed brands

Monday, December 01, 2008

Carona : RIP 1953-2003
Brand : Carona
Company : Carona Ltd

Brand Analysis Count : 361

Carona was a heritage brand of India which was once the second largest footwear
company in India. The brand is now no more. Carona is one of those brands
which could not withstand the competition which came after 1991.

Carona was a brand which thrived during the license raj. The brand thrived along
with Bata. Infact Carona was fighting head on with the market leader Bata. In my
home town , Carona store was just opposite to the Bata store. There were only
two choices for quality footwear Bata and Carona.

Carona in a way imitated Bata in every possible manner . The shops and the
products were extremely similar. When Bata launches one style, Carona quickly
followed suit. Both Bata and Carona was instrumental in popularising canvas
shoes in India. These shoes was a rage among kids at that time .

In 1992, Carona tried to tap the premium segment by launching the German
sports shoe brand Puma in the Indian market. This was to counter the popular
Power , Northstar and Hush Puppies brand from Bata.

Carona made a big mistake while launching Puma. The company felt that the
Indian consumers will fall for the global brand . The Puma brand was priced
above Rs 600. At that time the Bata brands like Power and Northstar was
retailing in the range of Rs 200 -300. Puma was a big flop in the Indian market
because of wrong pricing. The joint agreement was revoked by Puma in 1998.

The environment changed drastically during late 90's with the market opening
up. All the footwear companies faced the issue of tough competition and
increased costs. The cost was primarily attributed to the heavy workforce that
these companies had.

New brands like Liberty, Action, Lakhani etc began to corner the market with
new designs and fashion. Foreign brands like Nike ,Reebok and Adidas began to
market aggressively which further worsened the position of Carona.

Both Bata and Carona went in for big trouble those days. Bata had the backing of
their foreign parent which helped them sail through the restructuring exercise.
Carona did not had that luxury.Bata was able to sustain itself by launching new
models at affordable price ranges. But Carona was not able to excite the market
with new launches. Both Bata and Carona had its own showrooms which became
expensive to maintain. .Carona went in to BIFR fold in 1998.

In 2003, BIFR recommended closing down of Carona. BIFR noted that Carona
Management did not have the will or the capacity to sustain the company. Carona
went into eternal sleep in 2003. Carona was a brand that failed because of
mismanagement. Somewhere the company lost its control over the costs. It failed
to understand the competition and respond to it.

Labels: failed brands, Footwear

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Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Dyanora : RIP( 1975 -1995)
Brand : Dyanora
Company : Dynavision

Brand Analysis Count : 378

Dyanora is a brand which evokes lot of nostalgia in me. Dyanora was our first
television. I still remember the thrill of watching programs in Dyanora. Thrilled
because I no longer needed to plead with my mother to allow me to go and watch

TV in our neighbour's house.

Dyanora brand was launched in 1975. The brand belonged to a company known
as Dynavision which was JV between Tamilnadu Industrial Development
Corporation and the entrepreneur Mr Obul Reddy .
During those periods, there was severe restriction in the manufacturing and
selling of TVs because of licence raj. Those companies who got license minted
money because of lack of competition.
Dyanora also benefitted out of such limited competition. Dyanora started selling
B/W television and in 1982 it launched the Color Television.

The TV marketers started selling real volumes during 1980's when the
government started increasing the transmisson towers across the country.
The company was also going to face threat arisng out of the Government's liberal
economic policy during the 1980's where the licences for manufacturing TV was
given liberally. With the liberal license policy, many small and medium
companies started their manufacturing and marketing of television sets.

From a period where Dyanora faced competition from Solidaire and nobody else,
things started moving towards a highly competitive scenario.

Dyanora faced competion from large multinational and national players and also
from local regional players. It could not sustain itself in that competitive world.
The demand also began to go down which inturn affected the profitability.

Dyanora was a highly popular brand. The company also invested in brand
building. The brand had the tagline " keep in touch".

Watch the commercial here : Dyanora

The jingle were very popular at that time so was the visuals. I especially liked the
dog with spectacle visual.
The lyrics went on like this :

Are you in touch with whats going on

Are you in touch with the latest around
Get in touch with Dyanora
Get the best point of view
and the Sound thats true
stay in touch with the times
keep in touch with the new
Get the latest Dyanora
Keep in Touch.......

The ad was well made and was very popular during that time.

But the brand did not survive. The company also was confused about the future
of the brand. Faced with competition from large companies, Dynavision also tried
to prefer building a foriegn brand over the home grown Dyanora.

