1. By: Simon George

2. Team Members
Team Members
• Mansi Agarwal
• Neelam Choudhary
• Anjal Tyagi
• Abhshek Pundir
• K.S.S.Suraj
• Parth Sarthi Gairola

3. Index
Index
• Brand Equity
• Product Modification
• Brand Portfolio
• Decisions
• Product Costing
• Brand Positioning

4. Background
Karnataka Consumer Products Ltd(KPCL)
1962 – company established
-Started as manufacturer of cushion seats and
bare blocks.
- Concept of rubberized coir.
1965 - introduced first time, under the brand name
“Kurlon“..
Supply material to industrial buyers. .

5. 1983 – decided to start manufacturing for end user.
1985- capacity to produce 800 tones of rubberized coir(60%
being sold as bare blocks)
1987- stopped its line of bare blocks
By 90’s – Product portfolio :
mattresses, pillows, towels, doormats, and cushion seats
Leader in Indian comfort mattresses.
Export 10%of total mattress sale

7. Year End review
Costing
and
pricing
Position
Drop
Product
ing
Strategy
in Design
sales
Poorly
motivate
d
Dealers

8. Product Details
•Rubberized coir mattress was an evolution
from the traditional cotton mattress
•Kurlon mattress was made of million of
fibers bonded with latex and compressed to
form coir block.
•The design structure of Kurlon mattress
allowed free circulation of air and prevented
heat from building up between the mattress
and cot.

9. Product Varieties
Product varieties
• The most popular varieties of mattresses
in India are that of cotton, rubberized coir
and foam which differ in
density, freshness, comfort, strength and
shape
Mattress type advantages disadvantages
PU foam Soft, very light Hot, expensive, sag
Latex rubber Not as soft as foam, expensive
comfortable
Spring mattress No sagging, long life Very expensive, gets
noisy
Rubberized coir Firm, reasonably priced Tendency to sag
Cotton mattress Cheap, foldable, of any Forms lumps
size available

10. Product Line of Kurlon
• Apsara – Economy model (3 & 4inches)
• Super Deluxe – Premium model (3 &4 inches)
• Romantique – Super soft model (4.5inches)
• Klassic – Super premium model (5inches)
• Ortho – Designed for back problems(4 inches)

11. Catoregry sub- branding –wise performance 2003
Apsara Super Ortho Romanti total
delux que
No. of 25 28 15 10 16
model
(variety)
Sales(rs 324.01 145.01 222.48 175.13 196.27
million)
Pbt(rs 2.90 0.91 1.86 1.22 1.33
million)

12. Market
Cotton Mattress(70%)
Rubberised Coir Mattress , PU Form
Mattress ,
Spring Mattress and other (30% )

13. Segmentation and targeting
• Economy seekers – price is more
important
• Comfort seekers – comfort is more
important
• Value seekers – value is more important
• Additional attributes – orthopedic buyers

14. Target segment
• Normal buyers - involved in purchase for
marriage and additional to family.
• Therapeutic buyers- purchase mattresses
on account of back problems.

15. Normal Buyers
• INCOME LEVEL of rs 15000 per month.
• Purchase good mattress for the comfort
factor
• Economic factor – Apsara sales
• Volume price of apsara mattress
• Should be in true with competitors prices .
• Comfort segment – can be divided into those
who seek only comfort , no matter at what
price it may be .

16. Therapeutic Buyers
Purchase constitution mostly single beds to
prevent sub-brand target is ortho.
Price can be modified so as to associated
better quality with higher price . Dealer need
to be informed of the various ailment.

17. Consumer Buying
Behaviour

18. Buying Decision Process
• Who buys our product or services?
• Who makes the decision to buy the product?
• How is the purchase decision made?
• What does customer buy? What needs must be satisfied?
• Why do customer buy a particular brand?
• When do they buy? Any seasonality factor?
• Where do they go or look to buy the product or service?
• How is our product perceived by customers ?
• What social factors might influence the purchase decision?
• DO customer lifestyle influence their decision?
• How do personal and demographic factor influence the
purchase decision?

19. Buying Decision Process:
Buying Decision Process:
Five Stage Model
Five Stage Model
Problem Evaluation Post
Information Purchase
recognitio search
of
decision
purchase
n alternatives behavior

20. Problem recognition/reasons
for buying
 Marriage of son/daughter
 Need for replacing the old, damaged mattress
 Addition to the family in the form of child birth or
 Parents coming to stay
 Increased health concerns
 Others

21. Information Search
• The buyers gathered information on the mattress
• Through:
 advertisements : mass media, websites, ratings, etc
 consultation with
• mattress dealers, friends, and relatives
Advertisements were considered a very important
source of information.

22. Evaluation of Alternatives
Evaluation process:
• Trying to satisfy need
• Looking for certain benefits
• Sees product as bundle of attributes with varying abilities
for delivering benefits to satisfy this need
Evaluate 2-3 brands on following factors :

23. Competition
• Kurlon is the leading player in the country in the
rubberized coir mattress followed by
Duroflex,Starlite,Centuary and Aaram.
• In addition to these brands there are also
regional and local players both in branded and
unbranded category.
• For example Rilaxon in East, Bedsy in
Karnataka, Coiron and Sulfex in Kerala and
Tamilnadu.
• In addition to rubberized coir mattress there are
also Full PU foam and Spring mattress with
market share of 5% and 1% respecively.

24. Conti….
• Sleepwell and Springwel are the major
players in the PU foam and Spring mattress
segments respectively.

26. Brand equity
• Brand Equity implies combination of assets and
liabilities associated with a brand that enhances
or depreciates the value of brand.
• Brand Equity can be determined by the
following components:
1)Brand Awareness
2)Quality Perception
3)Brand Loyalty
4)Brand Association
5)Trademarks/Proprietary assets

27. Swot Analysis
STRENGTHS WEAKNESSES
• Brand name • Poorly motivated dealers
• Quality • Many sub brands
• Promotion
OPPORTUNITIES THREATS
• New brands • Closest competitor-Duroflex
• New markets • Brand loyalty
• Regional players

28. Promotions
 Kurlon advertise through various
channels.
 They had their own theme.
 They have various sales promotion
schemes- For customers
For traders
PROBLEMS-
 Had too many brands which created
confusion.
 Competitors with more attractive
schemes.

29. Positioning
In marketing, positioning is the
process by which marketers try to
create an image or identity in the
minds of their target market for its
product, brand, or organization.

30. Conti…
Had a unique tag line which focuses on
product itself.

32. Major Issues
• High no. of variations under its brand.
- adds confusion
• Ineffective sales promotion strategy.
- re allocate funds
• National v/s Regional brands
- strong competition
• Segmentation.
-using all segment variables
• Positioning.
- pure sleep nothing else
• Price
• Place.
-most of the sales are from south
-foreign sales stagnanting

33. Feasible solution
• Divide the product portfolio into 3 SBU’s
-premium products
-economic products
-orthopaedic products
• Product should be of standard size
• Promote only two or three sub brands
• Slogan writing
• Pricing should include cost leadership strategy

35. Cont…
• CURRENT MARKET • NEW MARKET
1. Increase dealers margin. 1. Go to the segment of lower –
2. Launch spring and PU mattress middle income group
for export 2. Can go for horizontal
3. Create a website for delivering diversification strategy
more customer value
4. Creating own retail chain
5. Special mattress to cater health
segment