For Group 1,15

Asian Paints: Every Color Tells a Story

Asian Paints is the market leader in the highly fragmented and highly competitive Rs
7750 crore ($1.73 Bn) Indian paint Industry. The organised sector constitutes around Rs 5400
crore ( $1.2 Bn). Asian Paints started its journey in 1942 with four young men in a garage in
Bombay. The name Asian Paints was picked randomly from the telephone directory. The brand
has traveled from that garage to become a Rs 1000 crore brand. From 1968 ,this brand occupies
a premium position in the Indian Paint industry. The story of the evolution of Asian Paints as
a brand is interesting. The brand now has an iconic status in the industry thanks to some
blockbuster big ideas from O&M. The brand once positioned as a mass market brand has
evolved itself to a higher plane.
Indian paint industry can be broadly divided into two segments
a.Decorative segment which constitutes the wall paints : exterior and interior, wood paints etc
b.Industrial segment which consists of automotive paints, and paints for industrial sector.
Decorative segment constitutes around 75 % of the total paint industry and Asian Paints is the
market leader with around 44% share. In the Industrial segment, Nerolac is the market leader.

In the decorative segment, it is interesting to see how Asian Paints have changed the
buying process of the product like paints. Paints are usually considered to be a low involvement
product. In earlier times, the decision of the brand was taken by the builder/contractor and the
home owners does not involve much in the process may be the decision of color rest with the
house owners. Asian Paints realized the need for brand building even during sixties. But at that
point of time, the company had a wide range of brands/subbrands. The focus of the company
was on product innovation and service network and managing quality proposition. The brand
focused on mass and rural market. Asian Paints had a mascot called Gattu who was created by
the celebrated cartoonist R K Laskhman. These efforts made the brand a leader during the late
sixties.
Then the company realised that although volume justified the leadership position, share
of mind for the brand was very low. That was the result of the mass segmentation adopted by
the brand. Rightly so because the industry was driven by channel driven promotions, building
a brand at that time was" uncommon sense". During 1983, the company tried to reposition the
brand as a premium brand. Asian Paints initiated the corporate campaign aimed to position the
company as the number one player in the industry. The objective was to upgrade to a more
margin premium product marketer .The corporate campaign “Spectrum of Excellence" was
aimed to increase the Salience of the brand in a quiet market.
 But this campaign failed to inspire any interest in the consumers and the company felt
that the market is moving towards a commodity market where price is the most important
differential. Asian Paints undertook a consumer research aimed at understanding the perception
of consumers about the product category. The research revealed lot of interesting insights.
Consumers felt that paints could change the mood of the space and it was a sign of festival and
plenitude. It could make a gloomy place bright and pleasant. From this insight came the
campaign of Asian Paints associating itself with festivals. Research also confirmed that
customers tend to repaint their houses on the occasion of festivities. Thus born the campaign
"Celebrate with Asian Paints". The campaigns were carefully crafted and there were different
campaign for different regions. These campaigns effectively enhanced the brand equity of
Asian Paints and established itself as a premium brand. More than that, these campaign ensured
an emotional connect with a brand in a low involvement category. The brand also phased out
many sub brands and rest of the sub brands was brought under Asian Paint's umbrella brand.
During the late nineties the brand had to be reinvented. Because no longer festivities
formed an important part in ones life. Since many brands went after festival seasons, the
positioning platform has become cluttered. More over the consumer buying behavior has
changed. The category was becoming less seasonal. People started associating more
importance to home decor and interiors. The choice of color became a high involvement
decision. From a low involvement category, paint was increasingly becoming a high
involvement category.

The brand also went in a brand overhaul. The logo was changed to a contemporary
upmarket one designed by Entreprise IG based in Singapore.The logo/design was to convey
self expression, sophistication and Technology. Thus came the birth of a wonderful positioning
strategy created by O&M. The insight was that the brand is about people and homes and homes
reflect the people living in it. Hence " Har Ghar Kuch Kehta Hai" translated to " Every Home
has a story to tell". This campaign is a perfect example of a brand laddering up and connecting
to a higher level in the mind of the customer. The campaigns reinforced the brand as a premium
emotional brand. Along with the campaign Asian Paints also ran parallel ads for its subbrands.
Saif Ali Khan endorsed the premium brand Royale .For Apex Ultima, the campaign was highly
localized and was different in different market.
Taking a cue from the success of Ghar campaign , the brand took ownership of the
COLOR. The insight is that each color has a story to tell. The latest campaign reflects on the
color and uses the campaign " Har Rang Kuch Kehta hai" translated to "Every color has a story
to tell". The brand is so serious about the color that it has tied up with IIT to explore new colors
and conduct research on colors. Asian Paints is a classic branding story and the brand is still
exploring and growing.
For Group 14

Colgate Slimsoft Charcoal toothbrush will make you say WhattheBlack !

