20.11.12
Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani
There are two different stores for organic food in the 2 km radius around my house in Mumbai. There are more sprouting in Chennai, Bangalore, Pune and more. From Vadodara to Vizag – there are murmurs of local entrepreneurs looking at organic foods as a business opportunity.
Really? Firstly, what is organic food? In India – there is no regulatory body such as the USDA that certifies food as organic. In absence of clear and widely known standards of organic food, there is little agreement on what is considered organic. More importantly, who cares?
For the Indian consumer, his/ her real worries are contaminated / sewage water used for irrigation, high level of pesticides used on the crop and perhaps genetically modified crops (ever since I read about porcine genes used for making fleshy potatoes—I am spooked!). The danger of bringing a foreign concept into India ‘as is’, is this: you can completely miss the real opportunity and can spend decades trying to educate a consumer rather than cater to their specific needs.
The so-called organic food industry would do well to call themselves ‘pesticide-free’ or ‘toxic-free’ rather than trying to force a nation to learn the meaning of organic.
For decades, the industry’s insistence on using the word ‘yoghurt’ instead of ‘curd’ or ‘dahi’ was mystifying. In the last few years, dairy brands have stumbled onto the incredible concept that consumers will be more responsive to the familiar!
But this learning does not seem to extend to the use of the word ‘pro-biotic’. What is it really? Every Indian knows that curd is good for digestion and curd rice is the easiest thing to digest – for babies to seniors. Would not a ‘super dahi’ or a ‘curd plus’ kind of nomenclature demystify this category?
Category after category—we see a rush to bring in foreign categories/ products/ brands to India—with barely a nod to local needs. But imported concepts do not translate into market successes and remain peripheral brands. To grow truly big— in a country such as ours—the answers need to be local. McDonald’s, Domino’s, Lays and others have all learnt the lessons of localisation with local flavours and cuisines becoming part of the local offering.
For others, the global dictates are so strong—that local opportunities are completely lost. For eons now, Harpic has been the overwhelming market leader in the toilet cleaner category. The closest challenger Domex is a distant second. It stays true to its global positioning of ‘germ kill’.
“Germs in the toilet” is not an Indian worry. Keeping it clean is. Preserving the increasingly upgraded bathroom’s pristine whiteness and caring for the marble and fancy ceramic fixtures is. Harpic is acid based. Domex contains bleach. One corrodes ceramic surfaces and ruins expensive fittings. The other maintains them continually. The word acid itself is full of negative connotations (think acid attacks and acid rain) and the other is a super cleaner. Nothing else. The opportunity for Domex to capitalise on its arch rival’s fundamental premise is enormous. Yet, it stands for ‘germ kill’ alone.
Thinking afresh is an imperative for Indian products. We were creating an Indian version of a pasta sauce for Mutti, one of Europe’s largest manufacturer of tomato products. While we ensured that the recipe was ‘Indian’ (higher sweet, salty and sour notes, greater spice levels)—we were assuming that the packaging format to be the same as it is globally—a glass jar. That is, till we conducted an ethnographic study of Indian kitchens and found that everything in jars—whether pickles, ghee or jam—came out by the spoon.
There was no behaviour whatsoever of a jar being overturned for a single use. Overturning a jar gave even the most affluent housewives a sense of over-use. To truly grow the pasta sauce market—we launched this product in pouches and market success validated the hypothesis.
Global products need to truly Indianise. Not just in terms of creating a local version of the same ads— but finding a deeper relevance for the Indian consumer in terms of positioning, naming and building in cultural cues that make the products relevant to India. The market size for “pesticide-free vegetables” is exponentially larger than “organic produce”.
The author is president, DY Works. She can be reached at alpana@dyworks.in
14.10.12
Indian homes: Shanti Nivas to Casa Grande
Alpana Parida,
Not just names, even the way Indians view their homes has changed. It's no longer the place where we let our masks slip but an avenue for showing off our international tastes and aspirations.
