Old brands get new life, virtually

1. Old Brands Get New Life,
Virtually
STAGING A COMEBACK Industry expects that once brands such as BPL,
Kenstar, Kelvinator & Onida build sustainable presence online, they
may want to re-enter or strengthen their brick-and-mortar presence

2. Contd..
Ecommerce portals have become rehab homes for some once-popular
consumer electronics brands that are trying to stage a comeback. BPL,
Kenstar, Kelvinator, Sansui, Onida and Maharaja White line are
attempting a resurrection by offering their products online at lower
prices than their global counterparts, attracting the eyeballs of bargain
hunters. BPL has entered into a threeyear exclusive sales deal with
Flipkart to relaunch its brand after almost a decade, senior industry
executives said. Videocon's three brands -Sansui, Kelvinator and
Kenstar -are selling airconditioners exclusively online for lack of pull in
retail stores.

3. Contd..
Onida first launched its washing machines online, getting a huge response,
which encouraged the company to take televisions and air-conditioners
online since their presence in physical stores had become marginal. Amazon,
Snapdeal and Paytm, too, are emerging as critical online marketplaces for
these comeback brands.
“If ecommerce can account for 50% of white goods sales in China, it is
possible it will scale up at the same pace in India in the next 4-5 years, which
means a huge opportunity to gain back lost share,“ said Gulu Mirchandani,
chairman and managing director of Mirc Electronics, the owner of the Onida
brand. “The number of positive reviews we have gained from buyers in
ecommerce helps to build the brand and viral marketing.“ Onida expects to
gain a 3-4% share from ecommerce sales in one year, he said.

4. Contd..
A recent study by Google and Forrester Consulting estimates that about
100 million people will make online purchases in India by 2016 and half
of them would be new online shoppers from Tier 1 and Tier II cities.
Brands such as BPL and Onida once dominated the consumer goods
business. However, the entry of Korean duo LG Electronics and
Samsung Electronics and multinational corporations such as Philips,
Whirlpool, Panasonic and Sony shrank their market share to low single
digits in the country's . `45,000 crore white goods market and reduced
their presence to a few brick-and-mortar stores in a handful of markets.

5. Contd..
A senior Videocon executive, asking not to be identified, said online is
better since competitors such as LG and Samsung are averse to such
platforms. “The overhead costs are almost half in online than in retail
shops. And there is a large breed of impulse buyers who purchase just
on price in online,“ he said. The executive said it is lucrative to focus
more on online for not-so-popular brands because building a sales
team and offline distribution is both time consuming and expensive.
For most of these brands, return ing to the market or expanding into
new categories does not involve high investment. Videocon introduced
its three brands into air-conditioners by utilising idle capacity, while
others are importing products from China and launching them under
their label.

6. Contd..
Videocon wants to extend its Sansui, Kenstar and Kelvinator brands into
new categories like microwave ovens and televisions only through
ecommerce. Maharaja Whiteline, which was recently acquired by
Europe's Groupe SEB, is also betting on online sales to revive the brand.
Groupe SEB India chief executive Sunil Wadhwa said the future belongs
to ecommerce. “Ecommerce today can reach pin codes where it will be
difficult for us to reach through brick-and-mortar stores,“ he said. The
business of Maharaja Whiteline has doubled in the past six months in
ecommerce.

7. Contd..
Industry expectations are that once these brands build a sustainable
presence online, they may want to re-enter or strengthen their brick-
and-mortar presence in the manner of mobile phone companies
Xiaomi and Motorola.
“Micromax, too, used the same strategy for its television business, first
gaining eyeballs online and then re-launching it offline,“ said Pulkit
Baid, director at Kolkata's leading retail chain Great Eastern Appliances.

8. For details and bookings contact:-
Parveen Kumar Chadha… THINK TANK
(Founder and C.E.O of Saxbee Consultants & Other-Mother
marketingandcommunicationconsultants.com)
Email :-saxbeeconsultants@gmail.com
Mobile No. +91-9818308353
Address:-First Floor G-20(A), Kirti Nagar, New Delhi India Postal Code-110015