A black bristled toothbrush for your white teeth !!Colgate has done something unusual in the
Indian market- a black colored toothbrush branded as Slimsoft Charcoal. The brand which is
available in other parts of the world is now launched in India with much fanfare. What is
unusual and interesting about the new product is the color of the toothbrush itself. Black color
is something that will be in the last option when one chose a color for the toothbrush bristles.
However Colgate chose to play contrarian and launched it in the market. The brand claims to
have charcoal infused bristles which will remove bacteria and plaque better than ordinary
bristles. Now only Colgate knows what is meant by charcoal " infused" bristles. Whatever it
might be, the launch is pretty interesting. Conventional wisdom says that black color may repel
a customer from buying a toothbrush for cleaning your teeth. Just like whether one would
choose a black color liquid floor cleaner ! But marketing is all about defying conventional
wisdom.

The black color is definitely intriguing for a consumer and this will prompt him to try the brand.
But he may have fight the natural urge not to chose black color . Novelty, the backing of the
Colgate brand and the relatively low risk would be the factors that will aid the new product to
induce trials. To hardsell the new launch, Colgate has initiated a social media campaign with
the hashtag : # Whattheblack. The initiative where the brand reached out to key influencers like
bloggers with a mystery black gift with only the indication of whattheblack site. The intrigued
influencers spread the message on their platforms and according to the reports, this went viral
What the new product will definitely do is the bring back some kind of energy back to the
toothbrush market.
For Group 2, 13
How Colgate is fighting Patanjali

Colgate holds around 54% market share in the Rs 6000 Crore Indian toothpaste market. Of
late, the brand is facing tough competition from Patanjali Ayurveda. Patanjali which is a brand
which is closely associated with Yoga guru Baba Ramdev is touted to be a disruptive force in
the consumer products market.Patanjali which recently got aggressive in the market has
garnered around Rs 5000 crore within a short span of time. It has overtaken firms like Jyothi
Lab, Emami etc in the turnover.
According to business news reports, Colgate is expected to face the toughest challenge with
Patanjali's Dant Kanti cornering a Rs 450 crore turnover in 15-16.
Colgate is a very aggressive marketer and is not expected to take competition lightly. Even
with a market share of 54%, the brand is not known to be complacent in the addressing of
competition. This case also Colgate took pro-active steps in countering the onslaught of
Patanjali Ayurveda.
Colgate chose to fight Dant Kanti using the variant Colgate Active Salt Neem. It is interesting
to see that Colgate Herbal was not aggressively promoted rather it chose the Active Salt variant.
Secondly, Colgate chose to rope in Priyanka Chopra to endorse the variant.While the neem +
salt combination brings the brand parity with Dant Kanti, the celebrity endorser enhances the
strength of the counter attack. Since Dant Kanti's main positioning is the Natural Platform,
Colgate now has three variants - Herbal,Active Salt , Active Salt Neem in its portfolio.

With the aggressive counter attack, Colgate expects to arrest the growth of Dant Kanti. Some
damage will be done since Patanjali uses price as the major strategy for market growth. But
with the natural attribute neutralised, Colgate expects to retain its current customer base with
the Colgate brand portfolio.

For Group 3 and 12

Nexcare : Differentiate through creativity

Indian wound-care market is dominated by the brand Band-Aid by Johnson & Johnson. This
category is created and owned by Band-aid and Band-aid has a generic status in this category.
Brands like Dettol had earlier tried to break into this category without much success.It is in this
market that 3M has launched its Nexcare brand. Nexcare has subtly launched itself in the Indian
market without much above-the-line promotions. What needs to be appreciated is the traction
that Nexcare has got interms of the distribution reach. Nexcare is now very well promoted in
most of the medical retail outlets.

So what makes Nexcare standout from the market-leader ? The main USP of Nexcare is the
form-factor and licensed branding. Nexcare has a unique form-factor in the shape of diamond.
According to brand's micro-site, the shape provides for a 360 degree protection and makes it
more waterproof.The entire packaging of the brand is highlighting the diamond shape to
convey the unique form-factor.Another differentiator is through the launch of bandages for
kids using licensed brands like Barbie, Ben10,Hot Wheels etc. 3M has positioned these
bandages as tattoo bandages which instantly appeal to kids. Infact my daughter pestered me
into buying a Barbie tattoo .

Being waterproof and having a unique shape are not very sustainable brand attributes. Any
competitors can copy these attributes. However, Nexcare has effectively placed itself in the
market using this USP.Another wise move from 3M is that the brand has not restricted to
wound-care but has extended its scope to skincare. Under the skincare range, the brand has
launched skin-care pads in its portfolio.

