Pond's : As beautiful as you want to be !

Brand : Pond's
Company : HLL
Agency : O&M


Pond's range of products were in India from as early as 1947 . This is a brand that has celebrated Women's courage and personality. A brand that has tried to evolve with the changing persona of Indian Women.

Theron T Pond, a Pharmacist from Newyork introduced " Pond's Golden Treasure" in 1846. It was a Witch-hazel based wonder product. In 1914, Pond's introduced the cold cream and vanishing cream and that moment marked the brand's evolution to a beauty icon.

In 1955, Pond's merged with another company Chesebrough. In 1987, Unilever purchased the brand from Chesebrough- Pond's.

Pond's is a brand that has been carefully nurtured by HLL. Till 1980's Pond's were a household name in talcum powders. Later the talcum powder faced competition from other categories, we call it as boundary blurring. Hence Pond's had to enter to different categories in the cosmetic market. Pond's have a market share of around 65% in the 600 crore Indian talcum powder market. Subsequently Pond's also became a generic name in the Winter care market. Pond's brand was known more during the nineties for its cold cream.

HLL decided that the brand have potential to grow in the cosmetics market. So Pond's was positioned as an all purpose skincare brand. The Indian cosmetics market is estimated to be around 1850 crore and in that the skin care market is estimated to be around 1300 crores.

In a survey on customers by AC Nielsen ORG Marg in 2003 , Pond's were among the most trusted brands in India. It was not by accident. Pond's had certain qualities that created a trust among the users of the brand. Pond's is known for

consistent Quality
Constantly Improving &
Changing with times.

I feel that all brands should have these qualities to succeed in the market.
Pond's knew the pulse of the market which made it a top brand in the cosmetic industry.
Pond's is targeting at the premium skin care market in India which is estimated to be around 325 crore. Currently Pond's is also aiming at the super premium segment and the launch of super premium range is expected in first quarter of 2006.

The target group that Pond's is aiming are the ladies above 30yrs of age. It is trying to capture the skin care needs with anti- ageing ,skin rejuvenation and anti- wrinkle products. Currently this segment is dominated by Revlon and other foreign brands.

Pond's uses the baseline " As beautiful as you want to be " I consider it as one of the best baselines currently on air. It tries to redefine beauty as something more than superficial. The baseline of Pond's cold cream " Googly Woogly Woosh" does not convey any meaning but the ads are lovely.

I have serious reservations of other ads of Pond's but I hope it appeals to the target market.

Pond's is a brand that is not complacent. In the talcum Powder category , Pond's have many variants like Dream Flower, Sandal, Prickly Heat ,and recently relaunched Magic. This has ensured that the leadership position remains intact.

Pond's is a brand for " Well grounded, self assured, and confident " women. HLL have used campaigns and events ( the prestigious Pond's Femina Miss India) to create and capture the beautiful moments in the life of the Indian Women.

Book Review : Outliers

Book : Outliers
Author : Malcolm Gladwell
Publisher : Allen Lane ( Penguin Books)


Price : Rs 399


Book review # 8

I bought this book with lot of expectations . I was thoroughly impressed by Malcolm Gladwell's previous books - The Tipping Point and The Blink.
The main motivation for me to buy this book was the " tagline" of the book. Gladwell marketed this book as one which will explain the story of success and honestly I fell for it.

I am disappointed .
Unlike the earlier creations, Outliers is nothing to write about. It is an ordinary and often a very boring read, except for the first two chapters. I found the book boring may be because I expected too much out of it. I knew that it was not a self- help book that will give you a step by step approach to success but I expected a hell lot of insights into those beautiful minds that created successes.

The author defines Outliers as those who have achieved extraordinary success in their lives.

As a reader, my only take-away from this book is his 10,000 hours rule. It is a remarkable insight and may be that single insight makes the money spent on this book worthwhile.
The ten thousand hour rule is simple
If you want to be a genius in a chosen field , you have to put in 10,000 hours of practice/study.

That is it...

This is not a new insight . We all knew that hardwork is essential and hardwork = success equation has become a cliche. But nobody has put a quantitative benchmark to the amount of hardwork needed to become a success.
Malcolm Gladwell did a great service by putting a magical number to hardwork. I thank him for that. Now I can tell my daughter and students about the quantum of work they have to put in to become a genius.

To my surprise, after giving away a powerful insight, Gladwell tried to undo and negate this 10,000 rule in the rest of the chapters. By quoting outdated examples , Gladwell tried to establish that external circumstances play the major role in shaping outliers. So effectively he says that even if you put in 10,000 hours of study , you may not become an outlier ????????

Then he goes on proving his contradictions with examples from history and most of the examples were alien to me.

But in the marketing point of view, this book was marketed well. There will be lot of readers like me who may have bought this book thinking that Gladwell will reveal the secret key to success....
and the message given to us by the author was :

fool... try working hard.. nobody has become successful by reading a book...