Homes used to be the very definition of our roots - and our current home was to be clearly distinguished from our 'ancestral home' or 'native place'. The women in the home were exalted as grih laxmis and this was a sanctified place that was not to be desecrated. Liquor was consumed outside, perhaps in the verandah or terrace and in vegetarian homes, the non-vegetarian indulgences - if any - were outside.
Homes were unsullied by the external world, they were havens that protected us not only from the elements but from the sullying effects of alien cultures. They were also places where we could let our masks slip. We spoke in our mother tongue, ate with our hands from stainless steel thalis and threw mattresses on the floor for extra guests - who were both frequent and many. They were spaces that were shared with no concept of personal space.
Our homes were where we stored everything and threw nothing. Mismatched curtains and sofas, the totally inappropriate machine made carpet (woolen in Mumbai?) and the Eureka Forbes vacuum cleaner (bought but never used), to say nothing of the bric-a-brac in show cases, the souvenirs from foreign trips and the sundry kitsch that defied provenance;all jostled for space.
Our homes were called Shanti Nivas, Gauri Sadan, Upasana, Diwan Shree, Kanchenjunga, Usha Kiran, Sah Jeevan and such like. They rooted us and we built our lives around our homes. Kids grew up and left - but the homes remained, often sprawling, unmanageable properties - with the ageing parents who stayed on as caretakers of a home that no longer was suitable for their life stage. Selling the home was never an option.
So much has changed about the way we view our homes now. For starters - the names have undergone a total transformation. Now we have Palm Springs, Miami Vista, Silver Oak, Hamilton Court, Bellissimo and Casa Grande in not only the metros, but in smaller towns like Kochi, Vadodara and Ranchi. The real estate industry is selling maximized spaces with minimalistic dêcor. Pristine white leather sofas and wooden or Italian flooring have become de jure. Interior decorators have mushroomed and coordinated walls and curtains have become a necessity.
The homes themselves appear international. A cursory analysis of real estate advertising throws up properties with views - both the interior and the exterior, that could be anywhere in the world. There is little of India that you see. The lure is that of an international lifestyle with jacuzzis and swimming and/ or plunge pools, rain showers and fitted kitchens;the new world is the promise of an escape. Exemplified by the hiding of all ugly things - the functional - the wires, the flush tank, the switchboards - and keeping only the aesthetics.
In less than a generation, we are living international lives. Our homes are no longer the place where we celebrate our traditional lifestyles, the one refuge where we can be ourselves. They are places where we flaunt our international tastes and aspirations. Where no mismatched dêcor exists and our interiors are as much statements of style as our clothing is.
Our need for making the indulgent, the everyday is now a necessity: the occasional indulgences of the past have become a way of life today at so many levels. The entertainment - which used to be the eagerly awaited Chitrahaar, the Sunday movie and the few English serials have given way to a 24-hour bonanza of channels and programs. The rare dessert or soft drinks that were the highlights of festivals or weddings, reside in our refrigerators and have inundated the everyday - chocolate has become the daily meetha. From at most twothree pairs of shoes/chappals - we now have a countless array. There is nothing occasional about anything in our life anymore.
In such a scenario - the occasional foreign trip, the stay at the luxury hotel or resort are no longer sufficient as rare indulgences. We want the experience everyday, just as we want 24x7 entertainment every day. We want our homes to become like the luxurious and sanitized world of hotels.
The aspiration of the foreign was always a promise of a better world. From hankering for brands/products that visiting relatives would bring in, we have tasted the foreign shores ourselves. We no longer are the recipients of others' largesse. We travel from Pattaya to Patagonia and eat pasta and paella. We shop abroad and take gifts to the same relatives who had brought us the coveted Yardley perfume and the microwaveable popcorn. We tell them to not bring anything because "Now you get everything in India".
In this taking of control of our aspirations, is the key to how we look at homes today. We are no longer content with morsels of the good life. We seek it and acquire it. The rise of the new "gated communities" is due to the fact that they create a bubble, a haven that we can escape to. It is the formation of a community where we belong, we trust and we celebrate.
The discourse of homes today is that they are as symbolic of an "escape from" as they are of an "escape to". They are as much a seeking of an international, luxury experiences as they are of escaping the current breakdown of communities.
