Brand Eveready, primarily known for its range of batteries and lighting products, has recently graduated to home appliances. Amritanshu Khaitan, MD, Eveready Industries India Ltd, tells us how the brand’s communication strategy will evolve with their new product segments.
By Christina Moniz
Brand Eveready, primarily known for its range of batteries and lighting products, has recently graduated to home appliances. Amritanshu Khaitan, Managing Director of Eveready Industries India Ltd, tells us how the brand’s communication strategy will evolve with their new product segments.
ON THE BRAND’S POSITIONING
“The recent introduction of consumer appliances is more or less a natural extension for the brand, given that the brand has been in the electrical space with batteries and flashlights. Being a heritage brand, our positioning will continue to be one that stands for power, energy and value for money. However, I believe that innovation is needed to keep the brand young and this is the challenge that very old brands face. Even though the brand is a hundred years old and inspires trust and confidence, you don’t want your consumers to view your brand as old. You need to be ahead of the curve when it comes to product innovation and development. Our foray into LEDs has further strengthened our brand positioning where Eveready LEDs are recognized as state-of-the-art, they’re brighter by 20% compared to the other leading brands in the segment.”
ON THE NEW FOCUS: APPLIANCES AND LIGHTING
“The two categories that we will be promoting on mass media are lighting (LEDs) and appliances. We believe these categories will add a lot to the company in terms of profitability and turnover. They are also of a much higher value and will enhance the brand image. This will also increase the interface of the brand with consumers. We will promote these products across television, print and digital. Television will be used largely for the LED category communication while appliances will be a mix of Print and Digital. Historically, our ad spends have been about 3% of turnover. Now it is at 4-5% in to promote the new segments.”
ON AKSHAY KUMAR AS BRAND AMBASSADOR
“We did a bit of research that helped us recognize that Akshay Kumar would be a great fit to the DNA of the brand, considering he also stands for power. He is macho, rugged, and consistent and has been a top performer for many years. All these values are in sync with our brand values. Once our campaigns roll out, we always run a research on them. We have received positive feedback on our current campaign.”
ON STRATEGY FOR THE NEW SEGMENTS
“The response has been positive for the appliance segment, but these are still early days. We plan to scale this up in the coming year. Since our brand cuts across all SECs and is present in both rural and urban regions, we’ve always maintained an Urban-Rural strategy. We will be focusing a lot on BTL activities as well with shop branding and product showcasing. In the rural areas, we will continue to do melas and wall painting events like we have in the past. On the Digital front, we have started some spends and campaigns on e-commerce platforms for the appliances and the lighting segment. Going forward, we will look at larger Digital campaigns for our brands maybe sometime next year.”
ON THE ‘GIVE ME RED’ TAGLINE
“‘Give Me Red’ has always been synonymous with the brand and we plan to keep it, but there will also be separate communications for the appliances category to focus on their features. Nevertheless, the baseline of the brand will stay the same and will continue to appear alongside the brand name wherever it is seen, along with the ‘Cat in 9’ logo. Down the line, I don’t rule out bringing out a brand campaign where the tagline and logo can be leveraged just like we did two years ago.”
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