Harpreet Singh Tibb, Marketing Director, Kellogg India & South Asia, talks about the first master-brand campaign on Television and how consumption and penetration are driving the brand’s growth in the country
By SALONI DUTTA
Q] How much has the ‘health conscience’ that India has developed in recent years helped the cause of Kellogg?
With new opportunities coming up, we see people leading very hectic lifestyles with working couples and nuclear families. Because of this change in lifestyle and high expectations and aspirations, people are actually making health changes. Also, because of the hectic work hours, people don’t really have time to cook breakfast, and that is when they look for nice, convenient and nutritious food. This is exactly where Kellogg’s breakfast cereals come in. So the drivers for Kellogg’s have been urbanization, availability of new opportunities and people wanting to be fit.
Q] What is the message that you are trying to drive with the master-brand campaign, ‘Bade Sapno ki Sahi Shuruat’?
We keep talking about India Shining. India is one of the fastest growing economies, though growth rates may have slowed down. Youngsters today aim for the moon and stars. And at the end of the day, if you have dreams and high aspirations, you need to have the right and solid start. And that is exactly what this campaign is all about. The ‘Bade Sapno Ki Sahi Shuruat’ or #feedingdreams is our first master-brand campaign on Television. We earlier had one which was in Print.
Q] How has the shift been in the media mix at Kellogg?
Two years ago, when we started the whole journey, we used Print because we had to educate people and de-mystify that our food is made of grains. Now we are moving to step two, which is telling a larger bunch of people about how breakfast plays an important role in achieving your dreams. When we did a survey called the ‘Indian breakfast Habit’, we realized that 25% of people don’t have breakfast, and close to 75% of the people actually skim breakfast, which means have a cup of tea or a glass of milk with just biscuits. That is not a nutritionally adequate breakfast. And that is the genesis of this campaign called, ‘Bade Sapno ki Sahi Shuruat’ #feedingdreams for us. That is why we have selected Television. Television has always been a core part of our media spends. But over the last few years, we have shifted a large amount of our monies to Digital, spending close to 15% on it. That reflects the way our consumers are changing, the kind of busy lives that we lead and the multiple screens we play with.
Q] How effectively are you leveraging Digital for marketing communications?
We keep hearing a lot about Digital marketing, which has started like a standalone medium of communication. But for us it is all about marketing in the Digital world. That is the first premise that we all operate on at Kellogg’s. Second is, how do we make use of the offline and online media really well. For example, we had a new campaign this year called ‘Kellogg wale Gupta ji ki family’ which got 11 million views. We created 100 videos and we told people 100 different ways in which you can have Kellogg’s breakfast cereals and we played that on Digital. So we played these 2 -2.5 minute video sitcoms that the Digital consumer loves. We have also tied up with Mindshare and set up something called the Kellogg Looproom, where we do a lot of social media tracking on a real-time basis, and pick up conversations and create campaigns online to leverage those topical trends that are going around at that time.
Q] Kellogg is mainly concentrating on the urban market whereas its competitors are making forays into rural India. What is the thought behind this?
At Kellogg, we focus only on urban and don’t do much in rural. We believe we have headspace to grow in urban India itself, and that is where we focus. We have very attractive price-points - Rs 10 and Rs 5 price points, for example, and that is helping us drive penetration in Tier II and Tier III towns. We are looking at winning one bastion at a time and the bastion we have identified is urban India right now. In this journey to change breakfast habits, we have actually put down a category development model which allows us to change habits over a period of time. Today, our penetrations are close to 20% across urban India. We have also doubled distribution in the last 5-6 years.
Q] With the recent Maggi controversy, do you feel the need for stricter regulations in the food industry in India? What are you doing at Kellogg’s to ensure that quality of products and other elements like packaging, labelling ingredients and seasonings meet regulatory requirements?
We comply with all the regulations prevalent in the country. As for the quality of our food, we have got stringent quality check measures internally. And we make sure that everything that goes out in the marketplace complies with our internal regulations, strict guidelines and also complies with all the regulations in the country. That is the way we play it at Kellogg. For us, food safety and serving the highest quality of food to our consumers has been of paramount importance, and we believe we have always been on the right track.