In 1995, the company entered into a JV with French multinational Thomson

International to sell their brand in India. With the focus on Thomson , Dyanora
was relegated to the backyard. Consumers also preferred national and
international brands which resulted in a significant erosion of Dyanora's market.

Finally the company went into BIFR fold in 1999 and later into eternity.

Dyanora was thus a part of history.

Labels: failed brands

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Thursday, November 23, 2006

Ganga Soap : RIP
Brand : Ganga
Company: Godrej Consumer Products

Brand Count: 163

If the Western Media's projection or prejudice about the social and cultural
makeup of India was correct, then Ganga soap would have been the most sold
soap brand in the world. Those who have been watching India specific programs

in BBC and National Geographic may wond er how can such a brand
fail in the land of elephants and Sadhus ?

Ganga soap was launched with much fanfare in 1993. The soap was positioned on
the religious platform and was claimed to be made of water from the river
Ganges. The soap attained salvation in the early 2000.
The brand comes from an accomplished marketer who markets such iconic
brands like Cinthol. The brand was promoted heavily and even had the film stars
like Govinda endorsing it. Promoted using the tagline " Now bath in Ganga" very
directly puts the soap in a religious platform. Reports suggest that the brand's
initial sales was encouraging and also there are reports that blame on the P&G
and Godrej break up caused the brand to decline.

Ganga had a revitalisation effort in 1997 when Godrej tried to relaunch the brand
under the name Doodh Ganga. But those effort went in vain.
The primary reason why the brand failed was that the differentiation was not
sustainable over time. Although Hindu's are very religious in nature and revers
the tradition but the consumers are discerning when it comes to purchasing
products. There is a clear divide between religion and products. Consumers
seldom like mixing the two. It is OK if religion and politics are mixed not soups
and gods. That may be the reason why the toys of Hindu mythological characters
are not popular in India.

The brand when launched was really praised for its innovative thinking. One
could see through the logic of the launch. Just looking at the crowd at Kumbh
Mela would encourage any marketer to think about launching a product for the
devotees of Ganga. But a closer look at the customers could have proved the
marketer wrong. Why would a customer buy a product? That is a question that
could reveal that Love for Ganga would not rake in sales.
Rather than using Ganga as a differentiator, Godrej could have positioned the
product on the basis if Purity and Gentleness like the Pears Soap. The can show
the use of Water from Ganga to reinforce the positioning. But the religious
platform failed miserably. More over this platform is too old dated for our new
generation. Another funny element is that although Hindus revere the Ganges,
people are aware that the river is the most polluted one. Hence there were
consumer buzz that using a soap made from such water may be dangerous.
Sensing this consumer talk, Godrej had to tell that the water was taken from
places near the origin of Ganges hence not polluted. Overall it was a messy affair.

Ganga is a brand that could have survived as a small niche. I am still not sure
about the exact reasons that brand have failed in the Indian market.The failure of
such a brand should inspire a marketer to delve deep into the psyche of Indian
consumer before jumping into conclusions.

source:economictimes. Mouthshut .com

Labels: branding, failed brands, FMCG, marketing myopia, personal care, soap
brands

Monday, April 02, 2007

Gold Spot : The Zing Thing ( RIP 1977-1993)
Brand : Gold Spot
Company:Coca Cola

Brand Count: 217

Gold Spot is a sad story in the Indian Branding world. This iconic brand was
killed for paving way for Coke's brands in India. Every one knows the story but
still...

Gold Spot was one among the three major softdrinks brand that ruled Indian
market along with Thums Up and Limca. The brand was built by Rames Chauhan
of Parle after the exit of Coca Cola from India during 1977. Chauhan spoted the
opportunity and three mega brands were born.
When Coca Cola came back to India in 1993, it bought out the three mega brands
from Chauhan for a consideration of $10 mn. These three brands had a huge
market share (combined) of over 69 % of India's SDC market. Then came the
expected move. Coke slowly began killing the Parle brands to make way for its
own brands. Thums Up was sidelined in favour of Coca Coala. Limca was
sidelined and Goldspot was killed to make way for Fanta.

