Promotions

Main target audience for kissan jam: Kids,Mothers and the youth

Positions itself as: Healthy and wholesome snacks for kids

For this it has done various promotions:

ATL communications(catering to mass media-TV,print,internet etc.)

2 very popular print ads:

Law of appetite

Target: Mothers

Message: The eatability of breakfast is in direct proportion to the rising level of appetites which is again in direct proportion to the volume of kissan jam spread on the toast.

Objective was to position kissan jam as a healthy snack and beneficial for kids by talking about the importance of breakfast and relating it to kissan jam. 

Roti disappears with kissan jam:

Target: Mothers

Tagline: There’s a lot more you can do with jam

Message: The idea was to let consumers know about the other uses of kissan jam,other than just with bread. So the ‘roti roll’ was introduced. 

Kissan also started the 100% real fruit campaign

Target: Mothers

Message: Positioning Kissan Jam as a healthy and nutritious snack for kids

Kissan Jammy advertisements: Using Rahul Dravid to endorse the brand

Target: Kids

Message: This was done when Rahul Dravid was in his peak form and had a big fan following. The idea was to create a perceived value for consumers. 

The Kissan Roti Roll Campaign became very popular. It turned out to be a solution for the tiffin problem of moms.

Every night between 10 and 11 PM, after dinner, cleaning up and putting her kids to bed, Mom watches her favorite prime-time soaps. This is also when she plans for her kid’s tiffin the next day. Short format episodes were created based on the funny excuses kids make for not eating their tiffin featuring a popular TV mom & kid duo. They were played between 9 & 11 PM, for 6 weeks. The episodes were also deployed on popular digital platforms like YouTube, Mira by VuClip, MSN and Sify. Print ads were deployed to catch her while relaxing with a newspaper after the morning rush of kids and husband leaving for school. Since mobile is her constant ally and internet is where she goes for answers, all communication led Moms to a tiffin recipe destination via Facebook.

 Message: Tiffin is a stress point for mothers. Kids don’t like eating healthy and nutritious tiffins that Mum’s pack for them. Hence they targeted tiffin as an opportunity by presenting a solution to mom’s tiffin problems. Hence were born the Kissan Rolls. 

Below the Line Communications(cater to niche market by using design,direct marketing,packaging,sales promotions(gifts and discounts) etc.

Free gifts:

Jam Packed Fun Moments is an interactive jam box designed for the Kissan brand by the Studio ABD to empower kids to make smarter eating choices. In addition to two fruity jars of jam, the boxed set includes a jungle-themed board game that gets kids engaged about healthy eating. The board game is set up in the style of Snakes & Ladders, where kids will go on a journey with the playful brand character Columbus.

Sales and discounts:

Pack of 3 combo discount:

Distribution

HUL started UPL (unilever premier league) program and BETTER stores concept. Earlier it was super value concept: In this concept the retailers were paid on giving their shelves to the company for displaying their product and also they were given a target on achieving for which they were given rewards.

HUL has introduced kiosk channel to strengthen the distribution set up.These kiosks helped the company to increase their sales in the rural areas and they got a good hold of the customers and set up a good distribution channel to keep the customers intact. This made it difficult for the competitors to get hold of that market.

To penetrate the rural markets, HUL launched a four-tier distribution system in which markets were segmented based on their accessibility and business potential.

Direct Coverage: HUL appointed a common stockist to service all outlets within a town.

Indirect Coverage: HUL targeted retailers in accessible villages close to larger urban markets.

Streamline: Reaching markets inaccessible by roads

Project Shakti targeted the very small villages and tapped into the rural women group.

HUL’s products are distributed through a network of 4000 re-distributors, stockist covering 6.3 million retail outlets reaching the entire urban population and about 250 million rural consumers. 

Today,Kissan Jam has a strong distribution network.It is widely available in almost all local stores. 

Pricing Strategies

At the time Kissan was formed, consumers had limited purchasing power. Thus Kissan adopted a low-cost price strategy to make its products affordable and attractive to consumers by guaranteeing them value for money. Despite competition, it ensured that the product mix and the sequence in which Kissan introduces its products is consistent with the core philosophy of providing jam at a basic, affordable price to appeal to the common masses. This helped Kissan Jam to create its brand image in the household sector of the society.

The current prices are:

Kissan Mixed fruit jam

500 gms bottle: Rs.110

200 gms bottle: Rs.48

15 gms sachet- Rs.2

100 gms tub- Rs.24

70 gms squeeze tube- Rs.24

Life Cycles

A Product Life Cycle looks at the different stages through which the product goes at different times from the starting point till it exits the market.