Alpana Parida is President of DY Works (alpana@dyworks. in), a leading brand strategy and design firm. The article has inputs from Snehasis Bose, Senior VP, strategy
22.8.12
Rejuvenating brands through design
Trends change, fashions change; and a brand that does not change with the times ends up looking as out of place in consumer’s lives as bell bottoms are in a world of skinny jeans!!
Consumers are defining their selves through brands and their aspirations; their self-images are formed by the set of brands they consume. So, Samsung and not Videocon, FastTrack not Titan, Peter England and not Double Bull are choices made, to become symbols of self-expression. Brands, therefore, need to mirror the consumer’s aspirations and needs.
When we worked on the Dabur rejuvenation, we reinvented an over 125 year old brand to make Ayurveda relevant to a younger Indian and lift it from the ‘brown’ ingestible powders and pills to other contemporary categories in foods and skin care. Himalaya followed in creating a more contemporary face of Ayurveda. As the younger Indian is looking to negotiate with tradition – a conclusion born out by behaviour: through the cocktails and dance in the evening and the traditional wedding in the morning or the touching of feet of elders in the family and being on first name basis with their international bosses; both these brands have made space for themselves in the Indian consumers’ lives and shelves as they themselves have negotiated tradition as brands.
Another powerful brand – Vicco – has missed the boat entirely. It appears old and dated and its fortunes are reflected in its low market shares. In 30 years, it hasn’t changed much and its traditional roots do not appeal today. Nonetheless, it has great brand equity (PE firms take note) and a good rejuvenation exercise can make it a powerhouse once more to take on Dabur and Himalaya head –on.
While logos play an important role in how a brand is perceived, packaging can be an equally powerful tool to make brands contemporary.
Packaging, much more than advertising, is what causes conversions. It is what consumers pay for, and dictates actual brand experience closely. Fastrack has broken the mould on classic, elegant watches and has a very strong and distinctive brand personality. The difference between a Titan and a Fastrack is not just in the design of the watches. It is in the attitude and personality of the wearer as well.
The packaging plays a very strong role in driving this brand experience further. Fastrack packaging is a tin – that is not the traditional flip top box. At the very outset – it challenges convention. Secondly, it evokes a rugged and raw world, which is also part of the brand’s personality. Thirdly it borrows from the world of liquor (it looks like a cut off container of a whiskey bottle) – lending an edgier aspect to the brand.
In category after category, particularly in the FMCG product categories; packaging can play a very important role in building the brand.
See the two images below of Fem Hand Soap and Santoor Hand Soap – a structure we created as far back as 2005. The Santoor packaging caused a disruption in a low engagement category (as compared to skin care) to drive sales and market shares.
The rub off of such packaging also impacted the parent brand – Santoor Soap positively. In some categories, packaging can drive innovations. The zip lock bag for namkeens or rice/ dal/ atta; the easy squeeze tube for glue, the hand pump for shampoos/ moisturisers, liquid soaps – all add to the functionality of the product and can add significant value to consumers. They are willing to pay more for this.
Categories such as tooth brushes – which are generally very low engagement categories after purchase see a disproportionate engagement during purchase. Here the product and the packaging win the day. The colour, the brightness, the shape are all features that directly lead to conversion. The behaviour at the time of purchase is almost similar to one of buying a ‘dinky’ car. The role of product design and packaging in winning market shares is very significant.
In an era of highly cluttered media spaces and pressures on cutting costs and advertising budgets, marketers need to discover the power of design in building brands. There are true market opportunities to be tapped. The rewards are just waiting to be reaped.
Alpana Parida
President, DY Works
16.8.12
When the realty bug bites …
There was a time, not so long ago, when our homes were places where we were ourselves. If we spoke English outside, we spoke our mother tongues at home. If we used spoons and forks outside, we ate with our hands at home. If we used fine china for guests, we used steel plates at home. It was a place where we had puja rooms or our own alcoves, where we had mismatched curtains and bedspreads, where comfort was more important than design.
