Marketing Funda : Indian Ingredient Brands

Marketing Guru Kevin Lane Keller defines Ingredient Branding as a special case of co-branding which involves creating brand equity for materials component or parts that are necessarily contained in other branded products. Prof. John Quelch  of Harvard defines ingredient branding as putting the brand of an ingredient out of the product to increase its appeal. 

Ingredient branding concept started as a co-branding where the brand owners of ingredient and product brands are different. In my opinion, the strategy has evolved where firms have started branding their own ingredients in order to create differentiation. Intel and Dupont are considered to be pioneers in this regard. Increasingly brands in India too have tried to develop ingredient brands to create differentiation. Some of the below cited examples are loosely connected to the concept of ingredient branding in the sense that the brand owners may not have registered as a trademark.

          Parent Brand             Ingredient brand

1. Orient fans               PSPO
2. Exo dishwash bar     Cyclozan
3. Chandrika soap        Activ Ayurveda
4. Clinic All Clear         ZPTO ( now not using it)
5. Horlicks                   DHA ( using it very less)
6. Maruti Suzuki        K-Series Engines
7. Bajaj Pulsar            DTSI
8. Titan Watches        HTSE
9. Citizen                   Eco-Drive
10. Tata Motors          DriveTech / Quadrajet
11. Ford Motors         TDCi
12. Hyundai                CRDi
13. Good Knight         Activ +
14. Godrej Fairglow   Fairness Proteins
15. Louis Philippe      Permapress ( Nishinbo Japan owned tech)
16. TVS Apache        RTR
17. Panasonic            Eco-Navi Sensors (for refridgerators)
18. Gariner Men        Active Perlite ( for deo)
19. Pantene               Pro-V
20. Fiama Di Wills    Derma Revitalizers ( for men's fairness cream)
21. Saffola                LoSorb Technology
22. Kent water purifier   Mineral RO technology

Brand Update : Does Limca Really Needs Kareena ?

The summer of 2012 belongs to lemon based beverages. Marketers are all out to woo consumers through high decibel promotions for lemon based beverage brands. These brands ( once neglected) started to be considered as high growth brands. In BCG metrics terms,Question Marks suddenly became Stars ! The reason is the late realization that Indians have a soft-corner for lemon flavor which was long neglected by maverick marketers who wanted the Cola to rule the market.Now lemon flavored segment is growing at 17-20% annually compared to single digit growth for the Cola brands.

The new Star of the block is the iconic Limca brand from Coca Cola. Coca Cola was reluctantly pushing the brand to the forefront through some well crafted campaigns during the last few years. Although the share of voice was less, the sheer quality of the campaigns lifted the brand to new heights. 

Watch some of these ads here : Limca Ads 2006-10

The campaigns used music very effectively and focused on the concept of freshness . All through these years, the taglines keep on changing from

Fresh Ho Jao

Haseen Lamhaon ko churao

Do Pal Taazgi

Maza taazgi ka

Doobo Taazgi mein

The brand conceived a brilliant imagery of water splashing with some soul-warming music which brought back the magic of Limca. 

This summer, the brand mandarins of Coke decided to change everything. The brilliant idea of a celebrity endorser was conceived and executed. Kareena Kapoor was chosen as the celebrity and the brand owners decided to ditch the earlier positioning and imagery and brought in a new higher order attribute to the brand - Pyaas Badhao where the concept is the brand wants its consumers to thirst for more ( success) in life.

Watch the ad here : Limca  Pyaas Badhao

I somehow feel that despite the best efforts and intention, the campaign lacks the magic. The brand seems to be preaching to consumers which was a drastic shift interms of the personality. Earlier campaigns had full of romance and soft imagery. The new campaign completely lacks any romance and is in the backdrop of sports seems so out of touch with the brand's personality. Kareena holding a limca bottle is not going to create any magic for the brand. Infact, Limca's brand equity which survived Coke's assassination attempt does not need to derive any support from celebrities. To be fair to the brand, Limca had earlier roped in celebrities like Salman Khan, Riya Sen etc to endorse it. 

In one of the reports, the brand owners suggested that the change in the brand strategy was warranted by the aggression of competing brands. However, that does not explain the logic of such a drastic shift in the brand's personality.

Brands exhorting the consumers to scale higher heights is not a new concept.Brands like Horlicks, Bournvita etc pitch on similar lines. Hence Limca's new preaching pitch puts it among the usual crowd not different. But the earlier romantic platform was something unique. I don't remember any beverage brand positioning on a romantic platform.

So uniqueness lost, in the clutter , heavily depended on celebrity for power, will be the outcome interms of the branding. Had the brand used Kareena in a romantic mood with water splashing around, Limca would have broken its own Limca Books of Records ! Alas... its preaching time...