Gold Spot was the orange drink with a Zingy taste. This iconic youth brand was
positioned as " Zing Thing" and was promoted heavily through all media. The
jingle " Gold Spot.. The Zing Thing" was one of the most memorable jingle at that
time ( still that jingle lingers in the mind of old timers).
Gold Spot was positioned as the youth brand and the ads talked about being crazy
about the brand . You can watch the Gold Spot ad here .
But the brand was killed. Fanta was launched but till now the brand has not being
able to take the position of Gold Spot. Coke was not able to clearly focus on the
segmentation of Fanta. Fanta is never perceived as a youth brand. Fanta is not
viewed or targeted at college students/youth. This confused targeting may have
crippled the growth of Fanta and still it couldn't reach the status of Gold Spot.
Coke expected that the users of Gold Spot will migrate to Fanta but it did not
happened.
We saw Limca coming back in 2006.. can we ever hope Gold Spot coming back ?

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Wednesday, December 14, 2005

Liril : Bring back the Liril girl

Brand : Liril

Company : HLL
Agency : Lowe

If you are looking for a case of an iconic Brand that is going to be killed by poor
marketing strategy , look no further, here is Liril for you.

Launched in 1975, the year I was born, this is a brand that built a segment or
should I say category for it self in the Indian market. The brand is also the
testimony to the genius of India's Ad man Alyque Padamsee. This is what he
says about the Liril Brand

The name Liril had been registered by Hindustan Lever from a list sent to them
by Unilever in London. Levers were very keen that the soap have striations,
wiggly stripes of different colours running across the tablet. I recommended the
tablet be blue - because waterfall is blue with white striations. Hindustan Lever
was very excited and produced 1,000 tablets for testing.
At this point Derk Wooller, the Marketing Controller of Hindustan Lever's soaps
division, stepped in and suggested we add the freshness of lime to our story. He
felt that though the waterfall had tremendous emotional appeal, Liril needed a
rational ingredient to clinch the deal. I was not averse to this but suggested that
we do an `As marketed' test: Blue Liril versus Green Liril with limes. I was
wrong and Wooller was right. The rest is history."
Alyque Padamsee in his book A Double Life.

The brand was a run away success and the Liril girl became the talk of the town.
The brand has
beenconsistentt with its communication and the effective use of brand imagery.
Further on brand imagery can be found in this article , visit
http://www.blonnet.com/catalyst/2004/09/23/stories/2004092300100200.htm

Liril was positioned on the freshness platform right from its birth. The girl and
the waterfall with the unique jingle ensured that the freshness is experienced by
the audience. Liril can be called as an experiential brand and the communication
perfectly supported that.

Liril did not change its positioning for 25 years although the models changed, the
brand communication was consistent. Then some nut in the company or the
agency thought that they should change the communication that worked so
effectively. The rest as I say it " Liril became history".

Liril has changed the imagery and the jingle in the name of freshness .The new
jingle or the ad never had that freshness. That is why Liril had to change the Ads
twice with in a span of five years. Mind you Liril never changed its imagery or the
Jingle for 25 years...

Reports say that Liril had to change because of its stagnant marketshare. I think
there are reasons for declining market share which can be that the brand failed to
understand the changing consumer expectations. There was a flurry of brand
launches during the past 10 years and Liril was sleeping all the time " may be
resting on the laurels" . It should have hold on its positioning of ' freshness " not
by changing its communication but by communicating more, developing variants,
bringing in flanking brands or variants and thus owning the whole segment for

itself.

But it never happened , Liril tried to introduce the Icy mint variant very late and
that too with a different jingle and imagery. We knew that the Old Liril had died.
HLL could have used the same communication strategy . Then came the horrible
experiment of Orange Liril with a stupid Jingle OOFYUMMA.... excuse me what
the hell is that?

The product failed. Then came the new campaign involving a couple and a new
jingle " La-ira -ela", the ad was good but where is liril ?

Like Onida , Liril has to come back with the old imagery and old jingle that made
liril what it Is ( or WAS?) [ It is a prediction].

When it does that consumers will take the brand to their heart .

Laaaaa lalalala laaa ...................

Labels: branding, failed brands, FMCG, HLL, marketing myopia, personal care,
soap brands

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Moti Soap : RIP
Brand : Moti
Company : HUL

Brand Analysis Count : 341

Moti was India's premium brand of soaps during the seventies. Now there is no
trace of this brand. Moti originally was a brand of Tata Oil Mills Company

( TOMCO). In 1993, TOMCO merged with HLL.

Moti was a special soap which had certain differentiation. The first differentiation
point was the Shape. Unlike other soaps which came in cake form, Moti was
round soap. Moti is the vernacular term for Pearl . So the soap was also in the
shape of pearl.