The names of the homes or buildings were Ashiana, Gauri Sadan, Upasana, Diwan Shree, Kanchenjunga, Jal Darshan, Sah Jeevan and the like. From the Nineties onwards came the influx of the Silver Oak, Garden Estate, Palm Meadows, Oceana Towers and Grande Vistas. More lyrical and whimsical names also found their way: Windmills of the Mind and Whispering Meadows became a part of the landscape. Specific locations were evocative, with Mantri Espana and Lodha Bellissimo emerging. Promising international lives, developments have come up in smaller towns as well with Balinese villas being promised in Baroda and Spanish haciendas in Chandigarh.
In less than a generation, we are living lives international. Our homes are no longer the places we celebrate our traditional lifestyles, the one refuge where we can be ourselves. They are places where we flaunt our international tastes and aspirations, where no mismatched décor exists and our interiors are as much statements of style as our clothing is.
We, however, remain proud Indians. We celebrate our cinema, enjoy our music, dance to the bhangra and follow our rituals. So how does this dichotomy exist? How do we explain this exuberant chasing of Western lives with such Indian hearts?
For one, we are fed up of the squalor around us. We are fed up of things that don't work and systems that break down. We long for the escape to international destinations but we no longer want to run away there. There is enough and more in the fabric of Indian culture and the robustness of the Indian economy to moor us here. We simply want to bring the experience here. On our turf, on our terms. And live in bubbles constructed to keep the chaos of India out of carefully crafted realities.
The rise and rise of the new gated communities is the success of this bubble that allows for an escape from the squalor of India.
While the real estate developers have got that right, they all seem to be doing the same thing.
The images appear empty and perhaps they work as the Indian consumer is looking to escape from the jostling crowds outside.
The escape in the gated bubble has become a category promise and real estate brands will have to go beyond that to differentiate. Perhaps they need to channel learnings from other categories, such as the hotels and hospitality business.
Hotels have stood as symbols of luxury long before real estate made the claim. Taj, Oberoi or even the State-owned Ashoka offered islands of luxury. And cloistered spaces that kept the world out. They borrowed heavily from local influences and yet kept a global language. Chettinad, Kerala or Rajasthani, local architecture, art and names dominate the hotel industry.
Other countries see successful elements of local art and architecture incorporated. We are proud Indians. We value our heritage and customs. Real estate brands that leverage that insight would be able create robust, differentiated brands.
The Abu Dhabi airport borrows from the sand dunes of Arabia to create a unique structure. The interiors are also inspired by local motifs, and create a perfect juxtaposition of the modern with the local.
When we had worked on a property being developed by Tata Realty and Infrastructure Ltd (TRIL), located on the Kochi Marine Drive, we found a local culture that took great pride in its roots.
The language was rich and spoken, there was a thriving cultural and literary tradition, Kerala locks and roofs were distinctive elements of local architecture and yet the names of local real estate developments were Sahara Grace, Jairaj Spectrum, Jairaj Starling, Trump Marvel, Eminence, Imperial Gardens, Triton, Link Horizon, Prestige Neptune’s Courtyard, Sunshine Court, Ivy League, Palm Top, Marigold, Solitaire, Good Earth Reflections – to name just a few.
We convinced TRIL that they should celebrate the local culture, and the property, located at the confluence of the sea, land and sky was called Tritvam.
There is a huge opportunity for real estate developers to maximise the appeal of their properties by keeping the codes of luxury spaces that are gated communities, but also by borrowing from local sensibilities.
(Alpana Parida is president of DY Works. The views expressed are personal.)
29.6.12
The big deal about ‘Trust at first sight’ - PART I
When I started my research about this topic, most people gave me a matter of fact reasoning – “trust is earned”, “bharosa to barson mein banta hai” and similar blah... But if trust was only so much about long term relations, why do we end up trusting (almost) random people with life’s important decisions - the friend’s mother you were able to pour heart out to, that broker who was able to convince you to buy a bigger house or the fund manager who managed to increase your confidence in a risky investment option, or for everyone who had an arranged marriage - the guy/girl you met once and decided to get married to…Huh! Now how does that happen??
