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.

Brand Update : Eyetex

The senior management of Arvind Laboratories has shared some of the important sales figures of Eyetex & Dazzler brand to Marketing Practice. The excerpts of the mail is given below.

• During 2007-08 the sales of Colour Cosmetics {CC} lead by EYETEX DAZLLER Nail Polish & EYETEX Eyeliner liquid increased by 22%.
• Nail Polish sales/other issues crossed 2.75 million units & Eyeliner Sales/other issues crossed 1.78 million units.
• Overall group sales in traditional Kajal & Kumkum crossed 110 million pieces.
• The firm has strengthened its sales teams all over India;
• There are 210 staff at all levels & about 75 Beauty Advisers in Retail counters now {& proposed to touch 250 before October 2008}.
• Current Year targets are 4.50 million units in Nail Polish & 2.64 million units in Eyeliner amongst other CC products such as Lipsticks, Compact Powder, Lip Gloss etc.,
• Overall 125 million units including Traditional Kajal & Kumkum.

Eyetex is on an overdrive and the growth of the brand shows that the extensive below the line activities of the the company has yielded positive results.

Brand Update : Motoyuva

Finally Motoyuva has gone soft on the parents. The brand has launched its new range W270 flip phone.
Watch the tvc here : Motoyuva w270
The ad shows the father trying to imitate the dude son after seeing the son talking to his girlfriend using the stylish W270. The basic idea is to highlight the stylish attribute of the phone and the message is consistent with the youthful positioning of the brand.

What I liked about the ads of Motoyuva is the choice of the actors. In this ad, the "father" is perfect and because of it, the ad is never boring.
The reason why the brand has gone little soft on parents may be because of fear of resentment . The previous ad for W230 was too harsh on the parents.

More importantly , the brand has got the price and the product perfect for the target segment. Firstly Motoyuva is a no-nonsense music phone. The brand has clearly identified that music is a decisive attribute as far as the 18-25 is concerned. Secondly the brand has got the price also right for the consumer.For an entry level consumer, the price of Motoyuva is compelling enough to elicit a favorable decision.These funny campaigns add the critical thrust to make the final decision.There was a gap in the entry level music phones which this brand has rightly tapped.

Nutralite : Better than Butter

Brand : Nutralite
Company : Zydus Cadilla
Agency : Mudra
Brand Analysis Count : 325

Zydus Cadilla is a bold marketer. First it fought with the sugar by launching the sugar alternative - Sugarfree Natura and now its fighting with butter by relaunching the brand Nutralite.

Nutralite is table margarine. World over margarine are used as a substitute for butter. Margarines are fat derived from either animal products or vegetable oils. The veggie margarines are used as a healthy alternative for butter.

Nutralite was acquired by Zydus in 2006. The brand was then relaunched with a controversial positioning " Better than Butter ". The slogan prompted Amul to take the issue to ASCI which directed Zydus to substantiate the claims in their future campaigns.

The organized branded butter market in India is estimated to be around Rs800 crore ( source : Moneycontrol). The market is dominated by Amul.

Nutralite brand achieves relevance owing to the changing lifestyles of urban Indian consumer. The affluent laid back lifestyle has created lot of lifestyle diseases and prompted the urban Indian consumer to be health conscious. The increasing incidence of heart problems and diabetes has paved the way for the emergence of health foods. Zydus is trying to cash in on this health wave.

Nutralite is positioned directly as a healthy alternative to butter. Like the SugarFree Natura,

Nutralite also wants the health conscious consumer to choose it to the ordinary butter. The logic behind the positioning is that Nutrilite has less cholesterol and does not contain hydrogenated fats compared to butter. It also has PUFA ( poly unsaturated fatty acid ) and MUFA (monounsaturated fatty acids ) which are known cholesterol fighters.

The brand was relaunched with television commercial showing the husband indulging in Aalu Paratha without being worried about health.

Watch the T VC here : Nutralite First ad

The controversy over the slogan - better than butter has prompted the brand to slightly alter the positioning to :Healthier than Butter.