So why do life cycle stages change?

Life cycle stages change as different consumers come in or go out, some adopt the product, some become loyal customers while some don’t.

This happens because consumer requirements are met by different formats as competitors start coming in. Consumers look at all available choices in the market. As more and more competitors come in, it no longer remains a product life cycle, it becomes an industry life cycle. Thus the appropriate unit of analysis would be Industry Life Cycle.

At the same time, it is important to look at how the brand grows over a period of time. After all, a strong brand name adds great value.

As Stephen King,WPP Group,London righly said: A product is something made in a factory, a brand is something that is bought by the customer; a product can be copied by a competitor,a brand is unique; a product can be quickly outdated,a successful brand is timeless.

A Brand Life Cycle helps the company understand and change accordingly, it’s strategies and positioning of the brand. 

The different life cycle stages are shown below:

There are five different life cycle stages:

1)Development:

The ‘incubation stage’ when the product concept is developed,conceived and tested before being introduced in the market.

Strategies:

-         Deciding on the concept,pricing etc.

-       Pre-launch and initial promotions

 2) Introduction: When the product is introduced in the market, promotional expenditures are high to create product awareness and develop a market for the product. Profits are non existent because of high promotion and low sales. In this phase, promotion is mainly aimed at innovators and early adopters.

 Strategies:

When to enter the market?

-pioneer v/s market leader

2)Growth: This stage is marked by a climbing up of sales. Focus is now on building product preference and increasing market share of the product as new competitors enter. This is aimed mainly at early adopters.

 Strategies:

-Improve product quality: add new features

- Enter new market segments

-Increase distribution coverage

-Lower prices to attract next layer of price-sensitive buyers

-Taking advantage of economies of scale

3)Maturity: This stage comes when the strong growth in sales diminishes and the objective is to defend market share while maximizing profit. This is aimed at middle majority customers.

 Strategies:

- Market modification: Expand the market

- Product modification: Adding new features

- Market program modification: Modifying price,distribution etc.

4)Decline: This stage starts when sales show a decline. It could be for a number of reasons: shifting consumer preferences,increasing competition etc.

 Strategies:

-       Harvesting: Gradually reducing the product’s or business’s cost while trying to maintain sales.

-       Divesting:  Sell the product to another firm

Kissan is a food brand that originated in 1935,was acquired by Brooke Bond in 1993 from UB group, after which it formed an independent brand under HUL in 1994. 

Today, it is the market leader with the largest market share of 65% . It has reached a stage where it has quite a few competitors. A lot of existing customers have shifted to alternatives but the loyal customers continue to buy kissan jam. So right now, it is in it’s maturity stage where it needs to keep making multiple offerings to multiple customers and maintain the market share.

Competition Analysis

According to Ohmae's 3C Model of marketing, a customer is making a choice at all  points of time between different offerings. Only by integrating corporation,customer and competition,can a sustained competitive advantage exist.Thus, tackling competition becomes very important. 

Kissan has the largest market share in jam(65%) and thus is the dominant brand in the industry. Some existing competitors would be

Direct Competitors: sil jam,mapro jam,druk jam,tops jam.

Substitute Products: Honey,Nutella Spread,Butter

All the direct competitors occupy a small percent of the market share. As far as the substitute products are concerned, butter can be a substitute for jam, but health conscious people may opt for mixed fruit jam rather than butter. Nutella Spread is also a substitute but it’s pricing is comparatively higher and availability is not as widespread as Kissan Jam.Honey could be a strong competitor since people who are health conscious might switch to honey. However, as far as the kids segment is concerned, kissan jam is more popular,thanks to the fun advertising and different flavors by kissan jam that are targeted specifically to attract kids.

Kissan jam has been innovating in different ways to differentiate it’s product and tackle competition:

Product diversity: Different flavors like pineapple, mango, orange, strawberry, guava etc.

Innovative packaging: It was the first to bring in easy to use squezee bottles, tubs and sachets. This attracted the kids as well as mothers who thought it is easy and safer for the kids to use squeeze bottles viz-a-viz the glass bottle.

New ways to use the product:

The roti disappears with jam advertisement encouraged the use of kissan jam with roti as well. It showed roti rolls with different flavor jams.

Also, in order to compete with the other healthy options like honey, Kissan launched a new breakfast spread- Kissan fruit kick spread, with no added sugar,targeted mainly at teenagers and the health conscious youth.It is available in two different combinations- dry fruit and mixed fruit.