Pricing strategy:

The company adopts Value-based pricing as its Pricing Strategy. It knows exactly at which level the
market will accept a price and comprehends how exactly its consumers „value its product‟. Tapal Tea
sells its products to resellers at a higher retail markup than Lipton Tea. Due to this factor, retailers are
themselves interested more in selling Tapal Tea to consumers. This is a vital part of the company‟s
marketing strategy. When compared with Lipton Tea, retailers are expected to sell large quantities of
Lipton Tea to compensate for the low markup. It sells most of its brands at a fixed retail price all over
Pakistan. Tapal follows high-medium price strategy in which it offers high quality tea at reasonable prices.
Tapal also follows a Going Rate Pricing strategy, in which it bases its price largely on competitors‟ price
that is Unilever. Unilever being the market leader always sets the price, and then Tapal accordingly
allocates its prices, always lower than that of Unilever. Tea prices have fallen over the years which are
because of reduced import duties and costs. Besides taking the competition into account, Tapal does cost
plus pricing. Tapal adopts Seasonal Pricing to stabilize its earnings and sales throughout the year. This
itself does not provide competitive advantage in a proper context, but helps in soothing out the earnings
and sales.

DISTRIBUTION STRATEGY
The distribution objective of Tapal is to maximize its market coverage. To accomplish this Tapal has a
wide distribution network of 410 distributors across Pakistan. Tapal has a wider distribution coverage in
the South where as Unilever has better distribution in the North. Therefore, Tapal‟s main objective is to
increase their sales in the North. It ensures that it places its tea in the same outlets as its competitors in
order to maximize availability. The distribution coverage of Tapal is as follows: 1. Karachi 14% 2. Lahore
34% 3. Islamabad 18% 4. Sukkur 22% 5. Hyderabad 12%

ISSUES IN CHANNEL OF DISTRIBUTION

There are a number of issues that take place in the channel of distribution everyday. These issues usually
emerge in the wholesale markets and everyday the company manager has to deal with them and manage
the issues effectively so that the company standard is not jeopardized. Tapal takes makes great effort to
manage and resolve these issues

PRODUCT MIX
The product mix is the set of all product lines and items that a company offers. Tapal has a single product
line-TEA, within which the company offers a number of brands ranging from the high quality products to
serve the upper class to reasonable products for the lower classes. Tapal offers a variety of products not
only to efficiently serve its entire target markets but also to gain a competitive edge over its major
competitors like Lipton and BrookeBond. The highly successful mix of great teas, modern marketing,
proper distribution and promotional activities has resulted in overwhelming growth for Tapal over the last
50 years. After Tapal's unique Family Mixture became Karachi's largest selling brand, the company was
encouraged to innovate further. As a result, in 1987, an entirely new category brand called Danedar was
created and launched. Tapal Danedar became the country's largest selling tea brand with a loyal
following. Since then a number brands have been introduced. The company follows the strategy of multi-
branding in which the company introduces the same product with different brand names. Detailed
descriptions of all the brands of Tapal are as follows:

Chenak Kenya Dust

Mezban Super Dust

Special Teabags

Gulbahar Green Tea

Family Mixture

Danedar Leaf Blend

Safari Kenya Leaf

Jasmine Green T

T a p a l m a k e s t e a t i m e t e r r i f i c!

TAPAL BRANDS Tapal Danedar

Pioneer of the

Danedar category in Pakistan, Tapal Danedar remains a favorite around the country with its grape-nutty
appearance, rich golden color and strong refreshing taste. In fact its popularity is such that other
companies have launched their own versions of this blend, but Tapal's remains the original and ultimate
Danedar because of its unique color, aroma and taste. Also available in double chamber tea bags, today
Tapal Danedar enjoys the position of the "No.1 Tea Brand" in Pakistan

Tapal Family Mixture

A unique combination of high-grown Kenya leaf and dust tea, Tapal Family Mixture is the pride of Tapal.
Developed in 1947, it created a completely new category in the tea market. It gives a refreshing aroma of
leaf and the strong taste of dust- together in one cup. It is the blend that started the Tapal success story
and many other companies followed Tapal in introducing similar blends.

Tapal Safari Chai

Tapal Safari is made from the finest Kenya leaf teas and provides extra cup of great tasting tea to the
consumer. Tapal Safari chai, with a safari theme, is aimed at adventurous people

Promotion
    Tapal has been active in advertising for each of its products in the product-line. It has been using
both BTL(below the line) and ATL( above the line) for the purpose of promotion. Through BTL Tapal is
focusing on display racks,sign boards etc. mainly placed to different retailers for heavy promotion against
their competitors. The specific term used by Tapal is the Modern Trade so that they have an eye contact
of the product with the customer. In this they are using shelves to display their product in big stores like
Makro and Metro. Through ATL tapal is focusing on broadcast and print media promotion by placing ads
on TV and placing newspapers ads as well.

Communication
Communication of the value created by the company is very important; this stage in our view is the
trickiest stage of the entire value creation process. Tapal has used the following tools and techniques to
communicate the value they have created for their target customers.

Electronic Media
 Tapal rely heavily upon print media but this trend is changing now because of customer‟s life style.
Right now, company is doing intensive advertising through networks. In their advertisement they hire the
services of renowned celebrities.
Advertising
As far as Advertising is concerned, the  Tapal has shifted away from Television advertising to “MASS
ADVERTISING

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22



Mass Advertising in the form of billboards are the most common form of advertising. Advertising on the
new Fm radio channels like City Radio or FM 107, FM 96 is also extensively done for the young urban
crowd for family mixture.

Tapal and Music

  Tapal is actively supporting the fast developing music industry in Pakistan. It has sponsored the
leading singers in Pakistan and actively participates in music concerts.

Public Relations
As far as publications such as catalogues and brochures are concerned the company does not have any
such publications. They have not yet focused on the possibility of issuing any sort of publications for
improving upon public relations.

Personal Selling
   The Company has a B2B (business to business) approach as far as personal selling is concerned.
Sales rep visit hotels like Marriott and Sheraton to offer bulk amounts at a discount rate. Face to face
communication of value is much more effective than advertising as immediate feedback can be received
which helps in ameliorating the communication process.

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TAPAL’S ADVERTISING STRATEGY

TARGET CONSUMER
The target consumer of TapalDanedar is



Male and Female who are 18 plus and coming from all sectors of Pakistan Families that come under the
income range of more than 5000 rupees.