So dear readers, in the next few lines/paragraphs/pages(!) I would try to scrape off the tip of the iceberg called ‘trust’ and our mysterious abilities to indulge into it almost instantly when encountered with suitable triggers. However, let me note here that there’s hardly any formula that you might find here, infact it might raise more questions instead…but that’s where the meat lies!
So coming back, it’s obviously much easier to build trust with the luxury of time, when you get multiple opportunities in various situations, like the colleague I met on my first day of job, the guys/girls some of you would have dated before getting married. But there are many more situations, where one has to make up one’s mind almost instantly or create an instant impression – like an arranged marriage meeting, a job interview, a new client meeting, a new bank/financial company experience or the simplest – the 3 seconds window that a new brand gets sitting on the super market shelf!
Our mind stores information in clusters. Like an automated sorter, we unconsciously make patterns from everything that we experience through life. Every new experience/thing/instance gets decoded by our contextual selves and gets associated with one of the numerous existing patterns in our head.
Trust works the same way too, through our lives we learn to trust many people, places, things, products, brands, symbols etc. Based on these we create patterns of trust which act like a filter to asses each new experience we get into. While the filter aims at finding intrinsic values which can be tested in the long term, it also looks for physical attributes which usually give us the confidence to trust almost instantly.
Now imagine getting hold on the general patterns of this ‘trustable physicality’ which if incorporated in new stuff gives a chance of creating instant trust! Now, that’ll be cool!
In order to find this eluding answer, I started a semiotic decoding of people/places/things that we already trust, which did take me to some interesting spaces.
Starting with people, the one person who everyone trusts?
Simple answer: Mother
Before I say further, imagine an image of a mother, NOT necessarily your mother, someone imaginary but one who could completely epitomize trust & reliability.
…….(Yeah. I really want you to imagine)
Do you see a middle aged woman, healthy-ly curvy/ slightly plump, dressed in a sari/salwar kameez, accessorized with gold bangles, earrings or a neck chain, a round red bindi and comfortable footwear.
Having tried this on 20 people, I got this characterization 90% of the time!
Besides uncovering our stereotypical selves (thanks to Nirupa Roys & Tulsis of the world), this points towards 3 key physical aspects:
A rounded identity outline with smoothed lines and chunky plump font. Spot on!
Check identities of other institutes where trust is a key requirement - like banks as they deal with money - they would follow similar style:
The age: The trustable mother needs to have some years of experience behind her. A sense of oldness cues knowledge, experience and hence credibility. Just the pretense of age-old-ness can lend a hell lot of trust.
A 16 yr old Mumbai real estate builder has a logo which makes it look like 100 yrs old brand… see it to believe it!
Other similar examples of brands which exhibit ‘age old experience’ as a key design thought:
The Traditional simple attire: The traditional-ness of the attire takes us to an older, authentic, tried and tested space where one could just trust without any skepticism, where one can be a child again and get rid of the responsibilities & stress of current life. Add to it the simple-ness of the attire, it cues
uncomplicating life by moving back to the roots where the world is pure and unadulterated.
Many brands use this value of simple authenticity that can instantly connect with the consumer:
So that’s about mommy dear, but does this define the world of trust?, Hell no! Remember the scraping of the iceberg….well we’ve just started….more on this in Part II.
By Runjhun Pacholi
AGM – Strategy
DY Works
So dear readers, in the next few lines/paragraphs/pages(!) I would try to scrape off the tip of the iceberg called ‘trust’ and our mysterious abilities to indulge into it almost instantly when encountered with suitable triggers. However, let me note here that there’s hardly any formula that you might find here, infact it might raise more questions instead…but that’s where the meat lies!
So coming back, it’s obviously much easier to build trust with the luxury of time, when you get multiple opportunities in various situations, like the colleague I met on my first day of job, the guys/girls some of you would have dated before getting married. But there are many more situations, where one has to make up one’s mind almost instantly or create an instant impression – like an arranged marriage meeting, a job interview, a new client meeting, a new bank/financial company experience or the simplest – the 3 seconds window that a new brand gets sitting on the super market shelf!