For Group 4 and 11

. Brand Wars : Pepsodent Vs Colgate

The August of 2013 saw the beginning of another war in the toothpaste market. Pepsodent, the
challenger brand from HUL directly attacked the market leader Colgate with a high profile
comparative advertisement. The ads directly compared Pepsodent Germicheck with Colgate
Strong Teeth with claim that Pepsodent Germicheck is 130% better in fighting germs than
Colgate Strong Teeth.

While this is not the first time that Pepsodent has frontally attacked Colgate. Pepsodent is a
small brand compared to Colgate. According to ET, Pepsodent Germicheck has a market share
of 6.4% while Colgate strong teeth has a market share of over 29.4%. For a challenger brand
like Pepsodent, fighting the leader directly certainly puts the brand in limelight.

In India, brands do engage in such direct attacks. Law does allow certain level of comparative
advertising provided it does not disparage the other brands. Usually the challenged brands take
the matter to either ASCI or to the court. But since these take time to settle, the comparative
ads may have achieved its objectives.

Most of the time, the challenger brand uses research evidence to support their claims of
superiority. In this case, Pepsodent claims that it has 130% more germ attack power than
Colgate. The fine print says that Colgate is indexed to 100 %. So is Pepsodent in a sense puffed
up the numbers to make it seem extraordinarily superior to Colgate.It is interesting to note that
Pepsodent Germicheck chose to attack Colgate Strong Teeth rather than Colgate Total. Colgate
Strong Teeth is the largest brand in the Colgate portfolio but this brand is not claiming any
germ killing attribute. Colgate Total is the brand which claims the germ killing attribute. So
rather than fighting the Colgate Total, Pepsodent Germicheck decided to launch the attack on
Colgate Strong Teeth.

Direct comparative ads, that too against an established market leader most often works for the
challenger brand. It has the shock value and the ensuing marketing war gets the challenger
brand eyeballs and media spaces especially in social media. Frontal attack using such tactics
has its fair share of risks. The market leader often will react with full might which may destroy
the challenger brand. In this case , it is the fight between the titans and if there is a war, both
will bleed.
For group 5 and 10

TITAN

Titan Industries was born in 1985 as a joint-venture between Tata Group and Tamilnadu
Industrial Development Corporation. Titan Industries introduced Titan Quartz watches to the
Indian market in 1986 and virtually transformed the Indian watch market dominated by the
likes of HMT and Allwyn.

With smart branding and some cool advertisements, Titan Watches quickly became the market
leader and had created a strong premium image in the market. Titan Industries later build
various brands targeting different segments in the Rs 4000-4200 crore Indian time-wear market
( source : Business Standard)

Titan Industries' brand portfolio consists of

Fastrack : targeting youngsters, Tanishq : lightweight jewelry ,Sonata.: Low priced, Xylys :
premium end

The Titan brand adopts a sub-branding strategy where various sub-brands target various
segments in the market. The notable sub-brands are Titan Raga, Titan Zoop,Titan Edge,
Orion, Purple, Obaku, Tycoon, Bandhan, Octane, Automatic and HTSE series. ( source : Titan
Website)

Titan Industries also diversified into jewelry with the brand Tanishq and then to eye-wear with
Titan Eye+ brands.This year, Titan Industries decided to rebrand itself as Titan Company Ltd.
According to news-reports, the name change was to signify the corporate brand's movement
from a watch company to a lifestyle company. The company leaders thought that the term "
industries" now is not relevant in the firm's new directions.

The current corporate rebranding of Titan Industries to Titan Company has also given a new
logo for the corporate brand. The new brand elements were designed by the famed agency Ray
+ Keshavan.The current rebranding has also an interesting offshoot. Now there are two brands
- Corporate brand Titan Company with its own logo and the watch brand - Titan with another
logo. Newsreports suggest that the watch brand will retain the existing logo and the tagline -
Be More. Since the Titan Watch brand is the most recognized and recalled brand, I am not sure
how the name change of the corporate brand will help build a lifestyle image.

Titan Industries started with a single brand- single product company. The initial portfolio
strategy was to build a branded house where all the product ( watches ) had the same brand
name ( Titan) which incidentally was the corporate brand. The brand architecture was to have
sub-brands targeting various segments. This strategy was changed with the introduction of
brands like Sonata , Tanishq etc. Fastrack which was launched as a sub-brand later became an
individual brand.
Hence over the period of time, Titan Industries' brand portfolio became a mix of House of
Brand and Branded House strategy. There were many individual brands in the portfolio, at the
same time bulk of the mid-range watches were endorsed by the corporate brand - Titan. Titan
brand was also used to endorse categories like eye-wear .The company also plans to include
categories like fragrances in the near future.

With the launch of a logo and name Titan Company, it is to be assumed that the company now
wants to develop a corporate brand different from the watch-brand. The issue here is that both
the brands are the same. Confusing isn't it !

