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ABLE, STABLE, DURABLE
Consumer Durable Marketing Grows

 BY JAGDEEP KAPOOR
  • One million units of room air conditioners
  • 3.7 million units of refrigerators.
  • 1.45 million units of washing machines
  • 3 lakh micro wave ovens.

The Consumer Durable market is moving ahead in a strong and consistent manner and it is indeed a great opportunity for people to not only be satisfied consumers, but for brand marketeers to grow and do well in this new environment.

There are some behavioural changes which have happened which are helping the market to grow.

First of all no longer is the buying pattern only seasonal or related to festival occasions. It has become broad based and the occasions of consumption have spread out throughout the year thus giving great scope to marketeers to build up their brands and to make sure that they are on the fast track. This has helped boost sales and the category.

Secondly, the width of distribution has increased with aggressive moves from marketeers to spread across small towns and also rural areas. This has helped various new customers to enter the category. One major fact is that the penetration in the rural areas is pretty low and it would make great sense to increase physical distribution since electronic distribution (Television) is already being spread out.

Thirdly the various price and size points are helping in finding customers who have never used these categories. Thus the ‘never use’ category is fast being targeted by marketeers through interesting sizes and prices.

Fourthly the ‘more than one’ phenomenon is growing. For example, ‘why should there be only one TV at home? Why not one more in the bedroom, maybe in some cases why not in every room. Similarly why should there not be more than one computer at home or more than one refrigerator in the office. Thus the width of consumption , the depth of consumption and the frequency of consumption are growing up which is a great opportunity for marketeers.

Fifthly, the service sector which is a major component of the Consumer Durable industry has also improved thereby giving better customer satisfaction and brand experience further enhancing the growth of the industry.

Thus we see that the industry is growing. In my opinion the Consumer Durable category is ‘ABLE, STABLE, DURABLE”.

For brand marketeers, the need to develop able, stable and durable brands is extremely critical with the changing consumer behaviour. There is a lot of opportunity which is available for brand marketeers to grow fast. I would strongly recommend that certain key initiatives be implemented to ensure successful consumer durable brands. I’m sharing these strategies.

The first brand strategy that I would like to recommend is the changing consumer need strategy. Brand marketeers must break all the rules and look at things afresh so that they can respond to the market quickly and get away from the status quo.

The second strategy I would recommend is that of Strong Customer Segmentation. There is no point in being everything to everyone because you would land up being nothing to anyone.

The third brand strategy I would recommend is that the brand must have a strong brand positioning and a strong brand personality . In order to succeed well positioned brands are far more successful than just commodities.

And finally the fourth brand strategy I would recommend is a mix of two abilities- affordability and availability. In today’s India there are different needs for different segments across the five thousand towns and six lakh villages in India. The brand which provides a good blend of affordability and availability in terms of price and size will succeed.

I would strongly advise in the Consumer Durable industry with the above strategy, be ‘ABLE, STABLE, DURABLE’.

The author is Brand Guru Jagdeep Kapoor, Managing Director of the successful Samsika Marketing Consultancy Pvt. Ltd.
Tel: 022-28597700/7701 Fax: 28597699 E-mail: jkapoor@samsika.com

Copyright © 2007 All rights reserved with Jagdeep Kapoor, Managing Director, Samsika Marketing Consultants Pvt. Ltd. No Part of this document may be modified, reproduced, stored, deleted or introduced in any retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means (Electronic, Mechanical, Photocopying, Recording or Otherwise), without the prior written permission of the copyright owner of the document.