Tapping the market

BY IMPACT Staff

Anshu Bagai, Marketing Director of Tupperware India, talks about increasing brand salience with a television campaign, four factors that helped the brand turn corners, overcoming the challenge of being perceived as an expensive brand and more

Q] After 16 years of existence, Tupperware has moved away from a Print-led strategy and launched a new campaign ‘She Can, You Can’, its first ever television commercial. What led to this move? What were the insights behind using TV as a medium at this point?

Historically, the direct selling industry is a push-led industry. Over the years, we realized that Indian consumers respect a brand when they see it in media. Indians being very brand conscious, we had to build in the customer pull, to make it easier for our sales force. Because we are not in retail, customers did not have the opportunity to touch and feel our products. This led us to the start of our campaign, over the last three years in newspapers; we would take one category at a time depending on the season - for example, water storage products in the summers. We would develop a good emotional creative with specific addresses and dates, about our experience centers at various malls and organized retail outlets, where customer could come over touch and feel our products. If they wanted to buy, they would leave behind their contact details, and our sales force would get in touch with them. Thus we created the customer pull; this was extremely impactful for us, and we managed to position Tupperware on an emotional and functional platform. Our positioning is ‘Seal love, Open freshness’.

Every brand has to stand for something big, women’s empowerment is something that is ingrained into the business model of Tupperware. We didn’t need a CSR activity to stand for something big - it was part of our business model itself, the whole story on brand Tupperware was incomplete until we put this together. This is what led to our campaign ‘She Can, You Can’. We felt it would be more meaningful and impactful if we take this beyond Tupperware and talk about complete women’s empowerment. The objective was that more women should join our sales force, as well as increase respect for the brand among consumers. This was based on the fundamental fact that successful case studies inspire others to believe that they can achieve their dreams as well. On the basis of this, we selected successful protagonists from among the typical women next door, such as one who gave up her job and became a sarpanch and another who started the first rural BPO in the country.

The campaign is not an advertisement, but a documentary-feature, which would lend itself to television where the reach is much more, leading to increase in brand salience.

Q] Has the campaign led to an increase in your sales force? Will the brand continue to use TV as a medium?

The response has been very good. We did achieve our objective; the reach in the smaller cities was fantastic. This has motivated us to take the campaign further, and yes, we will be using more of the television medium.

Q] What are the challenges faced by the brand today?

One issue we face is copycats -- people copy our products. I sincerely believe that when a consumer buys a lookalike, she knows it is not the real Tupperware.

Q] Your products have been perceived as good quality, but expensive, going by the standards of the average middle class household. Has the brand succeeded in breaking this barrier?

This was an issue we faced three years ago, before we developed the 1 litre Aquasafe bottle priced at Rs 190 a piece. This was the ‘door opener’ for us, it is the first product that Indian consumers buy. Once they buy this product, they see the value Tupperware products bring to them they are open to buying more products. They realize the great value-for-money they get, and it is no longer a challenge. In fact, it was a turning point for us.

Q] What are the other turning points for the brand?

• Firstly, Indianizing our product range
• Second, developing a ‘door opener’ product
• Third, our campaign, which gave us the customer pull by giving them an opportunity to touch and feel our products
• Fourth, completing the story with women’s empowerment and making the brand stand for something much bigger with ‘She Can, You Can’ These are the four factors that have helped the brand turn corners.

Q] Tupperware appointed Kunal Kapoor as the brand ambassador for its premium range only. What is the reasoning behind this?

India is many countries in one. On one side is the price-sensitive customer for whom we had developed the Aquasafe bottle. On the other side we have the premium segment, that is our Ultimo range, for customers willing to pay for what is the best in the world. Unlike the regular range, this range is more of a food compression range which helps you make daily cooking much simpler. The first thing that comes to mind when you think about food is recipes, which a master chef would give you. We thought Kunal Kapoor, the Masterchef judge, would be the best person to endorse a range like this.

Q] Besides mainstream advertising, what are the other campaigns that the brand uses to engage consumers?

We have a school programme running, because we feel children are the consumers of tomorrow. Since we have long term vision, we need to develop them. We run nutrition drives, wherein we give nutrition booklets and product samples.

We also have office programmes, wherein we have a small kiosk in various offices during lunch hour, where people get a chance to touch and feel our lunch range, because they are our target audience who carry our products.

We also have a Tupperware carnival in Tier II and Tier III cities, where there is no organized retail. At such places, we take up a central place for about a week and we invite consumers to come and have a look at our product range. This becomes the experience centre for the week. In addition to this, we have product displays at Café Coffee Day, Barista and Gold Gym outlets as well as beauty salons. We have the advantage of a product range that reaches out to various strata of society. We accordingly engage them at various touchpoints in their own space.

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Tags : CMO Interview