Another uniqueness was the size of the soap. Moti was a big soap. Often one gets
bored of the soap and it never quite finish fast.

Moti came in popular fragrances like Gulab ( Rose) and Sandal.

Moti was promoted as a premium soap . The soap was expensive and during the
eighties, the soap was priced around Rs 25.

Tomco also promoted this brand heavily. Most of the campaign had a signature
brand imagery the soap surrounded by pearls. Those ads were in most of the

magazines during the peak stage of this brand. Pearls formed

an important role in the entire brand communication and pearl was an anchor
which created an association with the brand in the consumer's mind.

I was searching for an ad of Moti and thanks to Saumyadip's blog, I got a vintage
ad of moti.

Moti then moved to HLL following the merger. That marked the end of this
brand.
I am not sure why HLL decided to sideline Moti soap. The brand was never
promoted and slowly the brand faded into oblivion.
The reason for this brand's death may be because it did not fit into the brand
portfolio of HLL. While Hamam ( another Tomco brand ) thrived, Moti was never
in the picture.
Then with the Power Brand strategy, brands like Moti never had a chance to
survive.

The brand had prospects if HLL had done some serious product development. In
the branding perspective Moti had certain assets. The name and the imagery
were wonderful assets for a marketer. Moti had both these assets.

The problem was with the product. There was something missing in the soap
which ultimately lead to the death of this brand. Another factor was at the
segmentation side. Now also the market for a premium soap is abysmally low in
India. Now also there is no successful premium brand of soaps in India ( Essenza
de wills is trying hard ).

So it was also a tough choice for HLL. The company may have felt that Moti did
not have a future as a premium soap. And it may cannibalize some existing
brands if the prices are rationalized. Moti may had to be repositioned if it had to
survive . But HLL was not prepared to invest in a brand which had a minuscule
2% of the market. So the decision was to slowly kill the brand.

Labels: failed brands, HLL, soap brands

Monday, August 06, 2007
Maruti Versa : Traveling Together Is Fun
Brand : Versa
Company : Maruti Suzuki Ltd
Agency : Lowe

Brand Analysis Count : 259

Maruti Versa is a sad story in Indian brand scene. This brand was launched with
much hype in 2001 but now is waiting for death in the Intensive Care Unit. Versa
was the first luxury Multi Purpose Vehicle from Maruti 's stable.

Versa was the logical upgrade brand for Maruti Omni. Omni was successful as a
family van and Maruti thought that there is a market for a luxuri van that can
carry more passengers than an ordinary car. Versa is the Indian version of the
popular Japanese van EVERY/ Carry. Versa was called MPV which is the
acronym for Multi Purpose Vehicle .

Versa had a dream launch. Maruti roped in the Big B and the small B ( Amitabh
and Abhishek Bachchan) to endorse the brand. The commercial featuring the

father son duo was a big hit at that point of time.

According to reports, Versa was Abhishek's first brand endorsement.

Versa was launched as an Affluent Microvan. The brand was positioned as " Two
luxury cars for the price of one" . The ads talked about twin A/C, comfort and
space. Versa was launched with a 1300 cc engine which was the same used in
Maruti Esteem.

Despite the dream launch, Versa failed to generate volume . The basic issue was
the price. Versa was launched with a price of Rs 5.15 lakh for the base model and
the top end model costs around Rs 6 lakh. Those enthusiastic customers who
flocked the showroom after viewing the ads was shocked by the steep price of
Versa. Versa was priced at par with Maruti Esteem and other entry level sedans.

Maruti was totally wrong in estimating the customer's perception of price in this
case. It sounds little paradoxic because the company had blockbuster products
like Maruti 800 and Alto which was in sync with Indian consumer's price value
equation. In the case of Versa, Maruti was little too ambitious. Versa was a large
car and the initial buyers were essentially those who had large family. For a small
family , there was no logic in going for Versa when a sedan was available at the
same price. Moreover the ' mini bus ' shape of the car also was a put off for many
customers .
The lack of customer enthusiasm translated to inventory pile up and sluggish
volumes for Versa. In 2004, Maruti relaunched Versa with a base price of Rs 4
lakh which was a drastic price cut. The positioning was also changed. The brand
was relaunched with the new positioning based on the joys of traveling together.
The tagline was changed to " Traveling in company in a car has its own kind of
fun". New campaigns were launched which highlighted the theme of traveling
together . The TG was identified as families which are large. The aim of the
campaign was to inform the new price as well as drive the message that Versa is
ideal for large families.