Related Brand
Limca : Lime N Lemony 

Chaze Mobiles : Ye Hui na Baat

Brand : Chaze
Company : Chaze Mobiles

Brand Analysis Count : 510

Some marketers will do anything to get their brand eyeballs. Chaze Mobile, which is yet to launch their products recently got  million dollar worth exposure in most of the media through one celebrity endorsement announcement. The brand  roped in the " upcoming " bollywood actress Sunny Leone as the brand ambassador.

huh !

Out of Action

Dear Readers,
I had a severe relapse of Inter vertebral disc  prolapse and was out of action for last two weeks. I am on the recovery path and will be back soon.

Love

Harish

Herbs & Berries : Branding Ayurveda

Brand : Herbs & Berries
Company : Hindustan Lifecare Ltd

Brand Analysis Count : # 509

Herbs & Berries is Hindustan Lifecare Ltd ( makers of Moods Condoms) foray into the Ayurvedic OTC market in India. Indian OTC market is huge worth around Rs 15,000 crore ( including both ayurvedic and allopathic drugs). Ayurvedic OTC products are growing at around 15-20% per annum. But the market is highly  competitive. Since the regulatory framework for herbal and ayurvedic products are less stringent compared to modern medicine, there is a huge rush of local players into this segment. A visit to the local ayurvedic drug store will awe you with the type and number of OTC products displayed. Most of these products seldom survive a financial year. The brand was launched in 2009 but began to make noise only in 2011.

Herbs & Berries is an interesting brand where HLL partners with a highly respected traditional ayurvedic company - Kottakkal Arya Vaidya Sala to develop this brand. In this arrangement, the Arya Vaidya Sala develops the products which are marketed by Hindustan Lifecare Ltd. HLL has strong distribution capabilities which will be utilized for Herbs & Berries. The co-branding with AVS will add credibility to the drug.

But HLL is a reluctant marketer which is reflected in the marketing of this brand also.The visibility of the brand is limited so is distribution. The brand is currently promoting Hair Nourishing oil and Pain management balm.

Another interesting fact is that Herbs & Berries shares the brand name with another Austrian company.  I wonder why HLL did not care to do a google search before finalizing the name. The Austrian brand is Herbs'N'Berries  and this can lead to trademark issues if at all HLL decide to take this brand international. 

What I like about Herbs & Berries is the brand name ( although shared) . The name is very modern and more of a herbal brand rather than ayurvedic brand which will help attract young consumers.But the brand needs to stand out from the rest with a proper brand architecture. So far there is no brand communication with regard to the parent brand which is a big marketing mistake. Hope that HLL will seriously invest in this brand. 

Brand Update : Thums Up wants you to live the thunder

This summer , the iconic brand in the Indian soft drinks industry has made a significant change in its positioning. Thums Up, rightly said as India's most resilient brand, is now running a campaign which marks a significant change in its positioning.

Over the last few years, Thums Up has been promoted on the theme where the protagonist ( celebrity) would do anything for his Thums Up. In all the campaigns, the protagonist would do unbelievable stunts to get hold of this Thums Up. The brand lived up to its reputation of being a Macho drink was further reinforced by its powerful tagline " Taste the Thunder".

This summer, the brand owners decided to change the winning formula. The entire brand's communication platform has been changed. The protagonist now does not chase Thums Up. But rather, he gets so excited after having Thums Up that he begins to do the stunts. The brand although retains the tagline " Taste The Thunder" now has another slogan " Aaj Kuch Toofany Kartey Hain ". 

Watch the ad here : Thums Up Live the thunder 

It also seems that the brand has dropped Akshay Kumar as the brand ambassador. The new ad features the Telugu super star - Mahesh Babu for the all India campaign.

What is significant in the latest campaign is that the brand's definition of context has changed. The protagonist now possess Thums Up and now he is seeking excitement outside the brand . In my opinion, now the brand is no longer the major focus or the goal in the plot. The ultimate goal of the celebrity is now something other than the brand ( like shortcut /time saving etc) . This is a very significant change in the brand's communication strategy  and not a good idea. While the earlier theme of chasing a Thums Up was unique, the idea of doing stunts after consuming a soft-drink is an old idea. For example , Mountain Dew's campaign of Daar Ke Aage Jeet Hain has the similar concept. I don't understand why a brand like Thums Up chose to ditch its unique communication platform and adapt a also-ran communication theme. Who got bored with the old positioning ?

The only solace is that the brand still carries the iconic tagline " Taste the Thunder "

Related brand

Thums Up

afaqs has a relevant article on the subject - Read it here