Q] With different brands trying to get a share of that bowl of cereal, what is the Kellogg brand strategy to stay ahead?
According to Nielsen, over the last 2.5-3 years, we have grown our share every year. In spite of competitors coming in, we have been very clearly focussed in terms of connecting with the consumers and serving them the right, relevant mixes and that is the reason our share is about 64%. To keep growing year-on-year on that kind of a base reflects the kind of work we are doing, and the way we are connecting with consumers with our relevant propositions.
Q] What is the marketing objective behind the ‘Khuljaye Bachpan’ campaign and the media mix used for it?
India as a country has a lot of tiger moms, who push kids to achieve and shine; this also creates a lot of stress and anxiety. But recently we have seen the emergence ‘buddy parenting’ wherein parents have realized that there is as much to learn from their kids as much as the kids can learn from parents. So the relationship is now becoming more equal and that is what we picked up as an insight and we believe that Chocos with its unique chocolatey flavour and the goodness of wheat plays an important role in maintaining the balance between the mom and the child - the mom wants to give the kid something nutritious to eat and the kid wants to have something that is tasty. We believe that when Chocos comes into your life, you can have fantastic moments between parent and child. And when you have a great time at home, we call it ‘Khuljaye Bachpan’. We also did something called the ‘Khuljaye’ moments running a contest and inviting parents to write their ‘Khuljaye’ stories. We got close to 900 entries and we invited 17 winners to a two-day event full of fun and games. We are going to create many such platforms which allow kids to grow in an uninhibited manner. In terms of media mix, we do a 360-degree with Television, Print, Digital, and we have also tied up with Mycity4kids which is a parenting website.
Q] You have recently signed on Saina Nehwal and also associate with Deepika Padukone. What is the value that they add to the brand?
Both of them are achievers and have done well for themselves in their respective fields and they believe in the power of breakfast. That is the reason we have associated with them. Saina comes in for us because our new campaign is ‘Bade Sapno Ki Sahi Shuruat’, where we want to show people who have achieved something by following the right kind of breakfast habits that will in turn inspire millions of others to eat breakfast.
Q] What do you think is the next big opportunity for Kellogg?
We believe in the power of breakfast and one of the big things that we picked up recently is that a lot of people are having breakfast out of home. We are looking at launching on-the-go breakfast packs, targeted at people who want to eat something outside the house. The campaign is going to be out in the next two-three weeks, and we are again going to partner with Meru to drive the importance of breakfast and invite people to sample our food.
ABOUT THE BRAND
Kellogg is known for its flagship brand Kellogg’s Corn Flakes® with its range of five variants positioned to all members of the family. Kellogg’s CHOCOS® with its three variants and Kellogg’s Honey Loops® are positioned for kids. The company’s portfolio in India also includes Kellogg’s Special K®; Kellogg’s All Bran Wheat Flakes®; four variants of Kellogg’s Muesli®, Kellogg’s Oat-bites®. The Kellogg’s range is available in single-serve pouches at Rs 10 and Rs 5 too. Kellogg forayed into the hot cereal segment in India with the launch of Kellogg’s Oats®. Today, the portfolio also includes three savoury oats variants namely Tomato Salsa, Green Pudina and Simply Pongal.
CMO FILE
Harpreet Singh Tibb has been the Marketing Director, Kellogg India & South Asia since January 2013. He has spent close to 18 years in the industry, leading brands, categories and businesses in his previous roles. Prior to Kellogg, he was Category Head of Packaged Foods at Hindustan Unilever. Tibb was responsible for creating the largest handwash behaviour change programme - Lifebuoy Swasthya Chetna. Using simple consumer insights, he created the disruptive campaign Kissanpur that won many awards at Indian and international forums. He is now experimenting with non-television campaigns and leveraging the power of Digital to build brands. A true foodie, he loves to experiment with different kinds of food.
MARKETING TIP
Dream big, be willing to take risks and don’t be scared of failure.
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Feedback: saloni.dutta@exchange4media.com