Watch the TVC here : Maruti Versa

But these campaigns did not had the desired results. Although sales peaked
immediately after the announcement of price cut, Versa was not able to sustain
the volume. More over the brand was eclipsed with the success of Maruti Wagon
R which was priced higher than Versa but with less space and engine power.

Frankly I am perplexed with the failure of Versa especially after the price cut.
Because this brand makes a perfect upgrade for those users who was fed up with
Omni. I feel that again the prime reason is the price. Even after the price cut, the
Versa still offers little value to the Indian consumer. Now that there are many
large comfortable vehicles with in the price band of 4.5- 6 lakh rage, Versa is not
even considered an option by the consumer. The brand recall is also very low. The
success of Wagon R also have put this brand in a very odd position in terms of the
Product line logic.
Versa has only two options left before it : one is to reduce the price drastically so
that the price value equations are favorable Or await the slow death.

Source : agencyfaqs,autocarindia , wikipedia

Labels: automobile brands, Brand Update, celebrity endorsement, failed brands

Monday, December 18, 2006

Vanilla Coke : Wakaw
Brand :Vanilla Coke
Company: Coca Cola
Agency: McCann Erickson

Brand Count : 178

Vanilla Coke was touted as the greatest innovation since Diet Coke in 1983. It also
has the distinction of the greatest flops after the New Coke. Vanilla Coke came
with a bang in the Indian market in April 2004. It went without much noise in

2005.

The history of this product variant dates back as early as 1950's. The mass
marketing of this variant began in 2002.The brand went global in 2004.
2004 saw the unusual scream " Wakaw" played across mass media. We all looked
up in awe : a brand new variant from Coca Cola : Vanilla Coke. The brand was
targeted at the metro youth was different. It was different in taste, promotion,
package, price etc.
Vanilla Coke was promoted in retro style. The brand had Vivek Oberoi , the then
bollywood flame endorsing the brand in an unusual style. Vivek sported the retro
look with typical combination of Elvis style + Shammi Kapoor style in an Old
Lamby Scooter screaming Wakaw.

The ads were surely clutter breaking and backed by 360 degree branding efforts
that ensured good publicity. The creative done by the famed Prasoon Joshi was
discussed in all media and that ensured truck loads of free publicity. The brand
also got into viral marketing. The campaign along with Contenst2win asked the c

ustomers to SMS Wakaw to 8558 inorder to win goodies.

According to media reports, the campaign resulted in 440,000 SMS in just 4
weeks creating a record of sorts.

According to Indiatelevision.com report, the media brief given to the agency was
to create a clutter breaking campaign targeted at youth. The campaign should
create a dhamaka in the market. And rightly so all the client requirements was
achieved with in a short span of time.

But how come a product with such a good start failed so easily. With in one year,
the brand has been taken out from most of the Indian states. The brand is said to
be available in Gujarat,Kolkatta and Delhi.
As a marketing person, I am also perplexed. Frankly I liked the ad the feel and
wanted to try it out. But soon the product was not at all available. The failure of
this product line extension may have delighted Alries and Trout .

I am assuming that the following factors may have caused the failure of this
brand.

a. The product may have been bad. The TG may not have liked the taste.
Although Coke has test marketed this product, there is always a chance that the
customers may have disliked the taste.
b.The campaign was not targeted at the right segment. This campaign had its fair
share of critics also. I liked the campaign because I have seen the old stars and
the lamby etc and could easily relate the old characters and the concept. But for a
twenty year old, he may not relate or understand the concept. The brand may
have lost out in that respect.
c. The brand was priced at a premium over the ordinary coke. This may have
discouraged the TG from checking out the brand. Together with the retro
campaign not clicking with the intended audience may have given a double
whammy for the brand.
d. Indian SD industry is a duopoly. Pepsi and Coke rule the roast and there are
brand loyal on both sides. The new variant will be tested first by the Coke loyal
and not the Pepsi loyal. Hence like most of the Product line extensions, the
variant will be pitted against the mother brand. Hence the customers may have
compared the new variant with the classic coke and not as a new drink. And
surely the classic coke won .
These are all assumptions because I am still confused.
The failure of Vanilla Coke is a classic case that proves that Marketing is not a
perfect science. There are no formula or theory that can make a brand successful.
To Quote Kotler " Marketing is easy to teach and understand but difficult to
practice".

source:agencyfaqs,indiatelevision.com,wikipedia,magindia,businessline

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