Our mind stores information in clusters. Like an automated sorter, we unconsciously make patterns from everything that we experience through life. Every new experience/thing/instance gets decoded by our contextual selves and gets associated with one of the numerous existing patterns in our head.
Trust works the same way too, through our lives we learn to trust many people, places, things, products, brands, symbols etc. Based on these we create patterns of trust which act like a filter to asses each new experience we get into. While the filter aims at finding intrinsic values which can be tested in the long term, it also looks for physical attributes which usually give us the confidence to trust almost instantly.
Now imagine getting hold on the general patterns of this ‘trustable physicality’ which if incorporated in new stuff gives a chance of creating instant trust! Now, that’ll be cool!
In order to find this eluding answer, I started a semiotic decoding of people/places/things that we already trust, which did take me to some interesting spaces.
Starting with people, the one person who everyone trusts?
Simple answer: Mother
Before I say further, imagine an image of a mother, NOT necessarily your mother, someone imaginary but one who could completely epitomize trust & reliability.
…….(Yeah. I really want you to imagine)
Do you see a middle aged woman, healthy-ly curvy/ slightly plump, dressed in a sari/salwar kameez, accessorized with gold bangles, earrings or a neck chain, a round red bindi and comfortable footwear.
Having tried this on 20 people, I got this characterization 90% of the time!
Besides uncovering our stereotypical selves (thanks to Nirupa Roys & Tulsis of the world), this points towards 3 key physical aspects:
- The healthy plumpness
- The age
- The Traditional but simple attire
Let’s see what is it about them that helps exuberate trust:
The Healthy Plumpness: A loving, trustable mother can never be thin or even tending towards it. The plumpness is like the mark, a reminder of her having gone through the maternal bliss of pregnancy, the union of the child & the bearer, something so pure and complete that it just cannot be shed away as extra pounds. It also symbolizes the inherent softness and completeness of her very role. Skinny or angular features give a certain edginess/cunning-ness to the character which is completely out of place for a mother in our culture.
Further, circles/spheres are also the most used symbols of denoting complete-ness and stability. There’s must be a reason why there’s a ‘Circle of trust’ & not ‘square of trust’!
Now put this learning into the hard corporate world. Remember the most trusted company of India. Now remember its identity:
The Healthy Plumpness: A loving, trustable mother can never be thin or even tending towards it. The plumpness is like the mark, a reminder of her having gone through the maternal bliss of pregnancy, the union of the child & the bearer, something so pure and complete that it just cannot be shed away as extra pounds. It also symbolizes the inherent softness and completeness of her very role. Skinny or angular features give a certain edginess/cunning-ness to the character which is completely out of place for a mother in our culture.
Further, circles/spheres are also the most used symbols of denoting complete-ness and stability. There’s must be a reason why there’s a ‘Circle of trust’ & not ‘square of trust’!
Now put this learning into the hard corporate world. Remember the most trusted company of India. Now remember its identity:
A rounded identity outline with smoothed lines and chunky plump font. Spot on!
Check identities of other institutes where trust is a key requirement - like banks as they deal with money - they would follow similar style:
The age: The trustable mother needs to have some years of experience behind her. A sense of oldness cues knowledge, experience and hence credibility. Just the pretense of age-old-ness can lend a hell lot of trust.
A 16 yr old Mumbai real estate builder has a logo which makes it look like 100 yrs old brand… see it to believe it!
Other similar examples of brands which exhibit ‘age old experience’ as a key design thought:
The Traditional simple attire: The traditional-ness of the attire takes us to an older, authentic, tried and tested space where one could just trust without any skepticism, where one can be a child again and get rid of the responsibilities & stress of current life. Add to it the simple-ness of the attire, it cues
uncomplicating life by moving back to the roots where the world is pure and unadulterated.
Many brands use this value of simple authenticity that can instantly connect with the consumer:
So that’s about mommy dear, but does this define the world of trust?, Hell no! Remember the scraping of the iceberg….well we’ve just started….more on this in Part II.
By Runjhun Pacholi
AGM – Strategy
DY Works
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)