For Group 6 and 9

Britannia NutriChoice : Tasty Health Biscuits

NutriChoice ,which was launched in the nineties, is leading the Briatannia's efforts to
create a new position of health in the biscuit market. The brand is now worth more than Rs 280
crore . The health and nutrition based biscuit segment in the Indian market is now worth around
Rs 500-600 crore and growing at a faster rate ( Business Standard).NutriChoice although
launched in the nineties had its graph shooting up after the relaunch in 2006. The relaunch
coincided with the general trend of the market moving towards healthy foods. The brand is
credited with the creation of a healthy biscuit segment in the market.

The success of this brand can be attributed to the timing, persistence and constant improvement.
The brand went for a change in the packaging along with the rebranding which made the brand
look more up-market and attractive. Secondly the brand constantly launched relevant variants
to keep the interest level high. In 2008, NutriChoice launched 5 Grain biscuits which really
caught the fancy of the health conscious consumers. It was then followed by high fibre digestive
crackers. 2010 saw the launch of diabetic- friendly NutriChoice variant which really became a
hit in the market. These initative saw the brand grow from around Rs 190 in 2010-11 to Rs 280
in 2011-12.

NutriChoice's positioning was purely based on the health platform. The brand considered itself
a cursader for healthy lifestyle. The brand's message was conveyed not only through
advertising but also through many innovative below-the-line activities. The brand pioneered
India's first health social networking site iHealthU.It also partnered with many agencies in
conducting events which promoted healthy lifestyle. The brand had adopted the slogan of a
Honestly Good Biscuit which cared for your health.
The basic premise of the brand is to provide a healthy alternative to snacks. NutriChoice at a
point had Rahul Dravid endorsing it.

This season, the brand has comeout with a new campaign which is very interesting. In
Advertising classrooms, we teach the concept called Two- sided arguments as a message
strategy. This is where the brand talks about both the positives and negatives to the consumer.
The latest NutriChoice ad is a typical two-sided message strategy executed perfectly.The brand
is now comparing itself with the alternatives like Brown Bread and Pizza or a Salad and
Doughnut. The brand says it may not be as healthy as a large bowl of salad but definitely more
healthy than a chocolate doughnut, but the brand has come half-way so asks the consumer to
do their part.

I find the ad extremely well executed and more importantly honest. The message is simple
and drives home the point that NutriChoice is a tasty alternative to junk foods.

For Group 7 and 8

Brand Wars : Perk Vs Munch

Its been a long time since Indian advertisement world saw a humorous fight between the brands.
There has been high profile competitive wars between the brands like Horlicks Vs Complan,
Vim Vs Dettol, Dettol Vs Lifebuoy, Pepsodent Vs Colgate etc but these were serious
fights. Recently the new war started between the arch rivals Perk and Munch. These brands
were keeping different paths between each other for quite some time. Both were trying to
position themselves on different attributes ; Perk focusing on the glucose content while Munch
was focusing on the crunchier proposition. However, Perk decided to poke Munch by launching
the first TVC featuring the son - Monu leaving home because his father gave the bigger, heavier
Perk to his brother Sonu.

Not to be left behind, Munch countered with another TVC which features Sonu leaving the
father because he gave the tastier Munch to the brother Monu.The Perk TVC was hilarious
with the brand trying to outsmart Munch by talking about the difference of 1 wafer and 5.5
grams with the Perk.
Munch however tried to downplay the grammage comparison by focusing on the taste. The
brand humorously counter's Perk's claim by stating that chocolates are eaten for taste and
not weight. While this argument is weak counter for Perk's claim, what saves Munch was the
humour and the instant fight back to Perk's offensive.
Had Munch not reacted , Perk could have used the "high grammage " value for money
proposition very effectively Munch was recently investing heavily in the promotion by taking
in cricketer Virat Kohli as the brand ambassador . Perk was struggling with the positioning
proposition and was in my opinion had a weaker platform based on the glucose content. Perk
was trying the break away from that weaker spot by launching an offensive against Munch.
With the two brand's paths crossing now, it will be a interesting space to watch for.

INSTRUCTIONS TO THE ASSIGNMENT

1. Develop a suitable dashboard consists of various marketing metrics to get the meaningful
insights to take managerial decisions. (Use the marketing situation given in the caselet
corresponding to the group}
2. There should not any duplication with other groups. It should be unique and different
3. The Assumptions should be mentioned before applying the metrics and consolidated
dashboard
4. The LAST DATE for submission is 9th October 2019
5. The soft copy to be sent to the class representative and he will consolidate and share it with
me through email/google drive/pendrive and hard copy should be submitted to me in my
cabin/drop it in my room before 9th of October 2019