The brand is now running a high decibel campaign featuring Sathish Shah. The message of the ad is to encourage the consumers to indulge in food without worrying about health. The brand is targeting the ladies in the households who are worried about their husband's health.

Watch the Tvc here : No Excuses

Nutralite aims to corner 8-10% of the butter market. The direct attack on butter will definitely catch the attention of the consumer. But whether this attention will be translated to sales is something to watch for. Convincing the consumer to opt for Nutralite instead of butter is not an easy task. Firstly the brand has to convince the customer that the good old Amul Butter is unhealthy. Second it has to achieve parity ( Points of parity) with butter. Then it has to convince the customer that Nutralite is indeed healthy. Hence the brand has no other alternative but to directly attack butter.

Margarines are not popular in India and the category is non-existent. The high profile launch of Nutralite may also see an emergence of margarines as a new product category.

Brand Update : Fastrack

Fastrack is moving on. The latest campaign of Fastrack presents a significant deviation from the earlier positioning. The brand is running a new TVC with the new slogan : Move On

Watch the TVC here : Move On

According to agencyfaqs, the brand is trying on multiple presentation platforms. That means multiple levels of positioning and experimenting with different themes and slogans. While the target segment and the personality of the brand remains the same, the marketer will not stick to a specific message. A classic example of this type of strategy is that of Pepsi. The brand tries to add freshness to the entire brand communication without sticking to a core theme.

So Fastrack is moving away from the earlier theme revolving round multiple ownership which was reflected in the slogan " How Many You Have? "

The new ad is fun to watch but predictable and lacks freshness. This concepts has been used by lot of brands lot of times. While the earlier slogan had a purpose ( to make customers buy more) , the new theme is aimed at building a persona around the brand. The brand chose irreverance and noncommittal enjoyment as the main brand persona.

The brand still remains youthfull targeting the age group 15-25.

The new ad is about two young lovers ending their relationship and moving on ( without any remorse or sadness). In a report in agencyfaqs, the Lowe's creative director Mr RajeshRamaswamy defended the theme by saying that " Today's generation live in instant gratification.Without commitment they seek variety ". The brand is trying to catch that personality.

That is true to certain extent. But my doubt is whether this attitude is universal or homogeneous across the urban youth segment. I have seen this type of non-committal behavior among college graduates but when looking at the percentage, it is hardly 20-25%. They exhibit the same irreverence and non-committal attitude. But the majority are ordinary young guys/gals.

Most of the new brands that targets the youngsters are speaking the same language of irreverence , flirting, non-committal rebel types. The brands like Motoyuva and Virgin Mobile shows almost the same personality profile.
So my doubt is are all Indian youngsters are like these so called DUDES who have lot of girlfriends to chose and goes to late night parties and live a life that these brands portray ?

I guess not .

What do you think ?


Related Brand
Fastrack

image courtesy : agencyfaqs

Brand Update : Margo

Margo is set for a new life. The India's heritage brand is getting a brand ambassador in Rani Mukharjee. According to news reports, the Bollywood diva is set to breathe a fresh air into this brand.
In my blogpost on Margo two years back, I had recommended some heavy duty celebrity endorsement for the brand. Glad that it is happening .

Margo, which was in existence even in 1920s , derives its strength in the neem formula. But over these years, the brand failed to keep itself relevant to the changing consumers. But still the brand is popular in West Bengal and Tamilnadu.

The brand is now not in the radar of the new generation . The endorsement of Rani will increase the brand recognition among the target audience. According to reports, Margo is not changing its formulation and is being positioned on the Neem attribute.

But the brand may have to work on the fragrance. Without losing the neem essence, the brand may have to make the fragrance more attractive to the new consumers. The ads for Margo is yet to be aired , so I am not sure about the new positioning of this soap.
There is a silver lining for this brand. The soap market in India is increasingly cluttered and consumers to an extent is overloaded with new attributes and variants. In such a case, the common tendency of consumers is to look for a simple easy solution. Margo with its neem attribute can very well take that space.

Related Brand

Margo

Image courtesy : Sify